There she sat watching the waves crash upon one another. Like two foes roaring and raging for their right to be the bigger wave. Somehow watching the sea war within itself was calming to Sam. As she was warring within herself as well. Who was she? Who had she been? What was she going to do? Who was she going to become?
Sam was so used to following the rules under watchful eyes, and living the life she wanted when she was alone. Truly being herself when she was alone. But was life really meant to be lived alone? All of her experiences in her young life taught her that no one is themselves amongst the crowd. Sam yearned to find someone or at least a few friends that would truly accept her as she was, and for all she had the potential to be whether she achieved that level of accomplishment or not. Sam truly believed there was a group of people who could be genuinely their purest selves that she could accept and love. They just weren’t back home, in street-side Texas.
On the last day of her vacation she watched that water as if it held the answers to all the questions she had. How could she really be happy there, when her heart pulled her away from home? She loved her family and the familiarity with her hometown, and knowing the lay of the land. Sam adored her nieces and nephews and hated the time she was already missing with them. But what good was it doing them or her, for her to be so miserable. She had to figure out how to get the hell out of Texas; and into a place welcoming of her mahogany skin tone and more left than right point of views. She needed to be set free. As free as the waves she couldn’t look away from. But anchored to Texas, she always felt.
Sam used to dream of a life in Hollywood, where she was an actress and director. Those dreams surely slipped from her grasp as she got older and was often told not to smile as hers wasn’t attractive. It was further more destroyed in college when a love gone wrong stole the last drop of hope that she had. Sam found unfamiliar ways to cope and soon found herself at a loss of wanting to live into the next day, let alone achieve a goal. Hiding who she was had come very easily to her, with her background in theatre. Sam booted herself up and got her degree, even making lasting friendships along the way. Surprised herself with that one.
Question is, how does she make it all mean something; how does she make it all worth it, now? What’s next for Sam? Does she go back to the job she likes with management she hates? Or does she drop it all and run away to some small town in Wisconsin to meet a country boy on a farm where she can love and feed animals, wear jeans and a flannel button up everyday? The new dream she wants for herself. A simple life. One she could call hers that no one had given her or made a way for her to have. A life Sam could really call her own.
As sam sat at the edge of the sea watching a water war, she warred. She cried. She got up, wiped her last tear, and prepared for her trip back home. Her dreams weighed on her, heavier than anything ever had. A simple life.
