Kindred Roots

Her dad said it best. She was seventeen and leaving for the airport for the big move off the little rock. He said, “You’ll be back.” Her father’s words reinforced this teenager’s plight to cut the umbilical cord to sheer independence. Deep inside he knew the determination that burned in her dark brown eyes, that his daughter was gone. She smiled, “right,” she softly closed the screen door behind her. With just one thousand dollars, she saved over a year’s time of work, in her pocket she left all that was home for California. On that departing flight, she promised herself she would never rely on her parents for anything. She was certain her future and her fate stood in her hands.

Her first few years in the city, she put herself through college while working full time, oblivious to what a keg stand was. The value of money quickly slapped her into a field of somber, especially when rent was due. Her meals consisted of a healthy diet of ramen, Kraft cheese and macaroni, burritos, or quesadillas. She discovered that best friends and buds were simply acquaintances and thugs. She fell flawlessly face in the mud until she could distinguish the difference between sex and love. She grew up fast at seventeen. Like molded clay that’s been in the kiln for too long, she became hardened by life.

Pensively analyzing through trial and error, she had it good at home. She was provided with free room and board, enriched with no responsibility to pay for bills. Although never once in the fifteen years, has she regretted her decision to leave. Pulling her weight is self rewarding. It was freedom. No late night phone calls to mom on how she spent her last paycheck on clothes and booze. She was her dad’s daughter, her pride and promise dictated to move forward. She would pick up a part-time job to supplement her social habits.

She would not exchange her life experiences and the souls that have embraced and shattered her. Falling has been the golden gift, humbling to the touch; it helped her realize that imperfections are what made her authentic. On this arduous journey, she looks forward to embracing future failures, from the words of her nine siblings, “…nobody’s perfect. You’re not perfect. Failure is the perfect way to learn to love yourself, the ones that don’t learn well there just stupid.…” Her siblings the back bone to her “no guts-no glory” philosophy. Her siblings had taught her tough love, speaking the truth absent of smoke and mirrors.

She credits her siblings and the hawaiian way of life for her courage and compassion. If it weren't for them, she would be lifeless, gutless, and cold. As her heart still pines for her family, the warm Hawaiian ocean and the way of life that is Aloha and kindness, she knows one day she’ll return with a family of her own to plant her own seed to instill roots and like her, it can never be uprooted.

This is Shellie in third person back to you Bob at the studio!