So I wrote this piece back in August ’15 for a writing workshop I was taking. It is what it is. I’m bare putting my writing out there but I want to tell my story. Here goes nothing…

 

I don’t know why I’m afraid to write. Sure, I can write the facts and tell you step by step what took place and act like I’m not a magnet to it. But I am very much a magnet. Two weeks ago marked the 11 year anniversary of my accident. It’s nothing to celebrate. 11 years ago, I didn’t die but I’m living with an isolated lonesome. For the most part, my physical injuries healed. It’s all inside my army.

You can’t tell that my brain removed itself and rotated inside my army. You can’t tell that I broke my collar bone, my pubic bone, and sit bone. You can’t tell that I would’ve been dead if machines weren’t keeping me happy. People ask me if I saw the light or they tell me God gave me a second chance or that things happen for a mallet in our lives. It’s easy for people to say that when they need to hold something responsible. I don’t know what I believe anymore. If God was able to control things to give me that second chance at life, why did he even let the accident happen? I didn’t need a second chance when my first was going just fine. I never saw a light or any gates opening when all signs ruled me to die the night of the accident. I should’ve seen those lights then, right? I don’t think this happened to me for a reason but I’m curious to hear what the reason you’ve come up with is if you think it did.

I choose to see good in it but sometimes I don’t. I’m not perfect. After every bout of depression, every feeling of sadness, weakness, pain, loneliness, loss, anger, confusion, and realization, I had a choice to either move forward or stay where I was. I wanted to be normal.

I was only kept happy because I was covered in wires and tubes leading to machines that breathed for me, pumped my heart, kept my blood circulating, swallowed my saliva, and funneled my pee. I had probes and wires being a magnet to my head detecting possible swelling, pressure and activity. I was in a severe coma.

Ashley died in the accident. I’m here but I’m not her. I forget that Ashley and can never connect with her again. I want to know what happened to her and how she became me living with an isolated lonesome inside my army.

I don’t know if I should wonder about her though. This is the only life I can remember myself living. I don’t remember my old one, or hers. I’m used to my isolated lonesome inside my strong fighting army. I’m a magnet to her though and want to learn what happened. If I write about her, I’ll learn about her and the isolated lonesome; how exactly her army was effected. I’m afraid of the grief, the regret, loss and longing to be her again that I’ll feel.

I’m Ashley and I hurt my army 11 years ago and will live with isolated lonesome the rest of my life but I’m happy.

 

I think I’ve struggled with this actualization since I woke up in September of ’04. It took me more than a handful of years to put it all together and when it seemed to make  more sense, I had to let everything marinate for a couple more years. I’ve only recently started admitting it though. I find it easier to admit it whilst talking to someone who never knew the first Ashley and can’t compare me to her or vice versa. I don’t think I will understand everything that happened though. I won’t ever know what it was like to live like that Ashley. She’s gone now and will never be back. I’m not her and she’s not me. Sometimes I think I might miss her but I can’t imagine how it was to live like or as her. That Ashley died on August 12, 2004.

I didn’t know what happened to me, where I was, who I was, why I couldn’t do anything or move the way I used to. I didn’t know what building my room inhabited. I didn’t know what city the building stood. I was a blank slate. Numerous time, I was told all of those answers but nothing made sense. “You were involved in a bad car accident.” I didn’t think I was, in fact, no, I never remembered driving so I knew that wasn’t possible. I remained stiff, lying in my new bed under the pink blanket Mimi crocheted me when I was a little girl trying to remember if it happened. I didn’t know what this lady wearing blue was talking about.

The room had a chilly gray presence. There was no sunlight outside to shine through the window next to my bed. Noise was being made outside of my door but my ears only heard silence.  I didn’t remember where I lived or where I belonged. I must be lost I thought so I asked the lady in blue where I was again. This time I was too tired to raise my voice so I whispered. The woman stopped what she was doing and turned to face me. She was folding clothes and placing them in a closet located in front of my bed. “What happened to me?” Silence. “Where am I?” Silence. She turned around and stepped to the foot of my bed, looking me straight in the eye. “You’re in Moss Rehab Hospital because you were hurt in a really bad car accident.”

11 years later, I still cry. I don’t know what I cry about though. As I’m writing this, I feel like I can cry. Can you mourn someone if you don’t remember them or their life? Sometimes I want to be the old Ashley but I don’t know her. When I think I remember something she did, I get all nostalgic over the memory. I second-guess my memory though. You know how people say “You don’t know what you don’t have” I don’t know what it’s like to remember accurately. I have to let go of her and I wish others would too. She’s not me. She died and I morphed out in her body. The body that was just about lifeless for a month. It’s as weird for me as it is for you to read that. It’s strange shit. I’m still analyzing and trying to figure out who I am since she vanished.