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By Porché Brott
As I stare at the blank piece of paper, thoughts swirl through my head a thousand words a second. The funny thing is, none of those words ever leave my head. They just stay stuck up there, stubborn and unwilling to leave, and sometimes flittering about so I can’t pinpoint which one goes where. I know I need to write, to let it out, but I hesitate. What’s preventing me? Is it fear? I’ve been told that if I don’t succeed the first time, to keep trying and not give up, but why does failure seem so fatal, so catastrophic? If I don’t get it right the first time, then what is the point in trying again? Would it be foolish to persevere, or would it help me flourish?
Memories flood my mind, images of things past that I wish would ultimately be erased from my mind’s database. So many hurts that I don’t understand. Words I can’t undo, words they can’t undo. It’s like opening anew the scab I carefully nurtured to ensure it didn’t open again.
Like that one day in fourth grade, sitting at my desk, quietly writing away, hopeful and enthusiastic about my work. At the time, I saw them as friends, but in that moment, they showed themselves to be frauds. And that day, when they came up and asked me something to the effect of, “Why are you writing about that? You should write about something you do know about, like pimples,” chills went down my spine. Alarms blared in my head, like a rooster alerting his hens of a prowling cat.
Inwardly I longed to be hidden in the deepest, darkest corner of the universe, feeling so incompetent and useless, so utterly feeble compared to them and all of mankind. At the time I tried to rationalize their words to me, to laugh along with them as they ridiculed me, but it did nothing to ease my newfound angst.
That day in fourth grade, I abandoned a teenager named Aurora Nikki Arrow, the character whom I had such high hopes writing about. Their words destroyed the ones I aspired to write.
Were they just joking with me, or were they serious? Were they right when they said that no one likes me? You’re right, I would reply, no one likes me, everyone loves me! But the words I spoke rang hollow when I was alone. With every remembrance of a thought, the prowling cat would overpower another hen, leaving a significant scar, a heavier burden, and a sadder countenance upon my face.
Why, oh my soul, are you cast down within me? Hope in the Lord, I tell myself, remembering a portion of a Psalm, and I know the Holy Spirit prompts me to trust and praise God. I know He’s blameless, that He intends everything for my good and for His glory. And I know He can handle my loneliness, and all these festering, dismaying, nagging thoughts. So, I once again entrust myself to Him, and then I look at the paper.
It is still blank.
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