The Other Sophia

By GG_LeBode , Brooklyn, NY

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Image Credit: Hadley B., Marblehead, MA

Dear Sophia,

It takes an uncomfortable amount of introspection to admit that I am “the other Sophia.” I’m the one who has to sacrifice my last vowel so that we can be identified separately. I am the one who should give up a letter of her identity. Every time someone shouts our name in a crowd and I crane my neck like Tantalus to his fruit tree, my heart stiffens when I realize they are speaking to you. Whenever they announce an award and speak my three syllables, I hold my breath for the last name. Then I have to hold my tongue while you bow so low your medals scrape the floor.

The stab of “almost” and “so close” is always the slightest bit sharper when I lose to myself. Gold medals shine brighter next to silver when they are engraved with the same string of letters. It’s not your fault, of course. The only first place we’ll ever share is Most Common Name in the United States for Four Years in a Row. There are more than 50,000 of us in our country alone. But you probably already knew that.

Every morning I watch you disappear with friends and I think, You know exactly where you belong. Every question I answer incorrectly is a reminder that I am the other Sophia. Every stolen glance at you is a bitter wish to be as good as – no, superior to – you. I don’t know if you catch me jabbing you with covetous glares, but even if you did, you would graciously forgive me, like the saint I’ll never be. I’ve always seen you as competition. You were the Sophia I wished I was. You were always one inch taller, one friend more likable, and one grade point smarter. I was Ron Weasley to your Harry Potter. I turned you into an ideal that I aspired to and impersonated.

You aren’t the only Sophia I’d rather be. There is the one in math class who finishes her tests before I can scrawl out our name. There is a clone in dance who can fouetté while I wobble in a passé. There is the one laughing with her friends while I watch, only pretending to read. There are far too many people who give me unattainable standards. While other girls wish they were Jennifer Lawrence, I still can’t get over those god-damned Sophias.

“Sophie,” I shout at myself, “would you please clean your dorky glasses and look at things objectively? You need to get over yourself. Do you really think no one understands how you feel? You have become a cliché of a teenager. Maybe I should get you a 1D album and a Twilight book. We can meet up at the Starbucks.” I cannot succumb to the stereotypes of a generation. I must stop lathering myself in self-pity and clean my glasses every once in a while.

It’s amazing what clear vision can do for a person. Suddenly I see the pimples hiding in the forest of your hairline. I see the crescents of stress and sleep deprivation beneath your eyes. I see the tears and the strength and all the bullet holes from everyone else who put a target on your back. I see a girl who wishes her name wasn’t so freaking common and that she could hide from all the pressure. I blink, to make sure I wasn’t imagining some wraith in this goddess’s place, and I see a girl just like me.

Sophia, you are gifted and virtuous and the reincarnation of Galatea, but you are not the goddess I made you out to be. I turned you into an idol and a martyr and a model in a magazine, but you are as human as I am. For every insecurity I flicked onto you, I hope they didn’t stick.

I am not the other Sophia. I am no one’s lesser version.

– Sophie

Texas Tough

By prokofiev, Bothell, WA

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Image Credit: Dan Z., Marblehead, MA

The author's comments:

Looking for photos of us, the ones I could find made me laugh; of the few photos I located, one captured him wearing a hat emblazoned with the words "NRA Freedom", and in another construction tools are visible in the corner. Lacking access to more than a few photos, I have relied on verbal accounts to learn about him; after learning so much about him now, after his death, I wish so much that I could talk to him now, with my greater understanding of him and awareness of the world around me. He was flawed, and while I recognize his shortcomings, I also celebrate his qualities I admire. Within this piece I worked to balance both aspects of him, the negative and the positive. For both the people you love or agree with and the people you hate or disagree with, have an open mind, and acknowledge both the good and then bad things about them. People are complex, confusing beings; do not try to simplify them in order to understand them.

“Junk fish!”

I look on in horror as the small fish attached to my pole is thrown on the ground and squished by my grandfather’s foot. Just six years old, I am on my first fishing trip, and my first catch is oozing, crushed on the ground. The fish (or thanks to my grandpa “seafood pancake”) is thrown back into the rushing river, no longer wriggling.

At the time, I could not fathom why my grandfather was so cruel to the small specimen dangling on my line; however, now I know that his actions, though blunt, had a clear cause. I was close to tears at his brutal killing of the writhing fish, and my grandmother was appalled at his action and told him so. Yet the specific species of fish I had caught was invasive and parasitic, feeding on many of the native species to the point where some species were nearing extinction, so to my grandfather it was only right to prevent it from further defiling the river. Growing up in Texas, my grandfather felt that hunting and fishing were merely natural activities. To him, there were was no point of those “hippie ideas” about saving the animals and abstaining from meat. Vegetarianism was a ridiculous concept really, for why would God have given us meat if we were not meant to eat it? Nonetheless, his mentality did not mean he did not care about the ecosystems he entered, in fact, he valued the forest and its creatures more than many of the environmentalists I see today. Respectful of the habitat he entered and the animals with in it and careful to only take what he would use, my grandfather instilled a sense of reverence towards nature and the organisms that lived in the environment within me.

Now, let us fast forward three years. I sit on the floor of my grandparent’s spacious house, shouting triumphantly after winning a rousing game of cards with my brother, as an old dog limps pathetically down the stairs towards us. A pup of his father’s farm dog, Rufus was a wedding present from my grandfather’s first wedding. After his first wife died, my grandfather moved, taking the dog with him; now that he is married again, the old dog is all he has left of his first marriage. The wooden stairs prove to be too slick for the sagging creature’s weathered paws and arthritic knees, and the dog slips and falls the last five steps. Suddenly, my grandfather stands up from his large leather chair and declares,

“I have to go do something.”

His heavy boots stomp on the ground; his hand reaches towards the dog’s throat, grabbing the unfortunate animal’s collar and dragging his weary body to the door. As he walks outside, grabbing the hunting gun from the closet, my grandmother begins to cry and my mother looks distraught, staring at his broad back in confusion. I hold my breath, eyes glued on the closing door, waiting for-for what?

I am smothered by silence.

A gunshot cuts the static of anticipation.

My mother gasps, the door slams. My grandfather walks silently back inside, his back hunched forward as he returns the gun to the closet. He sits back on the leather chair without a single word or glance to the rest of us in the room. The dog does not return.

Later, armed with only a shovel and old memories, my grandfather digs a grave as the heavy rain ceaselessly soaks the earth. He covers his venerable companion’s body with dirt, next to an apple tree the dog had spent many hours lounging under when the summer sun was still shining and the heat wrapped its stifling arms around you.

Born in Texas during the Great Depression, a veteran of a world war, thrice married and twice widowed, my grandfather was neither tactful nor sophisticated. His fingernails were perpetually caked with dirt, and I never saw him wearing any shoes but his crusty brown work boots. He was bow-legged, broad shouldered, and had a wide face and thick square glasses. A carpenter after his stint in the army as a undistinguished infantryman, he was missing three of his fingers from a lapse in judgement. Sometime after his third marriage, he was in his shed using a table saw, when in a moment of distraction, he sliced three of his fingers off at the knuckle. Unable to accept the deterioration of his body in old age, he continued to work another year, until a fall off a ladder spurred my grandmother to finally speak her mind and prohibit any further construction. Church was a weekly social event to him, where he talked with the other elders about church business, their wives, their grandchildren, their work. Raised in the south during an era of gender roles and segregation, he cared little for the feminists, was far from politically correct in terms of race, and firmly believed women should stay at home and tend the house. He smoked and he drank and he smoked some more despite my grandmother’s pleadings; he would never break his nicotine addiction or fully abstain from alcohol. However, he was always happy to see my siblings and I. Grandpa would greet us every morning and bid us goodnight each evening, and never turned down a game of cards or an invitation to share a crossword.

Sometime around my third year in school, my grandfather had a stroke, and after that, I saw very little of him. My mother warned me extensively about the potential effects, both physical and mental, and I prepared myself to see a broken shell of my proud grandfather. I saw little change at first though, just rare times of random confusion, or a delayed response here and there. Then we recieved more bad news. The years of smoking had invariably made their mark on his body; a cancer had bloomed in his lungs and had grown past the point of foreseable recovery. Not one month later he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. The various terms used to label my grandfather's aliments meant nothing to me though, until, inevitably, one morning of our visit to his house, he called me “Louise”, my mother’s name. That was the day I began to see deeper, past the impenetrable image I had of him, past his face torn with wrinkles, into the more human, mortal aspect of him.

He appeared tough, rough inside, often uncaring, speaking and acting bluntly, when really he merely saw no point in social convention or dishonesty even for the sake of propriety. I loved him, but was intimidated by his strict discipline and harsh voice; he demanded respect and obedience, and was extremely pragmatic. As I am now I have very little in the way of similar political or social beliefs; I dislike hunting and am socially liberal, speak openly about my support of the LGBT community, and am a vocal feminist. However, if I were to have told him any of these things, he would have told me he didn’t care. He might have told me I was wrong, and most definitely would not have accepted my sexuality and gender views as valid, but also would not use those characteristics to judge my person. In all honesty, he cared so little about what people said, (especially politicians, as he made so very clear every single time politics were mentioned,) but instead judged by character, the way one acted towards other people.

According to my mother, he loved my smile, because it reminded him of Flo, my grandmother. With a small smile, she recounts how he loved me and my inexhaustible energy, how he thought I was a "a riot. You had that grin, and you were such a character; it cracked him up". With all of my heart, I wish he could see me now.

But come now, a last memory to send you off.

I am 11, and we are on the beach. It is cold and my hair is whirling around me in the confused winds, my feet on the gritty, freezing surface of packed sand, my ankles splattered with sea foam from the receding wave. My grandfather is walking beside me, bent over from the weight of the years and the breaking of his own body. He is post-stroke and constantly confused, deprived of clarity. The rest of my family is further down the beach, laughing and screaming; in the fog they look distant, and their yells echo mournfully down the endless stretch of sand. My grandfather and I do not talk, but we walk together, our footprints side by side. He is nearest to the water, and when I look back his footsteps are gone, engulfed by the waves that caress the sand so thoughtfully, while mine continue alone. I am suddenly crying, devastated at the changes that have come to him and the future where he will be gone. When he notices and inquires why, calling me ‘Carol’, his daughter’s name, I lie and tell him that I just miss seeing him so often. He is thoughtful for an exceedingly long time, to the point where I think he has forgotten, but then he starts and turns to me, saying:

“Don’t cry, that isn’t worth none of your tears. Save them for something...something that matters.”

But he did matter more than I knew and he himself knew. Five years after his death, I still miss him. He was gratingly honest, caring, and stood firmly for what he believed in, without letting his strong beliefs affect how he treated people. And despite our differing views, for that I admire him.

CLOAK OF GRATITUDE

By Kathleen Hewitt

I let the autumn night air in through any window I had in my bedroom. I was getting older and I was never cool enough. Covering myself with a gold silk comforter from a beloved aunt, my body was held in fluffy down while my face and foot took in the leafy breeze. Auntie had given me this quilt, a gold so deep it was almost part of the crimson family, years after it was handmade in the old country. Under this mantle of comfort, the talks began.

She’d let herself in, a slight tap at the door first, closing it behind her while whispering, “Hi Mama.” Sliding under the loving fabric, she had her own blanket clutched in her hand. She would softly run it on her cheek, even now, at this age, and even now, when the blanket looked more like a narrow flannel scarf with holes in it.

I smiled in the dark room, moonlit. On those nights when there was a hunter moon, the talks would go on forever. Sleep could wait.

“I don’t even like football, I don’t know why I go to those games, but everyone goes, it’s what they do. And then everybody worries about who he or she is sitting with or who’s talking to whom. It’s like you have to be cool and go. Boys never gather in a big crowd like that and watch the girls play, not that I’d want them too. I’m having enough trouble with that…”

I’d shift a little, waiting for more, loving her 16-year-old voice.

The talks started a long time ago with her constant inquiries as to when ‘Riley’ the dog would be born and become part of the family. “Aren’t you just so excited?” she’d say. And she’d go on about what he might look like, the things she’d do with him, and how responsible she’d be. She was 10 when I thought a puppy, a ‘Golden Achiever’, she had begged for, might help her get through the time of my cancer treatment. The little pup with “the cutest face I’ve ever seen in my life” brought her the joy I had hoped for.

And then on some very dark nights, the words would be softer, “Are they really, really, really sure that you’re going to be alright?” I could smell her strawberry shampoo, hear the ‘blankie’ smoothing her face, and know that her eyes were on my nighttime shadow. I would tell her that I would be fine, that I had a lot to do, that she and I had a lot of things to do together, for years to come. On those nights, she’d come a little closer and fall asleep a little sooner. As a young teen, she counted on me always being awake and ready to listen. And I was. No little knock on the door but rather her sweet cherry lip-gloss coming into the room, “Mama, you’re not going to believe this one.” And she’d settle in and tell me about her life with every breathless detail. She had been out at a friend’s house and I had gone to bed early knowing her Dad would drive her home. Those nights even years after treatment were painful ones, worse when lying down, but the exhaustion had to be dealt with. The healing talks into the night got us both through.

Tears found the lush comforter some nights, hers and mine. Her sobbing about a friend’s betrayal would bring her through the door in a quiet sweep. She’d come to the other side, my side, and lay down deep, her head on my chest. The tears of my girl were always in some darkened bedroom of her soul. She rarely opens that door.

On summer nights, the ocean came in, with her beautiful long golden salty locks and tossing the too warm comforter aside, we’d giggle and belly laugh our way into the night. She’d stay, enjoying the cool of the air conditioner on those saturated nights and I’d love waking often, as I do, to find her hair all over the pillows, ‘blankie’ in hand, and our cat curled at her legs.

When there were times, weeks of nights, when she slept in her own room, not needing to share as much, I’d miss her. I couldn’t help but wonder if this was it, the time when it would stop, a natural end to a beautiful part of my girl and me.

And just when I think it’s part of our past, there’s a quiet knock and her long legs come in. She asks, “Are you still awake, Mama?”

I shift under the cloak of gratitude, whispering a silent prayer of thanks to the spirit that brings us love like this, and say, “Yes, honey, how are you? Come on in.”