Revised and Published "Sometimes I Wish I Could Forget"

So, this is the New and Improved version of this:

Time is relative. When you're 14 years old, the last 4 years may have seemed like the longest, best, worst, most important, most painful, what-ever-it-is years of your life. Then, as a 50 year old, your life has been steady, settled for a while and the last four years seem unimportant, a nonentity. A senior in high school may think that the year can't go any slower- that it seems like a lifetime before they will graduate when, in the big picture, this year is only one tiny fraction of their life. We all live and die, and go unnoticed by many. Four years mean nothing in the grand scheme of things, but at the same time, can define someones entire life.

Now, take a moment to think about the last four years of your life. Think about what they meant, what they did, how they changed you as a person. Think about what things would be like had they never happened, what you would be like if they simply disappeared. One moment they were a piece of your history, a chunk of your memory, part of what made you you, and the next thing you know, they were just gone. It would be as if a part of your life never even existed, you suddenly re-winded. This is what happened to Naomi Porter.

She hit her head on slippery steps and in a split second, four years disappeared. Anything from after the age of 12 was simply erased from her memory- her mothers affair, her parents divorce, her boyfriend Ace, her best friend Will, her love for yearbook and tennis, her ability to drive, her lost virginity, her new house, her half sister- everything. The most eventful, vital years of her life were forgotten. Her world had become a mystery- why did she drop that class? Why did she fall for Ace? Where did she wear that dress? How did she have her hair? Did her father have a girlfriend? Did she like the girlfriend? She begins to search for clues to piece together her history with. She had to trust people to tell her pieces of her past, and to tell them honestly. Naomi's life became a complete nightmare of question and wondering. At the same time, though, her amnesia had given her a fresh start. At sixteen years old, she had basically no past. She could choose to simply start over, be a whole new person. She didn't remember the old one, and no one would know that it ever existed. When Naomi finally does remember everything, she hides it. She doesn't tell anyone that her memory is back because, she doesn't want it to be. Starting over felt good, why face the reality of her messy but true life if she didn’t have to?

This book, Memories of a Teenage Amnesiac, makes me think about what it's like to forget. Is it better to forget your mistakes? To live with no history? To start with a clean slate? Or, is the point of life to live with the decisions that you make? At one point in the book, Naomi comments that she thinks perhaps the only reason that her significant other, James liked her is because she has no past, because the present and the future can be what she chooses, what she wants them to be. There are times in my life when I think that nothing could ever get worse. When I feel as if a mid-life crisis is occuring 30 years premature and all I want to do is just give up on everything and everyone. I would kill to erase my mistakes. I would do anything to go back in time and just start over. But maybe everything does, despite how cliche this may sound, happen for a reason because if it didn’t, there would be no argument as to why Naomi shouldn’t forget. She just would, there would be no hesitation because there would be no reason why she shouldn’t.

In sixth grade, I said something awful about one of my closest friends that I’ve had for as long as I can remember. The thing is, I didn’t even mean what I said about her, and she overheard. I remember what made me feel the worst about it was that when I called to apologize and tell her it didn’t mean it, I didn’t want to lose her, yadda, yadda, ya she wasn’t angry-- just really hurt, sad. And, I’ll never forget how her voice sounded because I’d never ever heard it that way before and that made everything a million times worse. I remember in that moment, hating myself more than I ever have before, being so ashamed of what I’d done that still to this day, the only person that knows is my mom. I remember a list of things I would do to take it back going through my head. A stream of items or words or people or foods or anything I would give up if I could go back in time and have her back.

Anything.
Anything to loosen the tight, dry knot in the back of my throat or fill the empty, aching hole in my stomach.
I had become desperate like anyone in a similar situation would be.

But, I couldn’t. There was nothing I could do because I’m only human and I don’t have a fairy god-mother or Hermione’s time turner. Because I’d done something that so many had done before me and so many will do after me- made a possibly life-altering mistake. And I regretted it deeply but, like the others, I would have to live with that.

So what’s the upside to this? Why, if everyone wants so badly what Naomi has the opportunity to have, should she not take it? Because I made up with that friend and she’s still at my house practically everyday eating my families supply of cookies. Because, while what I said will always be there, we still have our run-around-like-4-year-olds-on-a-summer-afternoon kind of juvenile relationship. Because, since that day, I have tried as hard as I possibly can to not say a single bad thing about a friend behind their back, and it’s worked for the most part. Because I learned an important lesson in a painfully hard way but because of that, I’ll never forget it. And, if I did, who knows how many times I would’ve made that mistake again. Sometimes I think when you do something wrong, you just get a strike and a bit of luck and everything is OK. But, if you forget and keep on doing that thing, you’re out of luck and strikes and nothing turns out OK. Because, “Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it” and though this quote is overused in my writing that’s only it’s so true and so, so, vitally important to remember.

Lately, I've been trying really hard to be catholic.

To believe in god, or fate, or bible stories. To go to church every Sunday, or confession, or just to pray once in a while. I feel like religion is an amazing thing to have as a part of one's life. I know, that sounds weird and poser-ish and completely the opposite of what a good catholic thinks/does. I should just believe. I shouldn't have to try or think about it. It should just happen. I shouldn't want it because it seems fun or helpful or exciting or exotic. I should want it, have it, simply because I believe. But I don't-- I want it because it seems like a good thing to have. And that's really awful, but it's true.

I'm growing up in a time and place and group of people where being religious is... well... weird, not normal, frowned upon. Most of my closest friends, even, would be weirded out or confused if I told them that I believed in god. Maybe that's just the people I know, and I'm taking to much liberty in generalizing that statement, but it certainly seems that way to me.

At this point, it's not even like I'm hiding a part of myself because I haven't believed in or done anything that is required to really be a catholic since probably 2nd grade. Yes, my parents are catholic, I was raised catholic- I got baptised and I had my first communion and now, I'm working towards my confirmation. but, does that make me catholic if I, myself, don't really, truly believe?

Hang in there, there's a purpose to all this self-absorbed rambling, I swear.

My point is this: Maybe I have a hard time believing in god because I just do. Because I've always been logical and couldn't picture things like resurrection or turning water to wine or just the fact that someone controls everything we do or think. Things that require some magic, a great imagination, and faith. But, maybe it's because of the people I meet and spend my time with. Maybe the teenage disapproval of religion is shaping me as a person, is turning me into something I'm not, or something I am or should be or was.

When I read Looking For Alaska by John Green, I can't help but think about Pudge's character and who he was before boarding school. I can't help but wonder if he would've been someone entirely different had he stayed at home, and whether that would've been a bad or good thing. When he arrived there, he couldn't even smoke a cigarette without coughing. Then, through joining forces with The Colonel and Alaska he became someone that his old self never would've imagined. Is it good that he smokes and drinks and plays pranks and sets off fireworks and watches porn? No. Is it good that this is the only way he came to make friends and fit in at his school? Absolutely not. But, it's reality. Our society has such a twisted definition of popularity, what it is to be "cool", such an ugly view on beauty or fame, people changing themselves for all the wrong reasons.

Was Pudge always meant to be that way? Did he just need someone to help him realize it? Do people have a certain self that is determined in their genes? A real, true personality, waiting to come out at just the right time, with just the right people? Or, is how we are, who we are, determined by experiences? Will the people we interact with as children determine our lives as adults?

I hope this post wasn't to disorganized and pointless. It feels like it was, a bit, but I hope you can still make sense of it and get something out of my weird, scrambled thoughts.

Silly how things end, isn't it?

SPOILER ALERT!!!! IF YOU HAVE NOT READ HARRY POTTER AND THE

DEATHLY HALLOWS, STOP READING HERE.

But seriously, what earth are you waiting for????

When I read over the scene of Hedwig's death I cannot help but be dissapointed by it's length and lack of intensity. The first time I read it, I felt so overwhelmingly confused and guilty. Why wasn't I crying? What the hell was the matter with me? This was Hedwig- Hedwig who just died and I was just sitting there. When Sirius died I couldn't contain myslef- my mom thought I was having some sort of attack, locked up in my bedroom. I cried when Cedric Diggory got killed and I cried when Hagrid's hippogriff nearly got killed, and god knows that Hedwig is far more important than Hagrid's Hippogriff. The last 100 pages of the Half Blood Prince is destroyed from my tears. So why couldn't I cry when Hedwig died? Her death was certainly important enough- that wasn't the issue. Was it simply that the way she died wasn't important enough? Sure, she can't talk so, it can't be dramatic in that respect- last words and all. But, somehow I feel like it should be more than just:

"No - HEDWIG"

A second's relief, and then another burst of green light. The owl screeched and fell to the floor of the cage.

"No - NO!"

"Hedwig - Hedwig -"

But the owl lay motionless and pathetic as a toy on the floor of her cage. He could not take it in, and his terror for the others was paramount.

And that's it- she's dead.

Hedwig who has been with Harry always- through thick and thin.

Hedwig who was with Harry wherever he went- who stayed with him at Howarts and who left with him in the summers.

Hedwig- who served as his only connection to the world in which he belonged during those long months spent with the Dursleys.

Hedwig who was given to him by Hagrid days before beginning at Hogwarts for the very first time when he was 11 years old. And now, 6 years later, only 53 pages into the 7th and final book, she's dead. And, no more than a half a page was dedicated to this tragic event.

Now, you may say that I'm overreacting- she's just an owl, right? Not even a major character. Not nearly as important as Sirius or Dumbledore or Ron or Hermione or Lupin or even Ginny. She doesn't deserve so much attention. But that's not true- if I've learned anything at all about what Dumbledore or Ron or Hermione or Sirius or Lupin thought was right, it's that all creatures are equal- all types of living things should be treated with the same respect and, going by that rule, Hedwig is possibly Harry's very best friend in the world, right?

So why does she get this pathetic ending? It's as if she almost fades away without anyone even noticing, anyone even caring. Had someone skipped a paragraph of reading, they never would have even known she died. They would have assumed that she was just mentioned less or left behind on their grand adventure or killed so unimportantly that J.K. Rowling didn't even bother to mention it. I don't think that Hedwig deserves that, do you?