I packed up the car; packed the baggage away. It would be my first Christmas without the man who raised me. I would spend the majority of my Christmas Eve car ride in a depressingly pensive state of mind. The memories almost seem sadder when they’re happy. As the wheels pulled out of the driveway I noticed the dirt polluting the snow, the clouds like smoke contaminating the sky. It comforted me to observe that the world seemed to feel the same way I did. 

The Christmas music sounded sad from the back of the car, or maybe just from the back of my mind. Where the memories lingered, reliving Christmases when everyone was here, Christmases I treasured like snow globes. I trapped them in the glass of my mind, and every night as I went to bed I’d watch them so I could sleep. Tiny little moments of everlasting peace. 

As the car ran along the road my mind was everywhere other than where my body was. Then suddenly I was back, as the car began to slide. Black ice took full control of the car. All of me had thought we would just slide into the ditch. I wish that was all that had happened that day. As the back of the car spun out the back right wheel hit the snow bank. Suddenly all the air in the world had gone, and gravity seemed to have let up. 

Flying through the air I believed that was it. I believed I wouldn’t leave there alive. Forever stuck at 15, and I lived my last day unhappy. When the car finally stopped I couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t supposed to stop. Part of me had accepted that I would die, but now I got to live? Living was an outcome I hadn’t prepared myself for, somehow living seemed harder. Of course I had hoped to live, but how much hope can I truly have in a moment like this.

This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. It was the first time I had ever seen my mom's head bleed. But me, though not injured, I just couldn’t speak. Was I traumatized or was it just disbelief? I didn’t feel much at all when I realized what had happened to me. Because this wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. 

When I finally understood that this had not been some lucid nightmare I was overcome with a dreadful sobriety. That was when the words I had trapped in my head finally started to spill out. It took me a week to tell my best friend what had happened; it feels stupid saying that now. Because I hadn’t done something bad, something bad had happened to me. So why did I feel the need to hide it? Why was I ashamed of something I couldn’t control? I realized a week was nothing compared to the years it took me to speak about the things that hurt me.

I believe I felt that way because to be ashamed was the trauma response I had been conditioned to have. If a victim doesn’t feel shame for what’s happened to them what’s stopping them from telling someone? This time I was the victim of a car crash. Yet I was still afraid to speak. The car hadn’t told me to keep my mouth shut, but a voice in the back of my mind did. I couldn’t tell if it was his or mine.

When the feeling of dread finally drifted off all that was left was the feeling of sobriety, and I learned to thrive in it. I had begged for sobriety my whole life. Not only from my father but from this floating feeling I had been plagued with. All I had ever wanted was a steady place on the ground. A steady home, a steady life, somewhere with walls that wouldn’t move regardless of what happened outside of them. When I couldn’t have that I floated away. I can’t quite remember where I went, but I do know I don’t want to go back.

While floating outside of my body I had been so distant from the ones I love. I was like an astronaut that had been in space for years. Sure solid ground felt unnatural at first, but no matter how long I floated around that would never be where I belonged. Home has always been right here on the ground. Living through every emotion with the people I love is where I found my gravity. I can finally feel some sense of sincerity. Now there’s nowhere I'd rather be than exactly where my feet are.