Left with a Scar
      When my parents got divorced I was the only one left with a scar. I love my parents and when they got divorced it was the worst and best decision of their lives. Their decision also affected me and my life. They got divorced because they couldn’t get along or agree on anything. One of the biggest mistakes they made was arguing in front of me. I was a witness to the madness they created. I can remember waiting for my mom and dad to come to bed and sleep with me. I can recall hearing the yelling and slamming of doors muffled by the walls in the apartment. Black sheets with red flowers all over me as I huddle under them trying get warm. I don’t want to hear it any more. They would argue about everything like why my dad didn’t come help my mom carry me out of the car when I was still in a car seat. My mom would have to walk two flights of stairs so she could get to the apartment. 
	Since I was two I did not know as much about what went on as I do now. All I knew was that my dad was gone and he didn’t come back. On the day of their divorce my dad got all his things and we took him to the bus station and he got on a bus to Ohio. About a week later I saw a city bus and pointed to it making the connection that my dad was on that bus. I pointed and said daddy, to which my mom had to tell me that my dad was not there that he was in Ohio. I was not aware of all the details but I did understand a few of the events that took place. Around that time I had just started school and the kids would talk about their parents and their dads. They would talk about how their dads took them to places and gave them things. But I couldn’t say anything because my father wasn’t there. That was when I realized that I was different from everyone else. 
	Life without such a father figure is hard. I didn’t have a dad to show me how to do things a mom can’t teach you. He wasn’t there physically to cheer me on at all my plays and recitals or to hang out with. He didn’t go to parties with me or show up at any events. He wasn’t there. But I have to say I love him in spite of. He has always picked up the phone whenever I called and has taken any chance he could to get me there to see him and I love him for just that.
	When I was six my dad decided to marry a woman named Marsha who had three children that were much older than me. I did not like having to share my dad at all. I already didn’t get to see my dad enough and now I had to share him once I got to him. That was not right. Marsha and I didn’t get along that much either. She didn’t know me and I didn’t like her. She yelled at me and wasn’t nice at all. What she didn’t know was my mom didn’t yell at me. When she tried to discipline me, it wouldn’t work the way she wanted it to. I would just cry if she screamed at me. Then her daughter Michel wasn’t any better than her mom. For the whole first summer I was up there she looked at me like I was dirt under her shoe. She despised me and my dad. The other two boys liked to hang out with me but they hated my father. I somewhat got along with them during the last part of the first and all of the second summer I was with them. 
	Marsha and my dad got divorced after only two and a half years into the marriage. They got divorced because Marsha felt that my dad tore her family apart and was keeping money from her. My father is honest and would never do that but she believed it and she ended their marriage. All of her three kids decided to move to their dad from her first marriage instead of living with their mother. She felt they did that to get away from my dad but maybe they did it get away from her. When I heard the news I was sad for my dad, he really did seem to love her and she just ended it because of her silly conspiracies. But I can’t say I wasn’t happy to be rid of her. Marsha became one less thorn in my side.
	During the school year when I’m not with my dad I’m with my mom. I love my mom and she was always there for me when I needed her. She was the parent that came to all my performances and supported me physically. But most of the time she had to work. She was there physically but mentally it felt like she had checked out. We left home early every day and get home late at night. My mom had about three different jobs and they all made her really busy. She was up late every night finishing her work. To me it seemed that she needed the work to fill a void that had been created in her life. She also was trying to take care of me and live a certain lifestyle. But even while she was busy she still made time to hang out with me. She still made time to take me to the movies or go shopping with me. Rarely did she say no to me when I asked for something. My mom did the best she could do with what she had on her own.
	Now my mom is no longer on her own. She got married to a man named Roderick Bell. She dated him when he was in college and they reconnected on Face book twenty years later. They didn’t really date but they talked on the phone and spoke on Face book. She went to see him in Memphis, TN and he asked her to marry him, she agreed and now they are married.
       The only down side to this situation is I don’t like him much. He seems nice on the outside but I feel that he is mean on the inside. In my family I was raised to remain calm and when you are arguing it is done to find a solution to the problem not to win when the other backs down. He never ever hit anyone but with his words. Basically all bark and no bite. He jokes and teases and then wants you to have heartfelt conversations with him. Six months and he feels you know him enough for him to be allowed access to your room. No. I still am getting to know him and so far I don’t like what I’ve seen. He wants someone to see the world the way he sees but it no one ever does. He never stays calm and gets all upset to the point of cussing and fussing about minor things that can be fixed with simple solutions. He contradicts everything you feel strongly about but when you do the same he feels disrespected. To him children shouldn’t voice their opinions about problems that they see. Yet my mother loves him and he lives in my house.   
	I know that these simple issues are not that big of a deal to anyone but to me they matter. I don’t enjoy chaos so I don’t like those that feel the need to cause it. Why does someone feel the need to get that up in arms about the fact that people are blocking an intersection? What does it matter that they are inconveniencing you? The fact that they could get hit and die should bother you more. Every day after he picks me up after school he has something else that he would like to say to the cars that block the street. If it bothers you so much you could take another road to get to my mother’s office. But still every day he makes a mean comment about the people in the intersection and the next day someone else is still blocking the street. That’s just one example of how he gets upset about little things that have simple solutions. Dozens of more problems in the world disrupt his way of life that everyone else seems to function okay with.
	My mom seems to enjoy this man so I have to put up with him. My first instinct was to tell her not to marry him, but being hated for the next six years until I left for college didn’t appeal to me so I held my peace. Her happiness was most important to me and I realised if he stuck around for six years then I’ll be gone starting my college education. I may even grow to somewhat like him. But now they argue too. No hitting or doing anything unseemly but he still is pretty mean. This is the main reason for my dislike. He is here to be a spouse to my mother. That entails her loving him, bearing his children and her working and her caring for me and them, when they come. His duties entail him loving her in spite of flaws, him caring for her and me, and him providing in the way he provides for the family. But too me arguing over simple thing that make absolutely no sense is not loving and especially when name-calling and being rude is involved. To me that is complete and utter chaos, no form of love in that situation. But my mom seems happy with it so I just bite the bullet and keep moving on. 
	My life seems to have been filled with emotional pains that have left some interesting scars. My parents divorce my father’s remarry and second divorce and lastly my mother’s remarry. But contrary to what’s been said I have lived a happy life with pleasant memories. My life now has happiness in it but it feels clouded by large amounts of anger.  I feel Anger towards my parents for ruining my innocent life, anger towards my father for taking me home to a crazy women and anger toward my mother for not really giving me an option to what went on. I never really understood why my parents got divorced and I may never actually get the whole story but I am somewhat ok with the fact that my life is like this. I have made peace with my life and I am ok with being different. Nothing else in this world causes me more anger that the fact that I am the one who is left split between two families except maybe the fact that I have to live with it. 
      My father’s family thinks one thing about my mother and what goes on that they don’t know about. My aunt is convinced that my mom isn’t feeding me good healthy organic food like she feeds her twins. My mother’s family doesn’t want me to go see my aunt because she isn’t the nicest person on the planet. In the midst of all this I feel overly conflicted. I have to sit and decide if I want to deal with my aunt’s problems so that I can spend time with my cousins and grandmother. But spending time with my mother also has a flaw. With my mother comes my mother’s husband which at times can make me wish for my father who I love but has his own problems like everyone else. My world feels like its sort of caving in and my only escape is to go to school. There I can be myself for eight hours each day. I don’t have o pretend and smile sweetly when something happens that I dislike. At school I can use my voice and I actually matter.
      My life isn’t bad as one filled with hate and ridicule but I have suffered some pain that no one should have to live through. It could be worse, my life could be a living hell but it’s also nowhere near any form of heaven. My life is at an unhappy medium where I am stuck with people in my family and I need to make it work. Staying happy is not out of the question but sometime finding it can be hard. In my safe haven I surround myself with those who make that happiness and constant joy. All of my friends are filled with silliness and fun times because sadness brings loneliness. Loneliness drives me to hate the world even more. Having friends that are good company brings peace when home life is hectic. In my family we wake up early and go to sleep late.  A house full of sleep deprived people is not good for a thirteen year old to live with. Quick tempers and desperation for sleep make tension high and stress even higher. My mother is constantly in pain and so am I. I hurt from the way her new husband hurts her feelings she hurts from over active nerves. We both hurt from a divorce but my hurts are fresh and open. I hurt from a desire to know why I was chosen for having certain differences that separate me from the “cool’ girls in my school. I hurt from the fact that I am left with the burden of my families’ differences. I hurt from the fact that my scar is there and no one seems to care or try and fix it. I hurt from the battle I feel my life has become.


Scars of my battle
Category 6-8
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