1! K.

Malara

Fairytale

! So this- this is what happily ever after looks like. It’s that electric excitement that you can feel in

the tips of your fingers, that makes you wish you could bottle this moment up and keep it in a glass jar for

the rest of your life. These are the moments I wish I could look at forever, gazing out at a sea of

mortarboards and tassels, looking over my right shoulder to see my family beaming back at me,

concentrating on the dignified college officials and professors sitting on the stage. I’m bordering on

giddy excitement, laughing and crying and cheering and I’m in complete disbelief- is this it? This is the

end of college? Is this genuinely happy, perfect moment about to signify the end of the best four years of

my life? The second I move my tassel, does that mean that my time at the only school I’ve ever been

proud of has come to an end? There’s another flash of disbelief, and one of fear... will anyone remember

what I’ve done here? Who I started as, and who I am leaving as? Now there’s a frightening thought.

Amongst all this joy and elation the very small child inside of me is scared of that big, bad, jobless world

out there. This sinking sense of disbelief distracts me momentarily, and in my mind’s eye I can see the

last four years literally flash by in a whirlwind blur... crying in the car on the way to orientation, crying in

the car on the way to move in, crying when my mom left (the thought still brings stinging tears to my

eyes), crying with my first roommate (who ended up becoming my best friend), very slowly finding my

niche, joining club (after club, after club, after club...), moving out, moving in, moving out, signing a

lease, falling in love, losing my dad, getting sick, falling more in love, abruptly being dumped out of love,

finding the friends that I will spend the rest of my life with, spending every one of the last sixteen days of

college laughing, crying, partying, and staying up all night... they’ve all brought me here, to this theatre

with its pretty lights and illustrious grandeur, so that I can hear my name called out, summa cum laude,

shake hands with the President, and know that I have made my mark on this world. I have found me, and

for that, I’ll let the tears of happiness run down my cheeks (thank goodness for waterproof mascara).

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!

! Freshmen and sophomore year are almost a blur to me, when I look back at my jar of bottled up

memories. The people, the words, the songs, they spin madly inside this glass prison, desperately trying

to escape back into my stream of consciousness. It isn’t that I want to lock those memories away- in fact I

want everything but that. Those two years were the years in which I grew the most, where I went from a

jaded, sarcastic, big-city girl who hated the world to a driven, poised, community-oriented, still-a-little-

sarcastic woman. I met my match at Iona. Instead of having teachers and administrators who told me to

“save myself from failure and rejection and just go to community college since I wouldn’t get in anywhere

better”, I had professors and faculty members who pushed me to be the best I could be. Certa bonum

certamen. Fight the good fight. I got involved, I stood up and made my voice heard. I volunteered in

community service projects to tutor underprivileged and underperforming students, in soup kitchens

feeding homeless families, delivering blankets, hot beverages and food to the homeless in New York City

at night... I joined the elite Edmund Rice Society, helping develop future leaders and welcoming

incoming students. I was chosen to be the president of the activities board, in charge of campus-wide

programming and an executive board of eleven extremely different personalities. Being as busy as I was

helped me to forget about being homesick and my roommate issues. I even learned to call Iona home.

! As I shake my jar of memories, my junior year floats to the top, and rests precariously against the

glass, just clear enough for me to watch, from a distance. Junior year... can I really be halfway done with

college? I’m living in a minuscule basement apartment, christened “the Hobbit Hole” by some of my

taller friends, my roommate and I don’t get along and this place isn’t big enough for both of us. I escape

whenever I can to my best friend’s apartment. We lay in bed, we cuddle. We watch movies and we talk

and we laugh. It’s nice. I feel safe when I’m with him. And then one night it happens. He’s just looking

at me and I’m looking at him and everything is completely still, like the rest of the world is moving and we

aren’t. I can feel the earth spinning, and right now, the only thing that matters, the only thing that exists

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in this imperfect world is us. My small, delicate hands fit perfectly in his. The next thing I know I’m

kissing him- and fireworks are exploding behind my eyes. Brilliant reds and blues, shooting silver stars

and magnificent kaleidoscope colors are dancing for me, and only for me. This is my private Eden, this is

my paradise on Earth. I’ve fallen for my best friend and I don’t even give a damn about the months I’ve

spent trying not to. This moment feels like it spans across decades- centuries, even, and when we pull

away all I can feel is this incredible sense of contentment. I’m tongue tied- usually I can’t shut up= and I

just know it’s okay. Two short, simple words, and everything in my world makes sense. Absolutely

everything.

! And that is exactly where the colorful, ecstatic memories stop, and the heavy, gray, storm clouds

obscure what was good and perfect.

! Is it true, like Robert Frost said, that “nothing gold can stay”? Must “Eden sink to grief”- can

happiness ever last? I thought I had conquered whatever it is that controls our lives- fate, destiny, the

stars, god (if she really exists). I was President of the Gaels Activities Board, I managed an e-board of 11,

a budget of $60,000, I held weekly meetings with representatives from every club on campus, I

programmed events for the entire school, I served as the Community Service Coordinator for the

Edmund Rice Society, I was a star Orientation leader, I had perfect grades, the perfect best friend, the

perfect almost boyfriend... and then the world’s heaviest, most hideous and unthinkable wrench was

thrown into my perfect plans. My father died, suddenly, and unexpectedly; and after seven years of not

speaking to him, I had no idea what to do, where to go, how to feel, what to say... Gone. In an instant. The

things I felt that day, they aren’t feelings I would wish on anyone. I was frozen- emotionally, physically,

spiritually. The entire world was zooming past me and my feet were glued to the floor. My arms, my legs,

they felt like lead, so heavy that I couldn’t even lift my hand to wipe away the tears. The air rushed out of

my lungs so fast that had I not been standing near a couch, in the middle of a very crowded Student Union

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!

on an abnormally warm February Monday, I would have crumpled to the ground. I was numb. I couldn’t

see, I didn’t feel, I was rendered completely and utterly speechless. It is a strange feeling, to wish that

you can fight against finality, against reality... but fight I did to no avail. There were so many words left

unspoken between my father and I, so many apologies I wished I could put forth as a peace offering. But

no matter how hard I tried, no matter how violently I cried and begged and pleaded, there was nothing I

could do to bring my father back. One single moment was all I asked, and there wasn’t anyone in the

world who could give it to me.

! And then, after a very rainy and dark week, the storm clouds lifted, in this sealed jar of memories.

You can see a watery rainbow, a faint reminder that life does move on despite tragedy. And then an eerie

calm takes hold. Something else is wrong, very wrong. It’s just like that sinking feeling you get in a

horror movie right before the psycho killer hacks the unsuspecting victim into a hundred bloody chunks

with a chainsaw. It’s just like the feeling you get when the sky turns green, like day old pea soup, before

the tornado siren goes off. All bets are off- there are no rules, no laws, everything is out of your control.

Such becomes this memory, and I barely remember what happens. This is a flash-bang memory... I’m

watching myself die, like I’m watching a lame movie on television that you can’t help but leave on...

schadenfreude, everybody. Flash- I’m laying in bed, after months of being sick. Bang- I’m being

diagnosed with everything from chronic otitis media to pneumonia to asthmatic bronchitis to manic

depression. Flash- I’m sinking in and out of consciousness, sleeping 20 hours a day. Bang- I’m hearing

what seems like the zillionth doctor tell my mother to find an oncologist. Flash- I’m lying in a hospital

bed, hooked up to heart machines, IVs, and being monitored round-the-clock by the world’s most

uncaring nurses. Bang- I’m sitting in a chair in yet another doctor’s office. I’m being told that I have a

rare, incurable auto-immune disease that is treated with chemotherapy. My face is eerily blank. Flash-

I’m being told that I can’t go back to school. Bang- I’m out of my chair, gasping for air, screaming and

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crying and banging my fists on my legs, I’m kneeling on the floor furious that I can’t go back to the only

place where I’ve ever felt like I was making a difference- the ONLY place where I wasn’t afraid to be me.

! The only place.

! That memory fades away, and I’m still watching this horrible movie that has become my actual

reality. I watch as my hair falls out, as my face and body become puffy and bloated from the steroids, as I

heave into garbage cans as the chemotherapy “works”. I watch as I can’t do anything but sit up because

the pain in my lungs is so fierce, so persistent that I scream “Just.Let.Me.Die.”

! Then, even without the memories safely held behind the glass, I remember the world’s most

awful dream... I’m in a puffy white cloud, and everything is soft and everything glows in a golden hue. I’m

oddly solid, and I feel like I’m slipping through these clouds, that is is getting harder and harder to hang

on to anything substantial. My dad is here, and I realize quite suddenly, that I’m in heaven. A surge of

panic floods my brain- is this it? Heaven? I didn’t say goodbye.

! I didn’t say goodbye to anyone.

He’s telling me that it is okay to let go, that there’s a place for me in this golden, soft, puffy, cloud world.

And then I see the most beautiful woman, with hair of gold and an expression on her face that puts you at

ease instantly. She tells me I have my choice, that I can come to Heaven, but that I should know that there

is someone on earth waiting for me... she waves her arm and all I can see in front of me is the boy I can’t

live without= my best friend, whispering to me, “Don’t leave me, Kat. I’m not ready to let you go. Come

back”.

! And so I go back.

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!

! The pain some days is almost unbearable, like a hundred thousand nails being forced under your

skin, and I’ve realized how much I’ve taken the simple act of being able to breathe for granted. Every few

days I want to give up, I want to go back to the heaven in my dream, but my best friend keeps me here, on

earth, through the darkest days and the darker nights. I count down the seconds, the minutes, the hours,

the days, the weeks until I can go back to my normal habitat. Everyday the ache for Iona becomes worse

and worse. It feels like someone has wedged a stake into my heart and every day it rips open my heart

even more. My waking hours are spent in agony, as my guilt stricken heart is wracked with the

inevitability of thinking about my father, about my life, about how every plan I had for the future has been

shattered into a million, tiny little pieces.

! Thirty-eight mind-numbingly long days later, I’m standing in front of my bathroom mirror,

putting on whatever make-up I can find that will make my eyes look more open, my cheeks rosier, my

smile brighter. This doctor’s appointment is my only shot at the elusive get-out-of-jail-free card, and I’m

tired of waiting for my body to throw doubles on its own. I get to the doctor’s office, and my palms are

sweating. My heart is thudding in my chest, dangerously close to exploding. I let the vampire tech take

my standard 5 tubes of that dark, crimson liquid that my veins so willingly pour forth, and I sit. And I

wait. The doctor’s brow is furrowed, I’m getting more and more anxious by the second. He sighs,

scribbles some things in my chart, flips back to old blood labs, test results, cat scans... I’m desperate. In

my most stubborn and obstinate voice I declare that I will be going back to school, no matter what anyone

says.

! That elusive moment that I’ve been counting down to finally arrives with a cautious permission to

go back, with warning after warning to “take it slow”.

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! SLOW?! No such thing! I’m going home! I let out a squeal of delight, several rib=breaking

coughs, and immediately change every social networking status that I can. The texts fly out as fast as my

formerly nimble fingers will allow- I’m going back.

! The rest of junior year sped by, it was as if someone had grabbed my jar of memories and thrown

into into a centrifuge... every day blended together, I was in the place I loved, doing the things I loved,

and even though I was more tired and sicker than I cared to admit, I woke up everyday knowing that I was

lucky to be alive- and that no matter how bad things were that day, no matter how tired I was, no matter

how desperately I needed a cup of liquid energy (caffeine being on the forbidden list, right under

alcohol), things couldn’t get worse than they had been.

! Learning how to live my life with all the stipulations this disease had so un-welcomingly forced

into my life’s agenda became easier with every passing day. One day however, stuck out like a sore

thumb on my calendar- my 21st birthday. Alcohol was absolutely forbidden, so out the window went my

plans to have my first legal drink at the bar near school. Unwillingly resigned to the fact that I could not

have my own drink to celebrate making it to 21 years young, I agreed to a small birthday dinner with my

best friend, and two our of closest friends. Much to my surprise, our intimate dinner for four turned into

a surprise birthday extravaganza of thirty of my closest friends nearly knocking me down with shock as

they shouted “SURPRISE!”

! I nearly turned and ran from the pure shock of it all. But as usual, my best friend wouldn’t let me

run. He caught me in his arms and looked at me so tenderly, so lovingly, that it was at that very moment I

knew that this brief, fleeting glance coupled with two words, most often said without meaning, meant

everything in the world. Thank you.

! I knew that I didn’t need any other explanation for the waves of emotion rushing through my

body- I was 100%, completely, head-over-heels, can’t eat, can’t sleep, over the fence world=series kind

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!

of in love with him. It was that indescribable feeling of the purest elation when you know that requited

love exists, when every nerve of your body is on edge, zinging and flinging neurons to your brain that

sends off those waves of emotion that allow you to communicate with your significant other without

uttering a single syllable. Tears of happiness leaked out of my eyes as I gazed in absolute wonder at the

people sitting in front of me, people who really did care about me. We sat, and we ate, and we talked and

laughed, and drank (I figured one glass of wine wouldn’t kill me), ate ice cream cake (my favorite), and

spent the night in the most marvelous of company.

! The next few months flew by, school was almost over, and there were graduation parties and

dinners and ceremonies to attend for my best friend (who had earned his MBA in a year flat!). Zingy

spring days turned into lazy days of summer, spent on the beach with my sisters, or up at school with my

best friend. Until of course, the entire reason I pushed myself to stay alive during the scariest days of my

life was gone in the amount of time it takes to send a text message. My relationship ended- and seemingly

my livelihood. I felt completely and utterly alone. He didn’t see us being together “officially” or at all

anymore. And in that instant, my best friend was gone from my life. I shed my tears and allowed myself to

rid myself of the emotions that threatened to suffocate me every time something reminded me of him.

! Perhaps it is because I subconsciously blocked out the worst of the emotional months, perhaps it

is because they truly did fly faster than I expected them to, but before I knew it, I finally became a second

semester senior. Gone were the days of student teaching and observation hours, gone were the core

classes. All that was left were electives and the extracurriculars. I breezed through the semester,

spending every waking moment laughing and partying and soul searching with the people who I know I

will spend the rest of my life with. I spent hour after hour after hour packing up four years worth of

memories and of all the “stuff” I had in cardboard boxes, to go from my home back to my mother’s house.

We stayed up all night for my 22nd birthday, celebrating in style what we hadn’t been able to celebrate

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the year before. We went to Honors Convocation, where I walked down the aisle decked out like an

academic war hero to accept the many honors and awards that I had so dutifully earned. We laughed and

cried at the annual Leadership Awards dinner, where our hard work and dedication to our extracurricular

activities was finally recognized. We dined in style at the Trustee’s Dinner, generously graced with

$10,000 seats by some very rich and very old alumnus. We barbecued over a charcoal grill in the

pouring rain for our Senior Events Committee hospitality dinner, and we spent our Wednesday evenings

out eating fifty-cent wings and drinking dollar drafts. We stayed up all night, desperately trying to finish

our papers and study for finals in between our spontaneous dance parties, complete with renditions of

every Disney song known to man. We dressed to the nines and danced the night away at our senior

formal, and we made champagne toasts at our senior send off. We reflected in our Baccalaureate mass,

and then finally, after 1,357 days... we walked into Madison Square Garden and took our seats in a sea of

mortarboards and tassels, ready to begin the next phase of our lives.

            More often than not, graduation speeches are dull and boring.  There’s a person at a podium

warning you of the sad and sorry state of the world outside the pretty, ivy-covered walls of your safe little

college.  They try to inspire hope through speeches driven by fear and anger.  But honestly, who wants to

hear that?  We know the world out there is ugly.  We know that we will be the ones who have to clean up

and fix the mess left to us by corrupt politicians and selfish governments.  How dare a graduation speaker

take away the pure joy you should be experiencing at your commencement exercises?

            You can imagine my relief when the wonderful woman known as Abigail Disney took to the stage to

deliver our commencement address.  She took to the stage and shamelessly pandered to us about our

achievements and our happiness.  After all, who better to talk about happiness than a person who grew up

in the Happiest Place on Earth?

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            Ms. Disney spoke to us in a way that inspired the most cynical of graduates.  She made us stop and

drink in the moment, and take notice of where we were, who surrounded us, who was t here rooting for

us.  Her words inspired us in that delectable way that gives you chills.  And as I took stock of where I was

and who surrounded me, I realized that I was surrounded by my family, my friends, my classmates and my

professors, my advisors and a thousand souls who pushed me, pulled me, supported me, and simply

helped me to become the strong, courageous woman I am today.  I know who I am, who I’ve become, who

I’ve chosen to be in this life, and I absolutely intend on leaving this world a better place simply for having

known me.  I know what feeds my soul and fills my heart.  This is my happily ever after, and I intend on

celebrating these happily ever after moments tomorrow, next month, twenty years from now, and on the

absolute last day of my life.

            Abigail said it best, and I hope she doesn’t mind me borrowing her words. “Everyone of us walks

the earth by virtue of a thousand moments of grace, both large and small, most of which we barely

notice.”  She told us that we were answered prayers, and truly, I am.  Selfishly I can claim this moment all

to my self, but I won’t.  This moment is as much for me as it is for my mother, my sisters, my

grandmother, my friends, my advisors and my confidants, and above all, for every single person in this

great wide world suffering through rare, chronic, and incurable diseases.  I am a shining beacon of light,

bright enough to guide even the most distant and lost soul home.  And as I rise, ready to take that walk

across the stage to celebrate my courage and my perseverance, I know that I am the brightest and most

illustrious light in the whole theatre.

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Copyright 2011 K. Malara