Walden 1

Amelia Walden

Ms. Levesque

Communications

1 June 2018

To Step Into The Light

I’m not much into the “friends” thing. I’ve seen too many best friends turn on eachother

for reasons that seemed honestly quite stupid. It could be said that my… friendlessness, if that’s

a word, began when I was betrayed by my best friend in fifth grade. Instead of crying and sitting

against a wall for the rest of the year (although I suppose I did that the first few days), I vowed

that I didn’t need friends. I constructed a barrier of independence and isolation never again to be

torn down. But, you could also say that it easily becomes lonely in that isolated space, and lately,

I feel like nobody even notices me anymore. I attend a school with a mere 20 kids in the class,

but I still feel I could leave and never be given a second glance. Who am I kidding, I doubt I’d be

given a first.

* * *

I drag my feet through the ajar doors of the school and assume my usual position on the

couch, armed with a journal and pen. The group of trend-following girls who could probably be

considered “popular” at a larger school huddles in the corner, out of view of the teachers, so that

they can talk about their various boy obsessions and celebrity crushes. The boys are split into

two groups: the group that is stationed around a skateboard and the kids fiddling with a Rubik’s
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Cube. A few of the girls stand at a whiteboard playing a drawing game. The eighth grade is

divided similarly. Everyone could be described as self-absorbed, but that’s just eighth and ninth

graders for you.

Then, the unexpected happens. One of the kids that was previously drawing a detailed

picture of cat, a girl by the name of Opal, steps toward me. Me. This is severely uncharted

territory. The last time I talked to another person of my age was to criticize the fact that no one in

my group for a project knew anything about correct comma placement when we had just been

given a lecture. Naturally, no one listened. Opal interrupts my train of thought.

“Hi, Iris. It’s my birthday this weekend,” she begins. I want to say, “I know, and I also

know that you have a cat named Jellybeans, a pomeranian named Snowflake, and an older sister

that is in college at Stanford, because we’ve been in school together for four years,” but I keep

quiet. This may be the only time I talk to another person in my class for awhile, and I’ll take any

chance I can get.

“A few of the other girls and I are going on a camping trip, if you want to come,” she

offers.

“You are talking to me, right?” I question skeptically.

“No, the other Iris in the class,” she sarcastically adds. “Of course I’m talking to you!”

“Oh, sorry, I just … yeah, I’d love to come!” I hope I don’t regret this. As much as I say I

don’t need or want friends, it is nice to hang out with other people sometimes… I guess.

“Perfect, meet us in the school parking lot Saturday morning, my mom will drive,” Opal

explains.
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“Sounds great!” I manage, laying on the sweetness a bit too thick. The unfortunate truth

is that I have become so ​independent​, I’m having a difficult time with conversation.

“Then it’s settled! May and Sage are coming too. This is going to be so much fun!” Opal

exclaims. This could possibly be the most difficult social situation I’ve dealt with in awhile.

Granted, I haven’t really been in a social situation in awhile.

* * *

I arrive at the parking lot Saturday at 8:00 AM. My mom was pretty excited for me when

I told her about Opal inviting me on a weekend camping trip and wanted to make sure I was here

super early. She knows this is the first time I’ve been invited to something since, like, fourth

grade.

“Hey, Iris!” Opal shouts. “Wow, you packed- ” She seems surprised.

“Yeah, I didn’t really know what to bring, so I just brought everything,” I interrupt.

“No, no, I was going to say light,” Opal finishes.

“Oh, well, it’s only for three days and two nights, right?” I ask, just to be sure.

“Yep. It’s going to be awesome. There is going to be a swimming hole, and a little slot

canyon just out the back of the campsite,” She sounds so excited. Maybe it isn’t bad to let down

my guard a little, to lose some of that stubbornness. Opal is just so sweet, and I feel like she

genuinely wants to involve me. And I really do love hiking and swimming, so that should be

really exciting.

I hug my mom goodbye and hop in the car, fighting the urge to ride in the passenger seat,

away from all of the others. On field trips, that is usually my designated spot anyway because no

one wants to sit next to the teacher, so I’ve embraced it. I’m always reminded that I’m on the low
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end of the totem pole when they whine their way into making me take the spot no one wants.

Honestly, I’ve imagined all of my class drawing straws and whoever ended up with the short one

complaining until I’d trade with them.

“I’ll sit in the front,” May offers. “Car rides make me feel pretty motion sick.” May

doesn’t give me a choice. Backseat it is.

* * *

The car ride is long and bumpy, but we mostly just play games on our phones. Well, I

guess the others check their Instagrams. I find the idea of posting a picture and receiving “likes”

to encourage an impossible ideal of perfection and feelings of superiority and inferiority. But,

hey, what do I know?

I must mention, I am much different than a stereotypical less-than-sociable person, being

someone who enjoys a run, mountain bike ride, or hike. I mostly just prefer to be outside; I find

the indoors to be almost claustrophobic.

When we finally arrive at the campsite, it is breathtaking. The sky is washed in variant

blue watercolor, and the powdery scarlet dirt is left to contrast the domed atmosphere. I step out

of the car, resisting my instinct to immediately start dashing around the campsite in search of the

perfect spot to draw and paint the lovely scene.

“Let’s set up the tent!” Opal calls from the center of the site. “Does anyone want to build

a firepit?”

“I will!” I exclaim. This will be the perfect opportunity to walk around and find

wonderful scenes to capture in my art journal while hunting for rocks.

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As I run off into a nearby section of brush, seemingly distant from the group even though

I can still hear them, I listen as Sage begins chatting with Opal.

“Why did you even invite Iris? She’s not your friend. She doesn’t even have friends,”

Sage says with a certain level of irritation.

“Exactly. She may act like she’s totally in to being alone and stuff, but I just feel like a

lot of it is that she really does want someone to talk to and doesn’t want to admit it,” Opal

explains my, well, exact sentiments.

The two girls continue to argue with each other, but I don’t say anything. I mean, Opal is

the first person to talk to me this year; I’m not jeopardizing that relationship. I build the fire pit

and start helping May set up the tent. Without speaking of course. That would be a challenge for

most people, but it’s a given for me. Since the beginning of sixth grade, I haven’t much wanted

to talk to people. I just construct my isolated fortress and observe the outside world. Nobody

speaks to me, and I don’t speak to them. But ninth grade has marked the onset of realizing the

loneliness in that forcefield-like bubble. I’ve been especially noting that no one seems to notice

my clear change in demeanor. Or, maybe, they just don’t care.

* * *

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be disliked by the rest of my class, and I

have no doubt it would be better than being ignored. At least then I know that they notice me and

see my existence. I feel like I could disappear and the class would simply find some furniture to

fill the void. No, I’m invisible to them. They wouldn’t even see a void.

When the question of “what superpower would you want if you could have one?” is

asked, many a child answers that invisibility would be pretty cool. I can tell you for a fact that
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being invisible sucks, and it’s a superpower I don’t wish for. It’s one that other students pass to

me, drop at my feet, and throw at me whenever they have the chance, and I definitely wish I

could wash it off.

* * *

May and I finish setting up the tent and making dinner.

The night goes as expected, with Sage, Opal, and May talking about the recent drama that

went down at school while I sit and listen. Sitting and listening is par for the course, after all. We

climb into the tent, with Sage having to sleep within the rainfly because it is too small,

meanwhile complaining that she should be allowed to trade spots with me. The stubborn yet soft

me would have let that happen. The more assertive me says there is no way.

We make breakfast and pack lunch to hike the slot canyon out the back of the campsite. It

looks like it may still be a bit muddy, which will be super fun. I am so excited for this hike

because there are supposed to be some cool climbing spots and even petroglyphs!

As we descend into the canyon, a thought hits me. This is what it’s like to have friends.

Not all joy has to be self-created, and happiness instantly expands as it bounces off of other

people. I guess I was just so stubborn and afraid of being hurt again that I simply stayed inside of

my shell. I closed myself in. Nobody seemed to notice so I didn’t put myself out there again. I

just accepted my predicament and embraced it because then I could make it my choice, and I

could decide that I wanted it this way. It made me feel a whole lot better about the situation.

I stare up at the canyon walls, noticing the twisted, water-swept shapes that form the tear

in the ground, and I imagine how my life would be different if I had adopted a different attitude

towards my social situation. My choice was definitely the most confident one. I chose
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independence. But, enough of that. Life was changing for me at the moment, almost as

swiftly-paced as the flash floods that run through canyons like these.

We ascend out of the slot canyon, return to camp, and begin searching our bags for

swimsuits. The swimming hole area is located about a half a mile along a trail to the left of the

campsite. As we walk to the swimming hole I turn to look back at the campsite. I thought that

Opal had been finding her towel, but I don’t see her now.

I sprint back to the campsite and hear a soft scream. Dashing in the direction of the

sound, I realize I’m headed to a spot above the slot canyon we had just been hiking. The

precarious edge is just fifty feet away from the farthest part of the campsite and should definitely

be better marked. Assuming the worst (I’m not being pessimistic- just realistic), I find a thick

cable that I used to wrap up my huge bundle of camping supplies and rush to the ledge.

Opal is fighting to grasp the rock handhold positioned about five feet lower than where I

am standing, and I tie a loop for her to use as a foothold. As I lower the rope, she clings to the

handhold with her left hand and places her right foot in the loop, still keeping her weight on the

slick canyon wall. Knowing I couldn’t possibly pull her by myself, I tie the other end of the cable

to the base of a large tree. I begin to hoist the rope higher as Opal searches for impressions and

protrusions in the rock face to use as holds and climbs up.

She nears the top, and I pull one final time so that she can make it. As she begins to help

me untie the cable, she says gratefully, “Thank you so much. I was having a difficult time this

morning with everything, and came back here to clear my head. I didn’t even see the dropoff.”

“Your welcome, but I was just doing what anyone would have,” I tell her.
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“No, not just anyone would have realized that I was missing or heard me calling, or even

think to find a rope. But you did,” she smiles.

“I guess you could say that after all these years of not ​being ​noticed, I’ve learned to

notice things myself,” I add a likely explanation for my perceptiveness.

“Wait, you’ve felt like you weren’t being noticed? I just always thought that you

preferred to be alone.” How do I explain this to her? The truth is, the not-wanting-friends sort of

began as a stubborn response to not having any. So, in a way, I did want to be alone, but I also

found that being alone can be… lonely. But by that time I was shy and independent and found I

was in too deep to become outgoing.

“Well, it sort of started out as a defense mechanism: after people were mean to me, I just

retreated into my alone space and didn’t have to feel it. But it became lonely after awhile, and I

realized that no one really approached me anymore, so I thought nobody cared,” I explain.

“Really? I know that my friends and I just assumed you liked it that way. We didn’t even

realize…”

“Yeah, I guess I was pretty stubborn about it too. I decided I didn’t want friends for

awhile so that it could be a conscious choice by me,” I continue, “but now I realize that having

friends is incredibly important. I can’t believe I didn’t understand until...”

“I get it. I’ve always taken an outgoing personality for granted. I never had trouble

making friends, but it makes sense that you would kind of give up if things weren’t working

out.”

“I’m really glad you understand, Opal. You’re the best friend I’ve had in awhile.” Having

opened up to Opal, I feel ready to be less hesitant and shy in social scenarios.
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“First, I think I’ll call my mom and tell her what happened. I’m still pretty shaken up,”

Opal says softly. “Then, we can go join May and Sage at the swimming hole!”

* * *

It has been a month since my camping outing with Opal and her friends and already

things have brightened up. I’ve taken a new strategy of opening up and actually approaching the

other kids at school. Though I still feel like not everybody will easily accept me after years of

standoffishness, I’m ready to at least try. I suppose that rather than being stuck in my little

fortress, I may have just found it difficult to leave and not even tried, but stepping out is what I

needed, and I’m glad I found someone to help me through the transition. Trusting in friends for

support is what I had to realize to begin the next chapter in my life.