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Monday, June 18, 2018

The 20-Year-Old Denise

Denise has always been unsure of herself. She never feels like she has found her right footing in anything. She wants so many things, yet she never knows where to start. She has always carefully measured every single thing before making any decisions; but most of the time, the time she takes to consider (and reconsider) is far too much hence there are rarely choices ever made. She misses out so much; she wastes too many opportunities.

She hardly remembers when it all started. Yes, all the harsh things and words the world has made her go through have been there long ago, but she never really recalled when was the first time she admit her defeat over the situations. There are a few single memories of her never really caring about what people say though they did hurt her in some ways, and she wants to know when she started doing so.

Denise opens her old diary, the one she has kept since she was fourteen. There she finds evidence of confident writings, a tasteful kind, rather than gloomy rantings. This diary, though, is accessible to everybody. So she starts comparing what she has written years ago and what she often writes about now. She is surprised to learn how different and how much she has changed, and wondered why that could happen. She had expected herself to be over-achieving by now yet she ends up having nothing in her hands at all.

It has been six years since the first entry in her diary, and now she has turned twenty. Not yet, though; she will officially turn twenty in three days. She has tried to reflect as much as she could, but she hasn't really found meaning or answers to any of these circumstances she's been having. She then starts wondering about the people she has met along the way. There are some she has never been in touch with anymore, there are some who have stayed for so long. She wishes to be able to contact them, but now that she is a coward she no longer feels the urge to reach them. But really, she cherishes them a lot. Every time she tries to recall her memories of those people, she will be all smiles. Denise will laugh on her own and tries to reconstruct the conversations she once had with them.

Not that she thinks that it is unnecessary to find them, though; she just thinks that she can do it later. She cannot figure out what to talk about, anyways. She has lost the taste and the relief when she talks to people about her problems. Her closest people won't listen; she tells them her stories when she is sad and all she gets are these very sentences, "Well, compared to my problem, yours is not that bad." or "Why won't you just be grateful for what you have become or where you are right now?" and many other denials towards her issues. Denise believes that everybody has turned into very selfish people that will never even try to understand her and help her. It may sound extreme, but she really thinks that it is the case; people think too much of themselves.

This doesn't mean that she is an exception, though. But she has tried so hard not to be that kind of person. Though expectant that she will receive the same treatment as the one she gives to people, she tries to listen to people's stories and lend them her shoulders. Unfortunately, this doesn't really give her much positive result; people are still reluctant to listen to her.

There are people who will, though, and she is very grateful for their existence. The only thing that makes it not working is that she has not really trusted them. Not that they are fake, but she just hasn't really felt that close to them. And so she decides not to believe in anyone any longer when it comes to her situations, and just casually befriends anyone while keeping them at an arm length.

She also sees her family differently as well. Denise had always found peace and love in her family. She used to think that her parents were basically the best parents in the world. She used to believe that her brother would stay lovely too. But as she grew up, she realized things she had not before; flaws of her beloved ones. Both of her parents are not saints and her brother can be so annoying and selfish. Even so, she still finds her family as the only home; she can still seek sanctuary here and they are her most trusted people on Earth. She now accepts every single part of her family members and cherishes them with all her heart--or at least what's left of it.

Even though what she thinks right now is rather sounding negative, she does not really mean it to be like that. She just has come to her senses, to be able to see reality better, to understand that she is often in a her own utopia and she has denies the truth served in front of her. She wants to be a lot mature, she wants to stand on her own feet. Denise no longer wants to be defined by someone else, but she really hasn't found it. But at least she knows that first drills. She is hopeful that this will remain this way, that she will stand strong against all the winds and lemons thrown at her, that she will find a way to love herself enough that she no longer needs to seek warmth and light from others. She wishes to be able to glow instead, and gives light and comfort to other people.

Denise closes her diary once again and smiles in relief. She looks at the window where she is served green and yellowish meadows, where the winds take her to another realm. She closes her eyes and she repels prayers for happiness, starting in her twenty.