It was painful, like an arrow shot in the dark. Although you can't see it, you can feel it coming for you know it's inevitable, silently traveling through the shadowy night, and once it strikes you, a scream of anguish is your only release. I was only a young girl when it happened: and that arrow sunk deep. Eventually time healed the wound as it does to all things, but that little silver scar still remains. It's grown sensitive, and not something that I'd usually tell anyone, but I figure now is the time to open up; to finally release all the pent up memories: the anger, the sadness, the depression. Promise me you'll remember this though: that although time heals all wounds, your mind can still remain in tact, and trust me, memories are just as painful.

Divorce. It's something that so many children go through now a days, and it happens so often that it's become a normal thing to this society. I was only 9 when my parents told me the news. What would I do without my father? Things would never be the same. Yet all I can remember was the tears running down my face, crying so intensely that I was eventually rendered breathless: all the while these terrible thoughts were racing through my mind. I could hear this little vindictive voice, hissing, 'you knew this was going to happen. You saw the signs, you knew. . You knew.' I did know, but I also knew, through my tear-welled eyes, knotted throat and breathless cries, that it was probably for the best. Before they told me, I had noticed some things were amiss in the house. My father never touched my mother anymore, and my mom didn't ever talk to him at all either. We were always out of the house, because when we were home all they did was ignore each other and argue every now and then: things were distant. My mom started hanging out with her friend more often, and eventually they fell for each other. It was time. That's when they told me they were filing for divorce.

It was so complicated: all these things that were happening. Packing up all my belongings, my little brother and I parted ways with our father, later moving in with my mom and her girlfriend. I didn't know how to handle this. I liked my mom's partner, for we had all been good friends for a long time now, and I was best friends with her four children, but it wasn't the same. I was still too young to fully understand the situation.

About two years later, we moved into another house way across town. It was my freshman year, I attended a new school, and I left all my old friends behind: the people that supported me throughout everything were now gone. I felt lonely, and I didn't know what was going to be happening with my new family. It was good, however, and I knew that I was happy with them. Yet I still couldn't get this feeling of emptiness out of my mind. I became depressed; I didn't want to talk to anyone, I didn't want to have friends, I just wanted to be done with school so I could find something better to do. I was a good kid; I attended the higher placement classes, maintained straight A's, and yet, I still felt empty, unaccomplished with myself; a deviant. I started doing things to my body, harming myself because of these disturbing thoughts that ran through my head. You're not good enough. What are you even doing with yourself; you have no real purpose here. You're so alone and nobody cares, you see? I was scared, scared of myself, terrified of these thoughts that wildly set themselves free. I didn't want to be alone, I never liked the feeling. I just didn't know what was so wrong with me that I would do and think these morbid things, however, I knew that it needed to stop immediately, I just needed help, but I couldn't do it on my own.

I found friends, or I should say, friends found me: ones that I still have and love entirely to this very day. They knew what I was into at the time, and they were able to pull me out of it. They made me smile, they made me laugh, and most of all, they made me happy. I was finally able to stop feeling so empty all the time, and that was such a good feeling. I began to look brighter, cheerful, and I started to set myself straight once and for all. I worked even harder in my classes, and maintained an above average GPA. By opening up, I made even more friends, and I realized how much I was missing out by being so antisocial and gloomy all the time. Life itself had been slipping through my fingers: I hadn't realized how gorgeous it truly was.

Once I was able to pick myself up completely from my pit of agony and dust myself off, I knew it was time that I found something to work for. I needed to know what I wanted to be when I got older; what I had planned for myself in the near future. Finally, I decided to start pursuing something that I had been interested in for a while: cosmetology. Around the same age that everything started happening, I had become captivated in this world of cosmetology. Coloring hair was the most captivating. So captivating that my hair had been every shade in the rainbow – all at once, even! During my sophomore year I was notified about a program that, through the use of your high school, offered free beauty school classes – perfect. I set these goals for myself: to maintain my straight A's, to graduate both from beauty school and high school, and to attend college for entrepreneurship classes so that I could start my own salon business. Attending cosmetology school is like having a job, except you only can receive tips. We work in a salon of our own, and we have to go there Monday through Friday from 1:00 pm – 6:00 pm: so I had to have my high school schedule altered so that I could attend on time. It's neat, too, because with cosmetology school, they have you do community service hours, so we do fundraisers like March of Dimes and things like that. It's great that way too, because, since mostly all of my time is taken up by cosmetology school and high school, I can still get my community service done. And although my time is so limited, I've been able to keep up with my personal goals: and I'm actually quite proud of myself and where I stand today.

I'm sure that if it hadn't been for those friends: those people that I hold dear to me, till this very day I would probably be the same way that I had been. I would've eventually broken down completely, forgetting about the world and all of it's nonsensical chaos. My sea of despair would have my corpse floating upon it, feeding me these awful thoughts about everything; and yet, it isn't. I feel like I've become a whole new person: my outlook on this world has changed entirely and I've found new meaning for myself: a purpose. I have set goals, created dreams and aspirations, and I can not wait to see the day when I accomplish them: I'm fighting so hard already. On another note, I love my family, all of them, so much, through thick and thin, and I do believe, with all my heart, that there couldn't have been a better choice for my mother. She's so happy now, and although I can't quite say the same thing for my father, I think it was better for him too. We haven't lost connection completely either, me and my brother visit him and stay at his house every other weekend. So things have been going well for me now, and I can finally say that yes, even though I've been put through so much, I can still smile, and I can still be happy. It's the best thing that could ever happen: to finally achieve this desired happiness. Before you can do something; before you can have the heart to pursue your dreams, you must be happy, and you must be committed, for your happiness and well being comes first and foremost, and that's what I have been able to learn from my past, and I will never, ever forget it.