Life's Developments by abbystansky

Lifeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Developmen ts By Abigail Stansky

Table of Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

TEENAGERS

FAMILY MATTERS

THE COVERS OVER MY SKIN

FIXING MY COLLAR

REACHING THE END

EXTREME(LY RELATABLE)

CONCLUSION

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Introduction As human beings, we share the world in which we live. Though we vary in culture and beliefs, for the most part we live similar lives and experience the same hardships. We experience births, death, aging, pain, emotions, and many other things. There are many outside factors that connect us in our everyday lives. Throughout this College Writing course, I have written a lot about life’s developments. Life’s developments are things such as finding your self-identity and dealing with all the curve balls that life may throw at you. For a lot of people, their safe place is with their family. Family is such an important piece of life and if you don’t have at least one family member that you can really trust then you’re missing out on such an important bond. Family consist of the people that can see you in your darkest times and won’t pass a single judgment. They play such a big role in who we are as humans. They teach you how to interact with others. They teach you your morals. Overall, they

teach you the things that school cannot. Later on, I will explain to you why family means so much to me. My family is one place that I know I fit in, even though that isn’t how I always felt. Fitting in seems to be a common theme in many people’s lives, whether it be fitting in at school, work, or even in your own family. A lot of people that I have developed friendships with over the years have explained that they have a hard time finding a place for themselves within their schools or families. However, we all fit in somewhere in this world. We wouldn’t have been put here if we didn’t. For some, fitting in might take some time. There may also be defining moments to tell you whether you fit in or not. It’s okay to not fit in, but we tend to find a place, or a group of people where we do. The people we like to hang out with and socialize with have a lot to do with who we are. The truth is that there will always be someone out there that can relate to your hobbies, the way you think, or your ideas and beliefs. We all have our friend, or friend groups that we get along with because we share something in common. These are friendships that make us forget the bad and create the good. We gravitate towards what makes us feel good. When we read a book like Easter Rising, it is easy to find yourself relating to the text. I cannot relate to facing multiple deaths of siblings, but I can relate to the coping mechanisms that MacDonald goes through. I found myself reflecting upon my own life and experiences while reading the book and writing these essays. My life, in no way, coincides with what MacDonald went through but the emotions and struggles that he faced were so real that I think anyone could have related to it. Before I dive into all those topics, I will help you understand the journey of finding ourselves. I started this book off with the chapter, This is Who We Are. One of the first obstacles you truly face in life is trying to find who you are. I’m no scientist but there is definitely DNA

that contributes to how we act and what our personalities are like but for the most part, it has to do with how we grow as a person. The people we are around, how our families have impacted us, and how we see the world with our own eyes combine together to create our self-identities. In this first chapter, I will talk about how MacDonald and I found ourselves, even though I am still in the process. After all, you need to develop a character before jumping into the stories.

This is Who We Are Developing identity is just another phrase for finding yourself. We aren’t born knowing exactly who we are. Growing up is our journey of finding ourselves. In the book, Easter Rising by Michael Patrick MacDonald, we are taken through his journey of finding himself. We travel through his emotional pain and important life events that helped him develop his self-identity. In order to develop your own identity, you have to experience events that shape you. Throughout a lot of the beginning of the book, MacDonald is only 13-years-old. Therefore, he is in the early process of developing his identity. We all get to a certain age when we start realizing that there are characteristics that make us similar to everyone else, but more importantly, there are things that make us different from everyone else. Depending on what you’ve been through and what you’ve experienced in life, this can happen earlier or later for some. For MacDonald, his process of developing his self-identity began when his brother, Davey, committed suicide. He dealt with his brother’s suicide by spending a lot of his time alone

and as he expresses in the book, he “felt connected to nothing and nobody” (10). The amount of time he spent locking himself up in his own world, gave him time reflect on himself and on others. His brothers, and other influences that he had around him, helped him realize that he is not like everyone else. Your identity can also be shown indirectly. For example, the way MacDonald and his other family members coped with this loss helps us understand who they are. MacDonald’s way of coping was to be alone and away from everything and everyone that reminded him of Davey. MacDonald cuts himself off and repeats this idea that he “had to get away from home” (14). This shows us that he is an independent person, he likes to figure things out by himself. After Davey’s death, MacDonald allowed himself to be sad about it for a few days but then came to a realization that “it felt a lot better to be pissed off than to be sad” (52). This brings me to another big factor in developing his identity, his music choice. He could have easily listened to sad music on repeat and let himself soak into the sadness of his loss. Instead, he listened to outsider bands that helped fuel and release his rage that was hidden deep within him. The emotions that we feel, coincide with the music that we listen to. It helps determine who we are, and also have to do with how we identify. This is one of many reasons that we tend to get along better with the people who listen to the same music as us. This is why MacDonald feels so comfortable and at peace when he is surrounded by people listening to the rage music that he becomes addicted to. As MacDonald begins to explore the world beyond Southie by himself, he begins to expose himself to the people that he thinks he wants to associate with. The people that we choose to associate with says a lot about who we are as a person. Once he realized that he wasn’t “normal,” he allowed himself to find people that he could relate to. These are the people at the

clubs and concerts that he would go to. They are also people who were considered weird and the outsiders. They made him feel “superior, in a way, like I’d been initiated into something that no one else got” (19). People and places that make you feel special tend to pull you in, they make you feel like you actually mean something in this world. The music MacDonald began to listen to opened up a new world to him. A world where he could be himself. It was as if he had never known himself until he discovered this world within the world. Even though he reached out to find this world he never knew about, it was as if this world had found him, “I had stumbled into the center of the universe I wanted to be in” (28). It also helped him explore new ideas and ways of life. The way he thought began to alter. The music he began to listen to paved a path that led him towards who he wanted to be. This music helped express things that he didn’t even realize he was holding back. It was as if his thoughts were stuck within him and he says, “It did feel good to listen to someone else getting it all out” (23). I think that the fact that the singers would let out what he was holding in, was what really connected him to the music. In my own experience, I would say that I didn’t start developing my own self-identity until I was 12-years-old. My first step towards my development was realizing that I was attracted to girls in a way that I felt I shouldn’t be. It felt rebellious, yet right. It helped pave the path that I was destined to walk down. After that, it was the music that I listened to. If I were to pick a defining genre or artist that helped me develop the most, it would be rap music. Specifically, Eminem. Just like MacDonald, I felt like Eminem would say the things that I felt deep within but couldn’t let out. I look back and realize that I was happiest when I was surrounded by people who understood how I felt about his music. I also enjoyed the people who, even though they weren’t big fans of his,

would listen to it with me with open minds. It’s those kinds of friends that help you develop even deeper. Another big factor in personal identity is the clothes that you choose to wear. We grow up with our parents dressing us. We grow up without much of our own self-expression. I’m sure most people can remember what it was like to pick out their first outfits on their own. The first time I truly picked out my own outfit was my freshman year of high school. I dressed myself before then, but not in the clothes that I could identify with. I could see the same within MacDonald. He dressed himself in the clothes he had, not the clothes that he identified with. Once he began to dress in his ragged old clothes to match the people at the concerts and in the stores that he would shop in, I could feel his comfort. I felt like I could start to truly act like myself once I started dressing in boy’s clothes. It was like a door opened for me, and I know MacDonald felt the same. Having a self-identity also means having your own opinions. A true self-identity is one that is not given to you by others. You find it within yourself. Your opinions show who you are as a person. MacDonald, for example, is straight edge and held a strong opinion on it; “I liked the smell of pot, but to me drugs were what normal people did, average people without much imagination” (67). First, this quote shows that he is straight edge which is a part of his identity. Then, it also shows that he wants to stray from the norm which is another part to his identity. Our identities are not one simple thing. They take time to develop and can continue to develop throughout your whole life. It can change based on big life experiences, the books you read, the places you go, or the music that you listen to. We are constantly developing ourselves. For MacDonald, his started with the loss of his brother and will continue until the day he dies. For now, we can say that he is developing an alternative, outsider identity. But who’s to say this

won’t change. He may seem mature but we are only in the time of his teenage years. I know I am not who I was at the age of 13. And I highly doubt MacDonald is the same person today that he was when he was 13.

Teenagers There is a true stigma around teenage years. It would be hard to find someone who is the same person that they were around the age of twelve. It seems to be the rebellious years, when you realize that you do get to be your own person. Up until you hit this age, you have an adult constantly watching over you, whether it be a teacher, parent, babysitter, or relatives. You are constantly being checked up on to make sure you aren’t getting into trouble. Then the day comes, your first day of being home alone. You’re free. You have the whole house to yourself and you can finally do whatever you want. When I was home alone for the first time, I blasted music as loud as I could, explicit music specifically. It was a rush. This rush is what you get when you can finally be on your own. This rush is your teenage years. Teenagers seem to think that they are always right. It’s as if they’ve conquered life already, when it is actually just getting started. When you’re a teenager, you think that you’ve

dealt with the worst of the worst and that you can handle anything life tosses your way. We all seem to think we are more mature than we really are. Teenage years are deceitful and dangerous. I thought I could handle anything when I was thirteen. I decided that I didn’t need my family nor anything they had to offer me. I had everything figured out. Or so I thought. It wasn’t too long until I realized how much I needed my family. There were some things that I don’t think I could have made it through without them. Once I traveled down my own path, I enjoyed the scenery for a while. I enjoyed it until I looked back and realized that my family was out of sight. I was too busy walking forward to realize what I was leaving behind.

Family Matters I believe that my family, the Stansky family, is something extremely special and rare. I am lucky to have been born into a group of good people, my extended family included. They are all supportive, caring, and dependable. However, I have not always thought so highly of them. I went through a period in my life when I hated them and would have done anything to get away from them. Even when I went through my low points with my family, I have always been proud of my last name. I’ve known since I was a little kid that, whether I marry a man or a woman, I will keep my last name forever. The name, Stansky, has something special to it. This is my story of how I strayed from my family from seventh grade to my junior year in high school, and how I found my way back. As a child, I was very dependent on my parents, and even my older sister. My parents dressed me, fed me, and drove me places. As a kid, I don’t think you could ask for anything else. They were the type of parents that would get their kids involved in every hobby possible. I 10

played soccer, basketball, baseball, I danced, I cheered, and I did karate. I had a childhood that was filled with opportunity, thanks to my parents. My parents came to support me at everything. I was always happy to point out my parents to my teammates and friends. I grew up in a very Catholic atmosphere. Family is very important in a Catholic community. My father, my sister, and I went to church every Sunday morning while my mom worked. At church, every pew held a different family, but somehow, we all looked the same. Every family would dress nice in light clothes. Everyone knew each other and were friends. It was a nice community to grow up in because you only see the good things in life, the things to be thankful for. My sister and I went to the same elementary school even though she is four years older than me. It was a smaller school and I spent every day and class with the same twenty kids from preschool to sixth grade. Our families knew each other. Even though my parents knew most of my classmatesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; parents, I wanted my classmates to know who my parents were. I was proud to show my parents off. In third grade, we had a day that was called Career Day. I had been waiting for this day for months. My parents both took the day off for me. They were both going to come in and talk about their jobs. My mom was excited to tell my class about nursing and my dad was going to talk about being a traveling salesman for businesses. I was talking them up to my friends all day, I was so excited to hear them talk in front of my class and my teacher. That day, I fell asleep while laying across the seats at the lunch table. My friends woke me up when it was time to go back and start Career Day. I walked into the classroom, and there my parents were. My mom was wearing jeans and a nice shirt while my dad was in a full suit to look professional. My mom smiled at me then a worried look rushed over her face. She walked

over to me and said that I didn’t look good. She took me to the main office to get my temperature taken. It was 103. The nurse told me that I needed to go home. I was devastated and couldn’t stop crying. I wanted my class to learn about my parents and now I had to miss Career Day. My mom took me home but my dad stayed and gave his talk. I couldn’t believe I missed it. I was so excited to hear what my parents had to say and for my friends to hear how cool they were. I wanted to share this story to show how highly I thought of my parents. I loved being with or around them. They were my best friends while I was growing up. Then, I got to seventh grade. New school, new setting. It was public school, which I had only heard rumors about at Catholic school. It was where all the troublemakers went, in my mind at least. I made a new friend group there. These were people who could be considered outsiders. My friend, Ben, wore skinny jeans with weird dark patterns all over them. Emma wore dark clothes and thick bottom eyeliner. Both of them always talked down about their families and how they didn’t fit in. I thought that the way to fit in with them was to be an outsider to my own family. This was my rebellion period. I dyed the underneath of my hair blue and red. I stopped talking to my parents. Lastly, I told my dad that I didn’t want to be Catholic anymore. He got angry and kept asking why. I knew the reason, but I froze when I was trying to tell him. I went to my mom, crying, and explained that I didn’t feel comfortable in the Catholic church anymore because they don’t accept people like me. People that are gay. My parents were okay with it but it took a while for my mom to adjust. It felt like I built a brick wall between my parents and me. From eighth grade on, I was never single. I constantly had a girlfriend. I went through five up through my junior year of high school. I was always putting my girlfriends before my family. The way I used to be so proud of my family, was now how I felt about my girlfriends. I

thought no one had me like my girlfriends had me. I was blind to the support that I had or could have had from my family, and for no good reason. I made myself an outsider to my family. We used to have family dinners almost every night until I hit eighth grade. We would talk about our days and our lives, we were a very open family. I became mute with my family. They would constantly express their worry that I didn’t communicate anymore. My mom says that it was because I was depressed. I think it was because I hated them, for no reason at all. I resented them for everything they said and everything they did. I would always go to my girlfriends’ houses instead of going home. I would stay there for days at a time. Then, came a time in my life that I couldn’t go through alone. Late in my junior year of high school, I had become so depressed and alone, my anxiety was eating me up but I didn’t even know that it existed. My girlfriend explained to me that she cheated on me. That set me over the ledge. I attempted to overdose. I regret it right as the last pills made their way down my throat. I went into my mom’s room with tears rolling down my face. She jumped up in a panic and called poison control who told her to bring me to the hospital. She was driving fast, it was about 11:30 at night. She drove with one hand on the wheel and one hand on me to let me know that she was there for me. My dad flew in from St. Louis, Missouri that night to sit next to me at the hospital. I’d forgotten how much my parents loved me and how much I loved them. I needed them. I do believe that in a small way a part of the reason that I overdosed was to get the attention of my parents to show them that I strayed too far and I needed them to direct me back. After that, my family became aware of each other again. We realized that we had all strayed from each other. My parents included. My dad was living in Missouri, my sister was

away at college, my mom was always working, and I was home alone most of the time. We reconnected. We began to tell each other about our weeks, the good and the bad. We became an open family again, like the days when we would have family dinners. Once I came to college, my family became closer than ever. I have never been so close to my sister or my parents. There are constant check-ins with each other and not because we have to but because we want to. Recently, I broke my hand. I called my mom who brought me to Urgent Care that night. I was crying but not in a painful way but in a depressed way. It was quiet, I had my head down and it was as if my body had heavy weights all over it. I knew I was going to be out of softball and that was mentally murdering me. My mom could see it. She knew exactly why I felt the way I did. Softball has always been one of the most important aspects of my life. To this day, I remain sad that I can’t play. But, my family has never been so supportive. I can’t do much with one hand. My mom has driven to school to help me clean my room. She’s washed my hair and helped me dress myself. My dad calls me every day to ask how I’m doing and we always end up talking about softball for an hour. They are doing everything in their power to make this time of being in a cast easier. My dad keeps telling me that my comeback in softball will be one that won’t be forgotten. They tell me they are proud that I have been handling it so well, it’s almost been a month. They make sure I feel their support and love. They have picked me up every time I’ve fallen down. I can only see my family knit becoming stronger and stronger in time. Of course, I had to leave a lot out, but we have definitely had our ups and downs together. We have deep conversations as a family. I could tell my parents anything, I never feel a need to hide. When I need a pick-me-up, I know I can come home to the best family I could ask for and they could put

a smile on my face in seconds. I’m blessed that my parents raised me the way that they did and that they’ve dealt with all my bullshit throughout the years. Like my mom has always reminded me, “friends come and go, but family is forever.”

The Covers over My Skin My family is a very supportive group of people. Most times while I was growing up, I didn’t understand what I had. I thought that they were uncomfortable with me because I was uncomfortable with myself. This makes me think of the lesson that people try to teach you as you grow up, that no one can love you if you don’t love yourself. I know this is aimed more towards girlfriends and boyfriends but it is relatable to family too. Typically, you would think of family members as people who would love you no matter what. They are the people that will love you even when you don’t love yourself. I think that we become blind to this at times because when you don’t love yourself, you can’t understand how others can love you. This is something that I continue to struggle with. I have tried to replace love for myself with love for others. When it comes down to it, it is all about what you think of yourself. You live inside your own mind. How could you see the love that others have for you, when you have none for yourself?

One thing that held me back from loving myself was not feeling comfortable in my own skin. I felt like there was a piece of myself missing. I never realized that just changing the way I dressed could have such a big impact on how I felt about myself. Every now and then I still feel uncomfortable when I have to dress up in front of others but I no longer feel uncomfortable dressing up around my family. Thanks to a small gesture from my father, I wear my suit and tie with confidence around them.

Fixing My Collar I started dressing in boy’s clothes as a freshman in high school. I felt more comfortable in them than I did in girl’s clothes. Well my body felt more comfortable, but I knew that people would look at me weird and I could tell when I was being judged. My parents never said much about it. My mom would continue to buy me boy’s clothes because she knew that’s what I would wear. All my dad ever did was silently stare, never saying a word. I always wondered what he was thinking or how it made him feel. Friday, September 23, 2016 was the day I finally stopped wondering what was going through my dad’s mind when he saw me in the clothes I felt most comfortable in. My parents and I headed out to Sandwich, Massachusetts for my cousin Richie’s wedding. It was weird not having my sister with us, but she had work. However, I was still excited. He is one of my favorite cousins. Not to mention the woman he married, Hayley, already felt like a part of the family. I sat in the backseat listening to my music while my parents talked for the whole 90-mile car ride. I wasn’t just excited to watch my cousin marry the love of his life. I also got to miss a day of school, which was the best wedding gift that I received.

We got to the hotel and made our way up to the room. We only had a few hours until we had to start getting ready for the wedding. My dad went out to find the bar, he wanted a couple “pre-wedding” beers. My mom decided it was the perfect time to take a nap. I sat in one of the two beds and watched Orange is the New Black while waiting for my dad to come back with a drink for me. A few hours went by when my dad came in and told us it was time to start getting ready. My mom hopped in the shower first. Once she got out, she began her typical routine for getting ready. She dried her hair, curled it, put her dress on, and then applied her makeup. If my sister had been there, she would have had the same routine. They probably would have even gotten ready together. Next, it was my dad’s turn to shower. While he was in there, I decided to get dressed. I put on my black dress pants, my black button up, my black vest, and my blue/black striped tie. Tying a tie came easy to me, I had been doing it since I was a kid. This was one of the first times that I wore a suit and tie in front of my extended family. I was nervous and rightfully so. I tied my hair to the side and hoped my parents would be pleased with how I looked in my suit. My dad got out of the shower and got dressed without speaking a word. All I could think was how uncomfortable he must be, to see his young daughter dressed up in a suit and tie. It was almost time to leave the room and head outside to the ceremony. I put on my shoes and made my way to the door. As I opened the door to let my mom and dad lead the way, my dad pulled me aside. He turned me around and started fixing my collar. The tie was showing in the back, he pulled it down and folded the collar to fix it. I turned around to face him and he smiled and said, “No daughter of mind should be looking unprofessional, when you’re dressed so nice.”

I realized that maybe I wasn’t a typical daughter, but my dad is happy with what he got. I couldn’t stop smiling after that. The feeling of my dad’s hands fixing my collar was a feeling that I never thought I would get. Him doing that gave me pride within myself. It’s a feeling that I will never let go of. That was when my dad showed me through his actions, that I really do fit in with our family.

Reaching the End In this last chapter, I will talk about the inevitable ending; death. It is not a chapter that will leave you feeling sad, I write it in hopes of the reader finding comfort in such a dark place. I hope that if you go through something as painful as the death of a loved one, that you realize that what you are feeling is normal and that you aren’t alone. By the time we hit eighteen, I will bet that most of us have dealt with at least one loss. With that being said, it may be the loss of a family member or a friend or even just a pet. We all know that familiar feeling of loss. MacDonald faces many experiences of loss in a short amount of time in the book, Easter Rising. Not many have had the same experiences as MacDonald, like losing so many family members in such a short period of time or watching your brother jump off a building and fall to his death. We all know that death is bound to find its way into our lives but that is when we need the support from friends and family. Experiencing something like death can be such a set-back, but there will be an end to the pain and grief.

I will show you comparisons of MacDonaldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s life to the seven stages of grieving. This is an idea that I feel so strongly about because people experience it without realizing. Our coping mechanisms may differ but we go through the same seven stages to get over the loss of a loved one. In the end, there should be this feeling of acceptance and peace.

Extreme(ly Relatable) Michael Patrick MacDonald faced multiple extreme events in his life that many have not. This explains why he could write a memoir about his life in his book, Easter Rising. As readers, we find this book interesting because you are never able to guess what was going to happen next. Even though the events that he faced in his life might be extreme, the lessons that he learned can be applied to those who live â&#x20AC;&#x153;normalâ&#x20AC;? lives like myself. We read about the obstacles that he faced while growing up and how he was trying to find himself at the same time. We may not all face the same struggles but in the end, we all learn common lessons. MacDonald faces several deaths within his family and a couple outside of his family. This is unusual and somewhat unheard of. Not many people have had to face as many deaths as he did, especially at a young age. However, at some point in our lives, we all face the seven stages of grief, as did MacDonald. His stages may have not been cut and dry but they were there. The book is kind of a read between the lines to catch these seven stages. He has multiple setbacks where he had to start the stages over again but in the end, he reached the seventh stage.

The first big event that MacDonald faces is the death of his brother Davey. This seemed to be the first event in his life that had a true impact on him. It is at least the first event that we know of. This sparked his first stage of grief, shock and denial. He couldn’t believe what had happened, he said it didn’t feel real. The initial feeling of it not feeling real seemed to be a common theme throughout all the deaths that he faced. The shocking part of everything to him was “that life was carrying on like normal for the rest of the world” (11). This is definitely something that everyone faces in a death. It seems weird that life doesn’t just stop because a life had actually found its own ending. It is like a chapter ending, yet the story continues. MacDonald realized that life just keeps on going which was just unreal for him. His second stage, pain and guilt. This stage definitely led him into the next stage. This would be when MacDonald walks in on his brother Frankie, with the emptiest look that he had ever seen. That may have been one of the most painful sights that MacDonald had seen even though he had seen death with his own eyes. He states, “After seeing Frankie sitting alone that day, I never wanted to see him – or anyone else – looking so emptied and expressionless again” (14). It is easy to see real, deep pain in this scene. For the guilt part of this stage, there isn’t much to explain. MacDonald says it for himself, “I wondered if I could ever make it stop, if I could ever live a day without him on my mind, without the sadness and the guilt I felt about his final decision” (14). Most people feel as though there was always something that they could have done to prevent a death. For MacDonald, he was stuck wondering if he could have said something or done something to stop his brother from killing himself. However, I’m sure his mother and Frankie, or anyone else in his family, wondered the same exact thing.

The next phase is anger. Due to this death, MacDonald broke away from his family and attempted to find something new. He discovered the world of punk music. Punk music was his way out of his normal everyday life with his family. This was him separating himself from his family. It was the beginning of his own world. It was also the start of his journey to find himself. He strayed away from his family in his early teenage years, which most of us do. I began to separate myself from my family when I was about twelve. For myself, it was due to the fact that I had entered a new school. Making the transition from a Catholic school to a public school took its toll on me. However, not everyone needs something traumatic or big to happen in order to go through the phase of distancing yourself from your family. This is typically what people would call the “teenager phase.” When you turn about eleven or twelve, you begin to feel different. It is as if you believe that you can handle life on your own and start making decisions for yourself. Usually your first decision to make is deciding who you want to be friends with and what you associate yourself with. When Davey died and MacDonald fell into the world of Punk music, he fell into a new wave of people. They were different from “normal” people. These people have a way of making MacDonald feel special, and that is what we look for at that age. MacDonald states, “I felt superior, in a way, like I’d been initiated into something that no one else got” (19). Which I believe that at that age, everyone enters a friend group that makes them feel special. When something makes you feel special or good about yourself, you gravitate towards it. MacDonald felt like he was “at the center of something that had never happened before, a completely new era where each person could invent a whole new existence” (39). This was true, except it was him that it had never happened to before. Other people had experienced it before. For him it was this

new exciting life that he got to be a part of but for others it was just another Saturday night and there was nothing that exciting about it. Now to get to the anger part of this, it was within the music itself and the people he hung out with. The music let out his anger for him. People like Bob, helped him let his anger out but not within himself. He let other people and the music let his anger out for him. He felt a connection to the way Bob “held his middle finger up in the air as if it was the whole world” (32). I know that he identified with this act because he talks about it multiple times with passion. While listening to this music, he makes the statement, “it did feel good to listen to someone else getting it all out” (23). He was finding ways to get his anger out indirectly. Depression and reflection comes next. It would be easy to say that he was depressed for practically the whole book but I am going to narrow it down to a specific section. When he began to find answers through faith and doctors. He kept thinking that he was dying. This was due to the physical toll that his mental health was pushing onto him. One way that I could tell he was in a state of depression was the way he was talking to the therapist. He was emotionally numb. He had convinced himself that what he was going through wasn’t so bad. However, it was so bad that the therapist couldn’t help but cry herself that this young boy was so numb to his whole life. He said that he “couldn’t get the therapist’s tears out of my head” (147). They were tears that should have been coming from within himself but he was too depressed to let them out. At this point he began to think about his own life and where he was heading. He decided that he wanted to get his GED and get a job. He had plans to move and leave Southie and the people within it behind. This was him reflecting on where he has been and where he wanted to go.

This was when he began his first attempt at pulling himself back, his “reconstruction and working through everything” stage. He went to his father’s funeral. I think that was his way of staying away from his inner family but still trying to get the support of some kind of family member. Yet, he got absolutely nothing from his father’s side and obviously nothing through his dead father. Although going to his father’s funeral and experiencing this helped him realize that he was reaching out for some kind of family support and needed to find his way back in. He followed this scene up with his trip to Europe. Which was when everything truly changed for him, specifically Ireland. Sometimes getting a different perspective on your life, or anything will open your eyes and your mind. Once he saw and felt the atmosphere of the communities and families in Ireland, he realized that he wanted to feel that with his own family back home. His grandpa helped him figure that one out by forcing him to travel there to see it and meet his relatives. MacDonald says, “I kind of liked being welcomed into the family, realizing how differently I had felt as a tourist in London and Paris, more like an outsider looking in” (181). He was an outsider in London and Paris like he was in his family. He chose to go there when he had the opportunity to go to Ireland instead. It is comparable to the fact that he chose to be an outsider to his own family when he had the choice to be treated like he was in Ireland. His acceptance and hope stage, the final stage was in the very end of the book. After being back in Ireland with his mother as an older man, he made a realization that helped resolve all seven stages. After complaining about his mother for most of their trip in Ireland, the last conversation his mother had with a stranger changed so much for him. He watched as his mother made a stranger cry of happiness. His mother went into a speech about the forms that you take in

life. MacDonald had definitely taken many different forms throughout his life. In the end, he made one big realization. He said, “you never know when you’ll need to give whatever you’ve got to give” (245). This may not mean much as a sentence itself but it is more of the feeling you get with it. You can gain this feeling of acceptance and peace which is something that MacDonald needed to feel to reach the seventh and final stage. Even though MacDonald faced many things that most people don’t, he still managed to go through the known seven stages, some maybe more than once, of grief. His life story is not easily related to but his emotions, his phases, and his thoughts can be easily comparable to those who live a “normal” life. Of course, there were more ups and downs than what I talked about. For example, he talks about feeling guilty when Frankie dies because he was not close to his family, but I tried to pick out the big points of this story that help show the seven stages of grief. He faced these stages over and over again with every death. These coping stages are easily relatable in any human’s life.

Conclusion Writing all these essays helped me reach so many realizations about human connections. It was nice to realize that we may experience different things but it is still so easy to relate to one another. Easter Rising also played a big part in this realization. For a while, I was so confused at why it was so easy to relate to Patrick MacDonald even though what I have experienced in life is nothing like what he did. In the end, I realized that what he went through was what it is like to be a human. As this book reaches its end, I hope that I may have taught you something through the realizations I have made throughout this semester. I learned about what it truly means to fit in. I learned that family means more to me than I thought. I learned that we all struggle while finding ourselves. Lastly, I learned that when facing something like death, there is always something to gain through the pain. In a world of seven billion people, I tend to wonder why it is so easy to feel alone. We need the reassurance from other people that we are not just a speck of dust floating through the air. However, we are never truly alone. There is always going to be someone out there that is

feeling the same emotion or going through the same thing as you. It is soothing to know that we arenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t alone with the way we feel.

About the Author

Abigail Rae Stansky grew up in Sturbridge, Massachusetts. She is the daughter of Peter and Helen Stansky. She has a sister, Emily, who is four years older than her. She attended a Catholic elementary school in Southbridge, Massachusetts from pre-school to sixth grade. She then transitioned over to a public school, Tantasqua Regional High School in Sturbridge, from seventh grade until graduation. She is attending Nichols College to major in English and minor in Psychology. She is a part of the Nichols College softball team. She also joined poetry club in late fall of her freshman year. She hopes to become a counselor for either a high school or college. 26

Unsure of what she really wants to do in life, her main goal is to help others get through life during their struggles and hardships. She wrote this book for her favorite professor at Nichols college, Professor Halprin.