From These Ashes...

These ashes once told a story. They held together a picture and witnessed an ephemeral moment-- an inevitable series of events lost in a time lag. We live by aphorisms: what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger, they say. These feelings of raw nature dignify us and remind us of our human condition. I refuse to believe this process calls for a pyrrhic victory, it's a sacrifice but not an ultimate defeat. These moments (these ashes) they reveal the very last inch of ourselves, regardless of the narrative....

On that note, my last semester as an undergraduate is just a few days away. I could write about my academic experiences, about what I was feeling as I walked through UCR (and eventually UCB), but that wouldn't even begin to cover the experiences between those corner stones. As much as I recognize the flaws in these institutions, I had to learn at an early age that they were my ticket out of a then hostile environment dictated by religious principles. In hindsight, I've learned, or rather accepted, the one general truth anyone can appreciate: what doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger. Now that my next chapter is just around the corner, I can keep those words close to my soul and blindly (but confidently) take the first few steps.

The job applications, the college graduate applications... they don't define who I am. This is something I have to keep reminding myself. I don't know if I'll be in a graduate program next fall, or out of the country; I just have to make sure I don't lose myself in the process. One of the reasons why I'm so fixated with the concepts of time and space is because I believe they truly ARE socially constructed. I knew that at such an early age when I would refuse to go to school because the routine wasn't doing it for me. That anxiety I would get the night before the week started was, in part, because I didn't want to feel like a headless chicken running in the world.  Maybe that's just the dreamer in me, but I'm sure glad I kept those child ideals intact.

Regardless of this social construct, I am obliged to partake in the hype. And since that's the case, I will continue to walk through the world like a headless chicken, but with my free-spirited youth by my side. I'll continue to do this, even if it requires every inch of myself-- every speck of ash.