Snapshot: My Mentor

As I mentioned to you, I finished this paper for my Journalism class... part of the assignment was to embellish the story, so there are a couple details added or exaggerated for flow. however, for the most part it is pretty factual.

It began about five years a go in the small town of Greenfield, Indiana. Greenfield, the town where the most exciting thing to do is go to The Wall (Wal-Mart); the town where the best place to hang out with your friends is Starbucks (twenty-four hours and free coffee at 2 am); and the town where the population is 99% Caucasian and the other 2% will move realizing that there is no diversity in this small Christianized city of 15,000.

Mary Ellenberger and I were freshmen in high school. She was the prized goalie of the girls Varsity soccer team, and I was the drum line section leader in band. She had a strong athletic appearance. Strong shoulders, walking with purpose, she knew who she was. She had a dry, sarcastic humor that was always followed by the most sincere laugh. She was well loved by all who had been touched by her smile. She had everything she needed to succeed. Everyone knew she was going to go far. There was no question.

It was our freshman year that we began blogging. We lived less than five minutes apart and saw each other everyday at school. What would we really have to say online that we had not already said in person? Come to find, an insurmountable number of things. It was an outlet that as fifteen year olds we were able to grasp onto quickly and run with. We wrote about life, death, love, God, and our families. We wrote about high school and the drama that naturally followed. We wrote about our joys, our sorrows, our successes, and our failures. Every gory detailed included.

As we grew in our friendship, we added another mode of communication: snail mail. We began writing letters when I was away for two summers with no access to a computer. It was slow at first, scattered letters just to say that we were thinking of the other person. However, soon enough it picked up speed. Pretty soon we were writing and responding instantly as letters came. There is nothing more personal than a hand-written, addressed letter. You can feel the time spent in each indented stroke of pen through the paper.

The letters took a shape of their own. Some were written on graph paper, or a napkin, or the back of a ticket stub (these are coveted). Shoeboxes full of letters with these unique touches stack my closet. Some cover my walls, some are framed, some are made into artwork, and some stored safely in the desk drawer. I began to be able to feel what she felt and think what she thought as the years progressed.

The writing became more serious this year. I left my childhood home, consequently leaving Mary. I started writing more and more. I wrote about the memories that painted the walls of my childhood home, so vividly etched in my head and the nostalgia that pervaded my daily life. Then another level of writing pierced the surface when John died. I wrote about his short 23 years of life, and the pain of mourning over someone I loved so much. I was bitter, I was angry, and I was crushed to the core. Writing comes easily at these times.

Mary read each word of my struggles and started breathing into my heart the idea that I should pursue writing. No one has read more of my work than she has. Five years of my life expressed in words that only she read. Five years of high school drama, exciting relationships, broken hearts, new adventures, reminiscent thoughts, new dreams, and old realizations. Five years of a friendship shared by pen and paper.