Lacombe !

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Megan Lacombe
Mrs. Dus
AP Language
June 10, 2015
Soul-gazing
For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of stars makes me dream.
- Vincent Van Gogh

In the third grade I would sit and read about worlds that didnt exist while I willfully
ignored the one that did. I sat at recess and ignored my friends and the fact that they wanted to
play with me. I colored rocks with inspirational words and designs on them and hoped that they
would inspire me. I ignored the fact I felt sick every day at lunch and had to leave. I ignored the
fact that something was wrong, really wrong. I still have one of my hope rocks. It is white and
smooth. Its design is abstract and curved. Blue lines drawn in colored pencil stolen from a
classroom make cracks in the polished white surface of the stone. It no longer is the symbol of
hope it once was. Its empty now.

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In the fourth grade I learned of death from a children's Bible. It told stories of resurrection
and hell accompanied by cartoonish images of saints and holy men. In death souls would leave
their human shells to return to Gods kingdom. I never believed it. It failed in its purpose. It did
not cause me to convert to Christianity. Exactly the opposite occurred. I read it like a book, simply
a collections of stories that had no other purpose than to amuse me. But the idea of an afterlife that interested me. In astronomy I was told that stars were souls. In Greek mythology
constellations represented people long dead who had pleased the gods: Cassiopeia in her chair,
Pegasus flying, Perseus, Orion, Andromeda. All the other more lowly souls were resigned to an
eternity in the Underworld unless they gave up all memory of their past life in order to be born
again. I changed this myth to fit my own ideas. I would sit looking up at the night sky and imagine
the stars were worlds. Not worlds for mortal bodies, but worlds of souls, dancing in the sky.
Worlds inhabited by Gatsby-esque parties, swimming pools, and giant libraries. The sky burning
with life after death, burning with hope and promise that death was not the end of revelry. I wanted
a universe of order. Wanted there to be a reason for everything. The stars were my reason.
I could not look at the night sky without crying. I imagined my grandfather was among the
stars and I cried with wonder and happiness. I imagined he was with his friends from the war, his
parents and dead children. My dead fish were swimming happily in a fishy paradise, free from the
fear of predators. The art teachers dead dog was there too, free from arthritis and blindness.
I cried for the people that these souls had left behind and I cried in self pity. I cried because in my
imagination all these dead souls were all free and I was not. I felt sick.
In the sixth grade I saw a planetarium show. In it the British narrator explained the life
cycle of stars. Stars die? No. No. No. No no no no no. This doesnt fit. They cant die. If stars, the

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most beautiful and eternal things in the universe can die, what hope is there for my soul? Where is
my reason? No. In the darkness, staring up at those swirling images, I cried. Everything dies.
In the seventh grade I made a telescope. It was not a grand thing, two cardboard tubes
connected by rings of plastic encasing two lenses. Nor was it a particularly effective telescope. It
might have served as a pirates spy glass or a tool for an adventurer, but it did not magnify the one
thing I was truly interested in: the stars. My love of the stars stemmed from my love of stories and
my love of imagination. This idea of worlds far beyond our own, out of our reach. I still imagined
them as worlds full of souls, but now they seemed lonely. There are enough stars that the soul of
every human being who has ever died could have a star of their own. The telescope was my
science fair project. A great exploration into the world of knowledge. I learned absolutely nothing
new from my project.
I began my project with an ambitious goal: create a telescope from the beginning. In my
imagination I pictured a beautiful wooden masterpiece, perfectly aligned for optimum efficiency.
I would fit the lenses to their wooden homes so gently it would have been an act of love. My
telescope came by mail. All the pieces were wrapped in plastic, separated by near invisible
barriers. I spread them out on the counter: two glass lenses, two cardboard tubes, three plastic
rings. They fit together perfectly and simply. I hated it. I knew absolutely everything about my
telescope. Here is a scratch, made when I dropped it. Here the convex lens, here a plastic eyepiece
curved at the edges. I could take it apart and reassemble it with the efficiency of a solder. It was
my weapon. My tool for discovering the world, but it failed. It couldnt look where I wanted it to.
Ultimately, my telescope was not the problem. Presenting my project was my problem. The
night before the science fair I rushed to finish my display board which had not been started. As

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I colored and pasted my parents watched on, the knot in my back hardened and my eyes began to
ache. And this is where I made my first mistake. I imagined the stress in my back was a gun, a real
weapon. A circular ring of cold metal pressing, pressing, pressing me forward when all I wanted to
do was lean back and fall. I imagined pulling the trigger. I began to cry.
In the seventh grade I began therapy. We dont always talk, sometimes we simply paint and
draw. I learn how to breathe again, to let out the knot in my back, to let the gun go and push
myself forward. We talk about friends and my mothers stress. Slowly changing the way I think.
Stop thinking hate and start thinking, this is bad, but I can deal with it. Start thinking about
medicine.
In the tenth grade neon orange circles dotted my white wooden night stand. Spilled from
their childproof container which is never closed and thus is not childproof at all. Knocked over
carelessly as I reached through the dark for my water bottle. They form their own constellations,
these burning pills. They burn in their path down my throat. Constellations of struggle and
perseverance. I can see my past in the empty spaces between them. Some rolled onto the floor and
I grope through the dark to find all of these lost souls. Moonlight illuminates a rectangular piece of
my carpet and I pick up my lost comrades and return them to their locked home.
Medicine is not an exact science. Playing with brain chemicals is risky. Too much change
and you feel like a stranger in your own thoughts. Too little and the hopelessness comes back.
Medicine is not magic, its a crutch that lets you stand so that someday you will be able to walk on
your own. Its experimentation; its trial and error; its orange and green and purple and blue; and
its wild, but its not magic. Very few things are magic.

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In January, I wanted to fall back again. Wanted to sit back and ride a wave through my life.
Wanted to sit back and let hopelessness push me. I didnt. I thought, this is bad, but I can deal.
I thought, just push. Push yourself. Hold onto the rocks beneath your feet. Talk. Dont remain
silent. Think about your family. Think about Lily, Caroline, Nate, Kate, Margaret, Susan, Paul,
Madeline, Ella, Annie. Think about the stars. Breathe out the knot in your back and write your
essay. Study for chemistry. Read a book. Keep moving. Those things are magic. I never fell.
In June, the world is at its most clich. Birds sing, sprinklers make a rhythmic music, and
off in the distance children are laughing. A slight breeze is blowing and my iced coffee is cold and
sweet. The world is beautiful and transient and ephemeral. Everything is, even stars. And that
doesnt make me want to cry, it makes me want to sing. To live brightly and supernova without
regrets. It makes me want to hold on against the wave, Gastsby-esque, and breathe. And for that
moment, its enough.