Home Again and Onward

An innocuous, white, sixteen-passenger Econoline van pulled into the parking lot of Magic Kingdom in Orlando, Florida. Inside, the van was brimming with excitement after an endless winter of anticipation had finally ended. As the doors opened, out spilled all eight members of my family, each of us eager to embark upon our first real vacation together. Although we all were looking forward to spending the next week exploring Disney World, nobody was more excited than me. Ever since I was a little girl I was enamored with all things Disney. Now, standing in front of Cinderella’s castle and watching the princesses waltz with their princes, it all felt surreal. As I wandered through the castle and down Main Street, all my expectations were surpassed. Instead of watching all of Disney’s characters in films, I was able to interact with them. While I was blissfully gobbling up waffles in the shape of mouse ears, Mickey Mouse himself greeted me at my table. I also dragged my parents along with me to wait in painfully long lines to collect the autographs of my favorite princesses. As I braved the wild rollercoasters and explored the endless attractions, this magical atmosphere was more than enough to satisfy the imagination of a ten-year-old girl. 

Flash forward eight years and the same innocuous Econoline van pulled into the same parking lot, although now with a new family member (my favorite little diva – Grace). I was just as excited as I was before but for a different reason: I was looking for a brief escape from a dismal year. The summer before my junior year of high school, my father was diagnosed with stage IV stomach cancer. The news was as devastating as a bomb exploding. Since I was the second oldest of seven children, I had to mask my confused emotions with a smile as to not cause unnecessary alarm for the younger ones. Now, as my younger siblings and I rode on Space Mountain, their imagination allowed them to visualize the tantalizing darkness as the actual realms of outer space. For me, it was simply darkness. Watching the parade of fictional characters stroll down Main Street no longer gave me that same overbearing joy I experienced as a naïve ten-year-old girl. Seeing my youngest sister overwhelmed with excitement after watching Beauty and the Beast live on stage, and my little brother ecstatic over defeating Emperor Zurg in an interactive Buzz-Lightyear attraction, I realized that the lures of Walt Disney World’s magical environment could no longer comfort me.

In order to find relief, I had to discover a realistic way to manage my stress as I was about to begin a pivotal year of high school. I tried turning to my usual outlet of Disney’s films and coincidently, his newest, Saving Mr. Banks, was the most inspiring. While the film lacked the typical enchantment associated with Disney, it highlighted how Walt Disney was a sincere person who faced hardships as a child. To cope with his adversity, he created Mickey Mouse in order to spread happiness to people of all ages. This was particularly uplifting to me as I faced this new horrifying development in my life. Eight years earlier I was content with superficial happiness, but now as a mature adult I realize that instead of seeking an inauthentic escape from reality, I must face life’s challenges in order to overcome them. While I am still not sure of how I will conquer every stressful experience life throws at me, I have faith that with time and patience I will triumph over even the most difficult obstacles. Similar to how Walt Disney battled through his impoverished youth, I will persevere with mental toughness as I embark on this next chapter of my life. I will not let barriers such as stage IV cancer get in the way of a strong family and a motivated young woman with a bright future.

This is my Common Application essay – the essay that was submitted to Bates upon awaiting the fate of my admission’s offer. The act of writing this essay granted me way more than a letter of acceptance from Bates College. For the first time in my personal and academic life, I became vulnerable through a piece of writing that was shared – writing not kept secret in a diary or in my head. The process of writing this essay gifted me a sense of humble pride and solidified my drive to pursue teaching as my career.

I wrote the first draft for this essay on a scrap piece of paper I found in my bedroom. I remember sitting on the deck outside of my family’s house, thinking about how I wanted to incorporate Disney somehow into this essay and then running upstairs to scribble and word vomit as the story flew from my scattered brain onto the paper. This first draft was an absolute mess but the story was there and needed further work in order to fully bloom. So, the very next day, I approached my favorite high school English teacher. While I certainly trusted his intelligence and ability to refine my writing, I was absolutely terrified and closed my eyes as I reluctantly clicked “send” and emailed him my first draft. I had to share with him information about my family I had not even talked about with my friends. I couldn’t help but wonder “How is he going to react and will he think any different of me?”  

I repeat – My first draft was a complete mess. Nonetheless, this teacher sincerely wished me and my family well during this difficult time for us. He acknowledged the strength of the story I hoped to tell but was honest with me and provided an abundance of constructive, formative feedback about the structure and organization of my writing. He even sat down with me for over an hour and had me tell him the story I wished to portray through writing and wrote all of my thoughts on the board as I was speaking. His patience and ability to listen to my goals for the piece proved his dedication to my learning. I trusted that he sincerely wanted me to succeed and we were able to productively work together and finish with a piece of writing that I was proud of. From this moment forward, I vowed to strive to be able to develop the same level of trust, compassion, empathy, and friendship with my students as their English teacher.

Moreover, after writing this essay – the themes I talk about – facing and overcoming adversity – started to unfold all throughout my senior year of high school. There were days I genuinely believed my life with my family would go back to normal – that my dad would be able to survive the cancer, become healthy again, and watch his children grow older. I thrived socially, academically, and athletically – was admitted to Bates with a string of numerous merit, community, and athletic scholarships, broke track and field records, and was surrounded by an incredible team of supportive friends and family members.

Despite all this teasing bliss, within a matter of seconds, everything took a turn for the worst and my hope for normalcy disappeared. Soon, I was faced with my first true experience learning to overcome the drastic ups and downs of life. My dad was never able to watch me walk across the stage and receive my high school diploma and the summer between graduating from high school, prepping for my first semester at Bates, proved to be the most emotionally taxing of my life to date. In all honesty, I was completely lost. Mentally, I couldn’t grasp how life could quickly turn that drastically in the blink of an eye – a turn I was not ready for in the slightest. And my unpreparedness showed – my anxiety skyrocketed and every little decision I had to make felt like the biggest of my life. I felt alone, out of control, and terrified of further loss.

On top of all these changes, I was expected to come to Maine, two hours away from a grieving family, and start the next chapter of my life at Bates. Everybody told me to start with a clean slate. But how was I supposed to do this when I wasn’t ready to erase the last? In all honestly, my Bates experience was really challenging. One semester never went by when I didn’t think about everything that could have been.  

Due to my inability to consistently face my fears, I also had a lot of trouble opening up to people. Part of me is always going to wish this could have been different. I will forever be the grieving daughter, longing for her past life. It was hard walking across the Bates quad feeling as though an essential part of my story was being left unheard. All that being said, a new part of me was able to realize the strength, resilience, and love that was able reshape my personality and epitomize my Bates experience.

While my Bates experience was difficult, and at times emotionally exhausting, during my four years I gradually learned to ride the ups and down of life. I learned to trust that life is not my deceitful enemy – life is natural – scary at times but genuinely very beautiful for everybody in different ways. I ended my Bates career with an incredible trip to London under my belt, Magna Cumme Laude, an honors English thesis student, captain of my cross country and track teams, All-American athlete, Editor-in-Chief of the student newspaper, and a Fulbright finalist. I conquered all of these accomplishments with a string of incredible friends and faculty members by my side. When graduation was upon me, I was asked to give a speech about my personal Bates experience at our Baccalaureate. And I gladly agreed because I hoped that my story would help anybody who had to face, or was facing, any adversity in their life.

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I stood in front of my Bates community and honestly told them my story. I decided to end the speech by emphasizing:

From this moment on, I realized that life is not so black and white. Moments are going to catch you off guard and you are going to have to react. Hidden beautiful moments have a way of surfacing when you least expect them to. Life has a funny way of keeping you on your toes and placing missing pieces back together. My life at Bates has been a nothing short of a convoluted puzzle. But trust, me. It’s worth figuring out.   

I did figure out my convoluted Bates puzzle and the summer after, and my Fulbright months that followed, all stood as another beautiful “up” in my life. Everything seemed to fall together nicely again for the first time in years and I was gifted with many successes, smiles, love and incredible, life-changing challenges and experiences. Soon enough, however, as I talked about in my speech, again, life threw another quick, drastic “down,” not just my way, but everybody’s way.

We have all been overcome with the mental burdens and trauma that have followed the unpredictability of COVID-19. This pandemic is a very frightening “down” for us all. For me personally, this pandemic has triggered the same mental unease at the suddenness of change I experienced as a high school senior who was faced with a completely new, foreign life before starting her freshman year at Bates. Life has changed in the blink of an eye with no real clear trajectory toward normalcy. Whenever faced with these life-altering “downs,” I always find myself asking: Why does this have to happen when life seems to be going so well? And I never have a solid answer at first.

While living in my Andover bubble for the past couple months – life in quarantine, home again – I have realized that there really is no one solid answer to this question. There are many unpredictable answers that lie in sporadic beautiful moments and mental breakthroughs. When reflecting upon all the change, frustration, and trauma I have had to face in the past few years, I remind myself how fortunate I am to be in the situation that I find myself today – with a loving, huge family who has been nothing but supportive as I navigate my next steps as a rising educator. For an indefinite period of time, I am home again, working on productively securing the same feeling of home that compelled me to write that Common Application essay all those years ago – a feeling of home that has now been blessed with love not only from the United States but also the Czech Republic – specifically the city square in a loving flat of Česky Têšín. 🙂

I cannot even begin to fathom what people are facing on the front lines. I am extremely grateful for all that acts of bravery, compassion, and brilliance people are providing as we all face the uncertainties of this pandemic together. As someone who was forced to evacuate and leave her job in the Czech Republic without saying goodbye to her students and school community, I also want to extend my sincerest sympathies for teachers, workers, and students who were forced to leave their classroom communities – we are all brave, resilient, and strong and can do our part to help lift each other up together and stay educated and connected the best we can during this fearsome time out of a physical classroom. Finally, I send lots of prayers and love to all of whom have lost family members, friends, and loved ones as a result of COVID-19. Many patients have even had to face the virus alone in hospitals so as to not risk infection. I know from experience that there are no words of sympathy that I can provide that will fill the void of their stolen lives, or the unbarring loneliness these people faced. But, I do know that with resilience, love, and support each day will get a little easier and their lives will be cherished and remembered in all the accomplishments and beautiful experiences to come.

We all shouldn’t let this pandemic get in the way of the strength of our communities and the love, laughter, and support we can all bring to each other during this confusing time. Life is unpredictable and we have all gone through, and faced, our own traumas before this pandemic took over. With the help of some gentle reminders from family and loved ones during these past couple months, I know that I am that same writer who wrote, “I will not let barriers such as stage IV cancer get in the way of a strong family and a motivated young woman with a bright future.” And I am the same young woman who stood up in front of her Bates community, and honestly spoke about the ups and downs of her collegiate experience. So, without a doubt, I know that we can all help each other, find home again and move onward in the healthiest and safest way possible.

Finally, to end, recently, while in quarantine, I returned to Disney for the same reason I held during my senior year of high school. Watching Disney’s wonderful mix of fantasy and reality has again proven to be comforting and uplifting. Walt Disney’s newest film Onward granted me the privilege of watching a replica of my life and the lessons I still need to learn. The main character of this newest film was never able to meet his father; his father passed away from cancer when he was just a baby. Therefore, in classic Disney fashion, this character went on a magical quest with his brother to try and find a spell to bring his father back for a day so he can finally meet him. By the end of the quest, he was only able to meet his father for all of a second but learned to live as his father’s son – a young man who can face his fears and conquer worthwhile accomplishments alongside the support of his brother and mother.

This film sounds predicable and typical of the fantastical stories the Walt Disney Company provides for children and family of all ages. However, this sweet story reminded me of the fact that there are still days when I sit back and relish in all of the memories I have been fortunate to have up to this point and how I would love to have my father back in my life for even just one day or one mere second. While this is not physically possible, I know that I have been blessed with a rich life bound together by incredible ups and heartbreaking downs – and both are crucial to who I am today.

Again, there are days when the absence of “what was” still haunts me and washes over me with overwhelming sadness and fear. Just recently my Harvard plans have been deferred for a year – yet another curveball thrown to deter plans I was able to accomplish and have longed for since I was a little girl. Instead of responding with frustration and fear and by feeling sorry for myself – emotions that are honestly pretty difficult to deflect right now – I have decided to be patient and mindful of the realties the world is facing as I think through what my next steps could be. Everybody’s plans have changed – we are all facing these unpredictable changes together.

I had plans to move into my own apartment in Boston and start my studies by June 1st. Now that is not part of my plan for this year – but this plan is not gone – just delayed and I have to remember that I am healthy, strong and ready for a life that will return to normal…it just might not play out as I originally, and thoroughly, thought it would play out. I don’t know what tomorrow will look like or bring. I don’t know what my next plan will be, what the next month will bring, and how all of this could change again – I still can’t believe, and saddens me to remember, that I was in the Czech Republic two months ago living life with my loving Czech family and school community. I cannot solve the impossible in a day and life keeps changing without me having a clue what’s coming. But I can remember all that there is to be thankful for. We all just need to think one day at a time – this is what I will be doing as I move onward as my father’s daughter – a confident, young woman with a bright future, who has the courage to speak, write, and share her stories and breakthroughs with others in hopes that her words can lift people up – despite any barriers and challenges 2020 has left in store.

So, as always…Ahoj! Stay safe, stay healthy, and stay positive as we all find home again, face and await life’s wild, heartbreaking downs…and of course, move onward toward beautiful, priceless, ups. 🙂