Losing Grace
Throughout my career as an English major, I have read many accounts from people’s live recounting invaluable morals from personal experience. And intrigued by this genre, I decided to try my inexperienced hand this noble educating. Through this—I warn you—truly chilling tale, I hope to impart what has become a virtue to me to you. And thus I enter the long tradition of knowing writers and ignorant readers as championed by my dear friend Eddie in “On Journal Articles” with the story of how I lost Grace.
I received Grace at my kindergarten graduation from my parents as a gift for completing two years education that consisted mostly of napping and crayons. I probably received more than that small teddy bear—not much more—but Grace was the only gift that lingers in the memory of my mind.
I loved Grace very much with that passionate love that only exists between a child and her dearest confident. And my heart, already much too sentimental for its own good, relished in the image of having Grace for the rest of my life. I pictured Grace being present at my future commencements of middle and high school, and even made it up in my mind that I would give Grace to my daughter in that far distant future.
I spoiled Grace. Somehow I found a little light green dress with a bow that fit her perfectly; and I—vainly—got no more delight than carrying her, in her lovely green dress, with me wherever I went. This included taking her to and from school as one who does not dare let her most valued possession out of her sight.
Therefore, in third grade I was still bringing her to school with me on a daily basis. I am not sure how acceptable it was to be bringing a stuffed animal to school at the age of eight (As a twenty year old, who has more than ten stuffed animals in her dorm room—not even including those I have elsewhere—I am well aware that my perception of the appropriate age for stuffed animal bearing is quite skewed), but still appropriate or not, I was bringing Grace to school with me every day. If only I had left her at home!
During my third grade year, I sat next to a kid named Jacob on the school bus. I don’t remember anything about him, but I know that he was a brat and I think that I hated him. Nonetheless, he was my bus mate and it was him that I sat next to and played with on the bus. To be honest, he is more or less irrelevant to this story, I just wanted to mention what a truly immoral person he was. I wish that I could blame the following traumatic events on him, but I cannot, for I think they were singularly my fault.
We were playing some sort of imaginative game, and of course Grace was involved and whatever toys he had. And in a particularly dramatic moment, Grace was ascending up to a balcony, which in our imagination was the area near the top of the school bus window.
Aside:Now for those of you who perhaps have never had that particular experience of riding on a public school bus, I will describe the nature of a school bus window. It is rectangular in shape, with a bar of metal stretching horizontally in its middle separating the upper piece of glass from the lower. This bar is the line to where one might slide down the upper piece of glass allowing fresh air into the bus. However, because the two rectangular pieces of glass are identical, when the top piece of glass is lowered all the way, and the top part of the window is open, it could easily be mistaken as closed by a young, carefree eight-year old girl.
And thus when Grace made her fateful ascent up those imaginary stairs to that imaginary balcony on that very real open window, I did not at all expect that it would be her last. And perhaps one of the most traumatic moments of my childhood was the feeling of the wind snatching Grace out of my hands and watching her fly into the void behind the bus.
Now as you can imagine, eight year old me was utterly distraught. It was not watching Grace disappear from sight that afflicted me, but rather my life without Grace flashing before my eyes. Of course I began to sob. It was the most natural thing to do. And my crying grew more and more desperate as Jacob persisted in asking me, “Why did you throw your bear out the window?”
It did not take long for my sister to notice my crying, discern from my hysterics what had happened, and after probably a few words about my needing to grow up, she was able to get the bus driver to stop the bus. But after deliberation, and the realization of how far back the loss had occurred, it was concluded that nothing could be done but to continue along.
I must have been devastated when I got home, and to be honest I have no idea how my parents handled my dejection. I do know that I was able to convince one of them, probably my father, to drive back to where I believed the fall to have occurred to look for Grace. But we couldn’t find her on the side of the road, and I never saw Grace again.
Oh, I did not think that retelling this story would be so painful! I did not know that such old wounds could bleed afresh! But at least, through my suffering, some good might come into the world. For a valuable lesson is buried in the story. And priceless instruction lurks beneath these words. I think the moral is clear: Be careful if you go up to a balcony, because it’s probably nothing more than an open window.