Her mind was clear and calm, rolling slowly out of bed on a quiet February morning. The dream of drowning remained in her mind, but she was accustomed to its presence there. With eyes still glazy and only slightly parted, she traced the wall for a light and flicked it on. The bright fluorescent light burned her eyes. When the shock faded, she stood before the mirror, a person she thought she knew stared back at her. She moved about her morning, a slow winding river shifted in her mind from black to light shades of grey and blue, the morning moved on and her with it.
Faces passed, a mixture of fake and real smiles were exchanged. As hard as she tried, her smile, and her positivity, never seemed real to herself. Although she could never convince herself others believed her. They bought her smile, her jokes, and the same laugh that was genuine only weeks before. This was the easy part, she said to herself, the same routine for the past two years, this is easy. The same words circled through her head “ Just smile, don’t let people see this side of you. You need to be strong. Other people need you to be strong for them.”
The day continues. Going through the motions gets easier, yet her feelings become more superficial. Things seem to move on without her, she stands still as the world moves a million miles an hour as she watches it go by.
As the days grew warmer, her skin, heart, and mind grew colder. Anything that required human emotion no longer came naturally to her. This once happy-go-lucky positive ball of energy was gone. No matter how deep or long she searched she couldn’t find that version of herself. The harder she tried to keep her head above the water, the weaker her arms and legs became. The water began to pull her under and the darkness consumed her mind.
As this dark cold water filled her mind, it engulfed her body. Those qualities that once made her confident she became so critical of. The smile she presented to the world became more and more convincing. It was almost as if she became an expert in lying to everyone around her.
The more time went by, the less she tried to cheer herself back up. She moved through life with little emotion and no effort. The cold and dark water filled her completely as if she was pushing against a current so strong she couldn’t move. She struggled so immensely to move forward, so she stopped trying and let the water drag her under.
.
And she knew then she had lost the battle with the water.
This was the first essay I wrote this year and my writing has come a long way since then. Though I am very proud of this piece and what it means to me. I think I displayed strong imagery and emotions, but I could have kept themes going throughout the entire paper that would have strengthened the meaning.