Best if Used By...

On 21.03.2025, I am nineteen years old, standing in my kitchen & wondering how I forgot to put half-&-half in my coffee, how I am five years, five months, & five days away from turning twenty-five, how I used to grip my mother’s hand & give it three squeezes before jumping into puddles, how I would shout so loud that the neighbors could hear when my ‘Pop’ would “under thunder” the tire swing, how I slept with a purple butterfly night light just in case the monsters under my bed came out that evening, & how fast I could sprint up the stairs when my brother shut off the basement lights. I look at my red mug, handcrafted in China & bite the chocolate made in Guatemala & I wonder how I became the woman who I am from the girl I was; I was not an adventurous child—I bawled when I was called on to climb the rope in gymnastics, & I can count on one hand the people I could talk to without tears before age five. I did not believe in calculated risks.

I wish I could curate a specific answer about what created the change. I suppose the concept of expiration. I poured my half-&-half, it smelled sour & was days beyond the Best if Used By… date. I believe my growth could be chalked up to a handful of experiences:

1. The art of my Pop’s storytelling

My childhood bedtime routine consisted of playing with Barbie Dolls in the bathtub, then climbing into my parents’ bed between my Pop & my brother (to be protected from the monsters under the bed, of course). My dad would read us one, two if we listened, chapters of a book, then tell us a story of his adventures. He hiked through mountain ranges & moved his life to Alaska & climbed multiple glaciers. His favorite story to tell (mine as well) was about the journey to a snowy cabin tucked away in the forest. As my brother & I got older (& less afraid of the ‘scary’ parts), Pop would begin to include us in his adventures—I was described as fearless & my brother would be a man of courage. I recall surviving a mountain lion & my brother wrestling a grizzly bear.

2. “Well… you ain’t got no legs, Lieutenant Dan!”

I shattered the entirety of both of my legs at fifteen years old. I don’t think you need a description of how my career in sports expired—self-explanatory.

3. You say goodbye… & I say hello.

I can count on one hand the number of people I could talk to before the age of five without bursting into tears. It got better, a bit, as I got older, however, I remained an introvert—I was quiet, shy, + a bit dorky, & it took quite a bit of time to grow out of my baby fat. When I was asked to give a speech at my seventh-grade graduation, I immediately refused. My parents, friends of D.M., the principal (if I remember correctly), said I was “just a bit nervous” & would be “more than happy” to give the speech in front of my entire graduating class… & their parents… & their siblings… & their grandma & their grandpa & the aunt that is way too involved.

I wrote this speech once, then another time, & at least three more times after that. I practiced reading it every morning on the way to school, at lunch in the library, & at the dinner table, then a few times in my head before falling asleep.

“Time. It’s a really funny thing. It has a magical way to erode & wear down our memories until they’re like the worn edges of an old piece of paper. I can remember the days where we sat in classrooms for a couple of hours taking MAP or AIR tests. There’s also the days where we’d goof off with our friends during class & the teachers would give us ‘the look’. There’s also the days where we laughed at nothing. It would be absolutely silent & everyone would burst out laughing. There were some days that weren’t at all that remarkable. Maybe some of our friends weren’t at school or we had tests in nearly every class. Funny or not, they were all memories we made. Although they may be as clear as day to you now, next year or even sooner, these memories may become as faded or as dull as an old piece of paper. You may say goodbye to them fairly quickly & to all the experiences we had at the middle school, but you also have to say hello. Say hello to all of the things we will experience at the high school. One of my favorite authors, Paulo Coehlo (pronounced: Pow-loo quay-lew), who wrote the novel The Alchemist, once said: ‘If you’re brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a new hello.’

As this school year comes to an end, all of us will be saying a goodbye unlike any seventh graders in the history of ******* schools. We will all be saying goodbye to:

• Swaggy Waggy

• Touchdown Jesus

• Salty Sal

• Mr. *********’s juggling acts

• I am V&N

• Discovery Tours & their ‘no-go trip to Chicago’

• Ms. *******’s travel tales

• The administration’s hard work & dedication to making this year the best

However, as Paulo Coehlo (pronounced: Pow-loo quay-lew) said, with brave goodbyes come new hellos! As sad as it might be to leave our wonderful seventh grade teachers & our inside jokes, let’s keep our hearts & our minds open to the many hellos as we move to the high school! We will be saying hello to:

• 8th graders in the high school… let’s go!

• Meeting new friends

• Taking exciting classes

• New teachers

• A bigger school

• New inside jokes

You say goodbye… I say hello.”

To this day, my dad & D.M. still say I “absolutely crushed it.”

4. Death—Car crashes, suicides, farming accidents, cont.

Have you ever seen someone die? The color drops from their face. They smell of curdled milk & they gurgle as if they’d just consumed some. Somehow, it is inherently beautiful, yet loss, in any form, changes you. I aided in my first extubation & do not resuscitate order during a rotational trauma experience, a young adult with three children & a heartbroken spouse. I threw up my breakfast for the next month & I gag at the sight of red velvet cupcakes. I watched a handful of classmates be buried throughout high school, listening to their grieving mothers scream for their babies back. I found out a close friend of mine chose to take his own life, & years later another best friend, a mentor, did the same. At twenty years old, the girl I spent middle school & high school with was hit & killed, immediately, by a woman who chose to become shit-faced on a Wednesday afternoon; she was on her way to take a university final. Grief forces you to reevaluate what matters, whether you are three, thirteen, or twenty-three. I think that love should be loud, life is short. Showing up matters more than words.

I used to fear the end. I hated when Pop’s stories were over & I would have to go to sleep. I was devastated any involvement in sports came to the close of the season. I refused to change, in any way, shape, or form (except for the one time I cut horrible bangs… it proved my point at the time). I was terrified of death.

The knowledge of expiration is now the reason I live, the reason I am filled with joy, the reason I chase dreams people call ‘crazed’, & the reason I willingly choose to embrace uncertainty + fill my life with continuous change.

My life will be a story worth telling, rather than a chapter left unfinished.