I chose this memory because it represents a formative, albeit painful, part of my childhood. The moment was during 5th grade at our afterschool program. I was in a months-long fight with my friends. It eventually passed, but the same loneliness followed me to middle school. I had overlooked it until now, but when I thought about moments that are important to me, I was surprised by how vividly I remembered it. This moment is not just about loneliness or rejection. It is about the shame and embarrassment I felt and how I coped with it. The most important thing in my mind was to make sure nobody knew how alone I was. That everybody looking thought it was my choice to sit alone. Even now, when I have great friends, I feel that devastating insecurity hiding beneath, that sheer terror of anyone seeing me alone. And that same survival mechanism is still there. I shove it down and pretend everything is okay, because if I pretend it enough then maybe it will be true. I just had to keep on pretending to be entranced in my book (although to be fair, I did read some very good books) or watch my favorite show. If I pretended I was happy and content, then maybe I would be. Or more than that, maybe others would think I was. Lingering on this memory was painful, yet writing it was strangely therapeutic. I had always felt a need to hide, in my book or later, behind my computer. I felt brave facing it head on for the first time. When I did start writing, I finished it all quickly.  Because really, at the heart of it, when everything else is stripped away, it’s about how I felt. It’s about how my chest felt so tight I couldn’t breathe, how I wanted to cry but was horrified at the idea of people seeing my tears. Those feelings that accompanied me for years on end, that I tried to bury and repress until I could pretend they didn’t exist. I think that’s what made it strangely easy to write. I have wanted to say it, to talk about it, to just acknowledge it, for so long that it was a release to write it all.