Originally I wanted to talk about how I spent yesterday afternoon dozing off at a local park, but then I realized “Don’t I have something better to talk about — something that doesn’t just involve me?”
This post was intended to be posted on my tumblr account but in the end I decided to post it here. Today I finished a tragedy I started reading the other day – I won’t say the title of the story simply because I want to be unreasonable like that :p Anyway, it was the kind of story that played with my emotions. It made me love the characters and be moved by their existence. Heck, it made me want to be a doctor for a slight moment, and never before in my life have I envisioned myself to be a doctor! The story made me ache inside, like an urge to be able to help people live longer…but I hate the hospital environment and how everyone is practically sad/in pain. Although quite a number of people have told me that I am quite the optimistic and cheerful person, I guess I’m not exactly what people think I am. Well, at least in this hospital setting.
The story made me think. And I’d like to share my thoughts with you. My thoughts about life and death. As a sixteen year old girl with no name to boast of, you most probably wouldn’t be interested in reading what I have to say about life, and I could understand how you feel. But you know what? I don’t want to keep these feelings to myself. It’s your choice if you want to read on, and it was my choice to open up to you.
It may just be my opinion, but why is it that people have so many idle days where they just waste time away, but when they are informed that a loved one’s or their own life is going to end soon, they make every day a celebration and say things like, “I wish I had more time!” But we did! We like to waste time and put things for later, but what if “later” never happened? Just because tomorrow is listed in the calendar doesn’t mean we’d be there to witness the sun rise.
While reading the story I realized how lucky I am to be normal. Well, technically I consider myself as a product with a defect. If the world was a factory and we were the products, I’d probably be disposed of for having a crooked back. But then I realized that other people have it worse. I need to wear glasses to see properly, but some people can’t see — period. Sometimes I complain how I can’t draw quite right, and yet there are people who could have been great artists but they were never born with hands to begin with — or maybe never lived to grow old enough to even learn how to hold a pen. Some people are aware that they won’t live very long, and in some way I think they have it good. Although they may be experiencing hardship — mentally, physically, and emotionally — they most probably realize that they need to treasure every moment they had left. And the people around them most likely appreciate their presence while they’re still alive. I don’t treasure every day of my life. I take things for granted. I take my health for granted. I can eat whatever I want, I live a comfortable life, I am taking the course I want — not everybody gets these things, and I take them for granted. But I shouldn’t be. The story made me realize that, and I’m grateful that I stumbled upon it.
A few days before my sixteenth birthday, I decided on a whim to become a bone marrow donor. I was so scared. I won’t even try act cool and say that I did it with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my power. Because I was so afraid. I don’t remember exactly how I felt or thought or acted on that day, but I do remember that I wanted to somehow give back to the world all the blessings that it has given to me. It was supposedly “My Gift to the World.” Today that feeling strengthened. Now, I don’t want to just limit it to my bone marrow. This feeling may just be a fleeting thing, but at this moment this is how I feel. It may change in the future, so I’m not going to be signing up for anything just yet, but when I am of legal age I would reconsider this again — I want to donate everything I could when I die. God forbid if I die in a fire, or drown in the Pacific, or maybe run missing and my body would never be found… But if I were to die a peaceful death, slowly deteriorating and fading out of existence… If my organs could give someone a second chance to live… If my eyes could help a father see his child for the first time, why not? If my heart could add years to a newlywed’s life, how could I refuse? If a part of me could live on in the body of someone else, I would be honored. I’ve wasted many days, and I believe that these people would know how to treasure every moment of life. I would never be a doctor, but I could be a donor. At least in some way I could help save a life.
But maybe I’m being careless for saying all this so early in my life. I’d like to think that I have a long life ahead of me, and that I’d be able to help people throughout my life and long after I’ve died. I could never be a social worker… I won’t lie and say that I’m selfless, because I’m very selfish, and I couldn’t even take care of myself properly, how much more someone in need. I’m bad at physical work, cleaning, and I couldn’t cook to save my life. But maybe I’m not being careless. While writing this post, a thought crossed my mind — what if the eye I give would live in the body of a boy that would grow up to be the doctor I could never be? Or if my kidney would walk on the runway of the model I was never qualified to become? Maybe, in some way, I’d be able to live the dreams I never got to fulfill in this manner. I’d have helped them, and they’d have helped me. Win-win situation, I guess? 
But like I said, I may be too young to think about my death. I don’t want to be the type of person that endured through life just awaiting for the day she may cease to exist. I guess you could think of this post as my “Back-up Plan”. If I mess up my life and think that I’m not able to be of any use to anyone, I could remember this donor plan and feel a sense of purpose. Even if I don’t mess up and actually end up living a good life, I could think of this as my grand exit. Either way I’d be able to say that I’d done something good with my life.
End note: The title of this post is “Sixty Seven” because the story had 67 glorious chapters.
