I have met people who think they know everything and met people who seem to not know anything, but I have never knew someone who suffered from memory loss, besides myself. Ever since I was young my sister told me I was reckless. Every time I learned how to play a new sport, instrument, game, anything really, I would exceed my limits.
A couple of years ago I wanted to learn how to snowboard. The first winter season was fine. Not only was I keeping up with my friends, I would be able to compete with them. I felt untouchable at the rate I was adapting to this new experience. Last day of the season, last run of the night, last jump of the trail, I wanted to do something so amazing no one would ever forget it. I climbed up the mountain to gain more speed for the last jump. I knew how to take a jump, and even do some tricks in the air, but this time I was going for a 360 spin. Going faster than you can imagine, snow blasting my face, I took the jump. That is as far as I can recall of that day. My friend shot a video and showed it to me. I ended up barley turning and started to go upside-down. For people who don’t snow board or ski, at the end of a season usually the mountain is slushy by day and rock hard ice by night. Since I attempted this trick at night, it made the fall so much worse. My helmet broke down the middle, my rotator cuff had a second degree shatter, and I had transient global amnesia. My memory of that entire day and weeks behind that were gone, along with my connection to people. Time was nothing to me for I had not known what it was, my name, or who I was.
Months would pass and it felt like weeks. People I did not know were telling me stories of the past My girlfriend at that time said I treated her like a stranger, and my close friends and family felt the same way. School was the first of my struggle. I understood algebra and nothing else. Grammar to me was a foreign language, and sports were too difficult. I found myself reading for minutes or so, and I would start to lose concentration, and then I could not remember the content or what I was doing. Any time I played sports, such as football track or even snowboarding again, the slightest exertion of force I would start to stumble and wouldn’t be able to speak what was on my mind. People would always laugh and make joke about me when I did not know common things, places, celebrities, or commonly known people.
Within months I saw myself physically getting better, except fear of criticism developed in my mind. I was too afraid to make friends, be social, exercise, anything you can think of that involved activity or socializing. I was gaining a lot of weight and my friends disappeared one by one. By my senior year I did not know what to do with my life. My girlfriend had became my ex after two years, best friend number one moved to Florida, and best friend number 2 started hanging out with a different group of people. My whole senior year I felt alone and like there was something huge missing in my life. I did meet someone eventually. She was awesome, her mother liked me and everything was great. Her ex though was a very jealous and spiteful person; he spread a rumor that I hit the girl during lunch. When police showed up to my house asking for me to not have any contact with this girl, I was in shock. My father believed I hit her, even after the principle pulled up a video of us in the cafeteria proving I was innocent. Peace and tranquility between my father and me was inevitable. At the time I knew that my life in high school was soon to end. I felt the pressure of being a first generation to graduate high school and go to college in my entire family. I felt as if it was up to me to help my family from out the gutter, and I did not know how to do so. At this point everything seemed impossible with the amount of time I had left. The only thing I ever looked forward to was my job and sports, because I knew I wouldn’t have to go home.
Even though this situation is filled with bad thing getting worse, there was something to positively learn form this. With all the free time I had all I ever did was watch television and read about everything going on in the world. With me in depression from my ex I turned to making music. Since I was always writing poetry, I figured it would be fun combining the two. Since I worked, I never went to a single party, and in turn I had money for school. As a server at Perkins, I was always sociable with people. This made my fear of meeting people disappear without my knowledge of it. My SAT scores and high school GPA was enough to land me in Pennsylvania State University, where I chose my major in communications. Working as a server made me wonder more about the world, and what it had to offer after meeting so many people at my job. Always working made me ahead of the game with time management in school. The first party I went to in PSU I was bored. All I could think about was making music and learning more.
Most people always ask me if it was impossible to adapt to society’s intelligence, too hard, did I ever want to quit? It took a long time, and my memories are slightly scattered still, but I have gained my memories back. Working at the impossible made me stronger and smarter mentally. I feel like I can do anything and I have no limits, plus my confidence is higher than it has ever been. Now I am working on finishing my diploma and work harder than ever before. Although most people think things are impossible, not everything is.
In that respect I believe in the impossible.