Dear Dad

September 8th

September 8th,

            My first summer in California was, as expected, perfection.  The weather was beautiful and so was Anabella.  I still haven’t told Anabella I love her.  I wanted to so many times but I didn’t.  It was either that I couldn’t build up the courage or that it was just not the right time.

            So the first day of school again.  Back to homeroom with people who ignore my presence.  I sat in the seat I usually sat in last year.  Everyone was chatting with friends and totally ignoring the teacher who was handing out papers and trying to re-explain the dress code as teachers did every year.  No short shorts, no thin tank tops, no bra straps.  Did anyone ever follow the dress code, no. 

            I was handed my schedule for this year and it was once again written in a secret military code.  I turned to the same girls as I did last year and said, “Second year, and I still don’t know what this means.”  The same mean girl as last year grabbed the paper and read it out to me and added, “Why’d you take advanced writing?  Wasn’t writing last year torture enough?”  I had more courage this year than last and had the guts to say, “Maybe I like writing.”  They laughed obnoxiously and tossed the paper back at me.

            Anabella and I actually had some classes together this year.  We had science, English, history, and writing together.  Writing last year with Anabella was interesting.  I had to tell the class what she was trying to say every time she wanted to ask a question.  I also had to read all of her oral presentations to the class.  I didn’t mind I it really.  She was a great writer, way better than I’ll ever be.  She had views on life and people that made you think a little different, made you act a little different, and made you feel a little different.  She could write a piece on family and make you treasure life and the people you love.  She could write a piece on a memory from her past and make you think and act like a little kid again.

            We had writing today and, of course, I sat next to Anabella.  The class hadn’t even begun yet and she was writing away.  I looked over at what she was writing.  She has several papers stacked under the one she was writing on.  They were all covered in her handwriting.  “What are you writing?”  I asked her.  She put the papers away in her bag and signed, ‘The same paper as last year.’

             She had been working on this paper for over a year.  It was the same one that she wouldn’t let me see when I asked last year.  It must be something good because she spends every second of her free time devoted to writing, editing and then rewriting it.  She told me that after all this work she’s still not finished with it.  It must be something brilliant.  If she can write an amazing piece in an hour for an assignment in class, then this piece that’s taken her over a year that she’s writing for fun must be extraordinary.