sitting like peaks upon my lungs

This is an essay I wrote in my twelfth grade english class in high school. It was my midterm. The assignment was to choose an inspirational quote about success and write about how we were going to succeed in the future. As I read this again, I feel like I'm still the same person, yet I have grown and changed since the Spring. Perhaps I am a little bit more positive even though I still have my moments.

Sitting Like Peaks Upon My Lungs

by Hannah Rose Duperre

e.e. cummings once said “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” These words foster me, sitting like peaks upon my lungs, and these words speak like sermons, parading like the April rains. This quote tells of the valor one must learn to cultivate in order to be successful in life, fully realize their importance and find the mistakenly beautiful and wonder-some genius that is born of the syncopation of both heart and mind. This single sentence reminds me that I may have to constantly overcome many struggles and challenges in order to rise to my full potential and portray the greatest interpretation of my character. Everyday, using my strengths, weaknesses, failures and triumphs, I strive to try to find the courage to “grow up.”

What does it mean to really be grown up? I tend to contemplate and peel apart the process: a student saunters proudly across a lighted plane, to get a scrolled decree as the congratulations of completing twelve years of public education, the family-friendly crowd cheers and in between post-graduation pictures, people tell him or her that they’re “all grown up”, or “you’ve grown up so fast!” When I was younger I always felt that high school students were so old and so grown up, but now that I have reached the age of 17, I feel far from being a “grown-up”. I have found that “growing up” is not quite a destination, but a process of ups and downs and progression towards greater goals.

I have become a young woman with many wishes and hopes, and growing up for me personally is having the courage to wake up in the morning, get out of bed, and keep trying in a world where I feel so out of place at times. I want to earn a college degree. I want to inspire people. I want to feel real. I want to stop running to the shelter of my memories, or to the foam of the future, to get away from the present time at hand. And by God, by the time the moon’s light strokes the stars and sky, I just want to believe in myself and escape the fears that sit like peaks on my lungs.

In order to achieve something greater beyond high school and as I begin to compose the next chapter of my so-called life, I must first recognize that things may happen in my life that I have no control over and I must be prepared to react in a way that doesn’t cater to my weaknesses, but to my strengths. This will come with much strife, tears, laughter, and joy. I will have to try my best every single day to not let my fears consume me. I will have to find every possible way to be happy with my efforts, even though at the end of the day I may struggle to not feel worthless when my best just doesn’t feel like it is enough. Some days I may crumble beneath those mountains on my back and begin to fall and feel the crushing of my lungs, but I have to breathe, just breathe. I need to stop confusing myself. Falling does not necessarily mean failing. Failing is when you give up entirely on growing up. A simple fall is a common climb. To succeed, I’ll just have to get back up.

Overall, the biggest conflict I’ll have to deal with for the rest of my life is the cold hard fact that I happen to have the hardest time believing in and accepting myself. I’ve come to realize very recently that this is probably the main source of my weaknesses. I tend to become unmotivated very easily and have difficulty expressing my feelings verbally. I can be stubborn. I can be lazy. I am so disorganized and honestly I’m a complete and utter mess. I often let these simplicities become complexities and pay too much attention to them, for it is within my strength, not my weaknesses, that I will be able to find the bravery needed to accept the call to grow up, and move on to making a difference in the lives of others. How am I going to be able to make a difference in others’ lives, if I don’t first make a change in my own? The truth is, I won’t, not unless I take that common climb and face down the peaks sitting on my lungs. I have stars to remember and scars to forget, all with the slight spark of determination that lies within my gut and the strong convictions that sing in my soul. I am growing up.