The Scent of Roses

My Little Blue Shack

       To whoever is reading:  I hope you enjoy this story, I know the intro makes it seem boring, but I assure you it gets better, also not a great writer but I am trying!  This story is about pieces of my life but most of it is fictional enjoy!

I would always find myself questioning why is life so hard. They say that life is beautiful, but I simply never understood the logic behind that phrase. How can life be beautiful?  Life involves pain, violence suffering, and loss, we go to college,  we lose childhood friends,  and then get old. Important people leave and we act like it is normal.  How can life be beautiful?

 I  remember as a child how much I used to love life,  what I loved most was the innocence and thrill of what comes next, the days I would wonder where my imagination would take me, will I be a superhero or will I be a princess, the days I would be excited to see my beautiful yet crazy friends in elementary. The smell of day, the rays of sunshine,  the feeling I had when I found my first crush, and the never-constant feeling of emptiness, it was all so simple...

I would not say that my life has been wonderful, but it hasn't been horrible.  I've always wanted to be strong but couldn't. My single mother along with my younger brother and I, have lived in a small blue apartment all our lives. Although it was small I found that this was my safe space, Unfortunately, it had its problems every day there was dirt everywhere, it was challenging to deal with such a small space, but I found happiness through doing small things. Whether as a child that was playing with my dolls, as an adolescent finding the perfect book that made me feel,  and lastly discovering what love and happiness felt like through a small shiny box on our tv stand.  All I knew was that my little blue shack kept me safe.

 Every day my mother would struggle and hustle to feed us, life was inexplicably hard for her, and I never understood why.   On my worst days I would even question, what did my family and I do to deserve a life such as this?  It did not matter anyway...because I knew that I had a wonderful family in front of me. I've always looked up to my mother since I was a little girl, She taught me everything after my father left and started a new life with his new perfect family.   I've always tried my best to help my family when they needed me the most. In middle school, I would always pick my younger brother up from school while my mother worked her ass off to provide us with meals.  My mother worked at a small market forty hours a week, on top of that my mom was disabled, she grew up without sight but that never stopped me from loving her, it only made me look up to her more.   

    Although my life was hard I would always try to ignore reality through my favorite movies and books such as  "Marvel" I dreamt of always being a superhero, strong like She-Hulk, or intelligent like Tony Stark. I also found a love for romantic teenage movies and shows around the age of 16,  at times I always wished my life were like these movies, such as Clueless, The duff, and most importantly my all-time favorite show Buffy the Vampire Slayer. 

I always wanted to be her, her strength, her beauty,  tasteful sense of style, her long blonde hair, and her power.  Watching these shows and movies, made me feel powerful,  I felt her power, and I wanted her power. Yet I always knew I could not be her or any of them, deep down inside each of these movies and shows was my escape from my morbid reality, my reality of poverty, sadness, loss, and minimal hope.   There was absolutely no way I could be this girl... well because I am a dark skin black girl growing up in America,  and I always assumed life was meant to be hard for us. 

   Although I had all these portals to escape reality, I found my happiness in reality, through music.  I would rap and always sing my head off until I could not anymore. Music always made me feel at peace with myself, in that moment I always felt like a marvel superhero, or buffy the vampire slayer, I felt like I was in a field of roses and I was free.  My biggest dream was to live beach, Isolated, I'd walk outside as the wind blew my afro back and forth, with the taste of the sea at the tip of my tongue,  I would be a famous artist, I would donate all my money to those and need, but would always keep to myself. 

Unfortunately, this never happened, we all have that one moment in life that changes our perspective on everything and throws us off our original path, a simple moment, usually, that moment is in high school, or just during a mid-life crisis, but for me, these were multiple moments throughout my life.   My biggest was when I began college, I know pretty cliche, but it changed my whole life. My three biggest rules are to never let myself get distracted, to always keep to myself, and to always be kind to others. but once I ended up letting go that's when my world began to crumble, I was no longer safe in my little blue shack, and even escaping reality did not help me,  I guess... this is where my story begins.