In my very short lifetime, I've learned enough to get a greasy little Mexican boy out of the gutter, and into the hearts of too many people to count. I debate how my presence in their lives effects them. Am I the pulse that keeps their life flowing: the electrical burst that revives them from stagnancy? Or, am I the blood clot that restricts oxygen-- paralyzing half of their face? I can't be sure of the answer to this, but what I am sure of is how I respond to them.
Here's what I do know:
I'm a deficit. I was born missing things; I was born without knowledge, experience, wisdom. I was born a small malnourished infant; I didn't scream upon delivery. I never made a fuss. I quickly learned that a voice is something that was answered with violence. I was born without Love. True Love. Yes, I was fed, and I was clothed, but everything I had never penetrated deeper than my skin.
Why am I so fascinated with my life?
Because(,) I. Am. A. Deficit.
And yet here I am, surrounded by people who love me (people who have faith in me). I've followed that bread trail, and picked each crumb up. And now I have enough loaves to feed an army.
I am a deficit, but my life has given me everything I've needed to change that. Somewhere along the way, I found knowledge. I found experience. I found (a very young and malleable) wisdom.
I found Love.
Somehow, somewhere, someone decided to turn my life into an Easter Egg Hunt, only instead of colored jelly beans, inside each egg was a person. And they gave me something I can't comprehend how to repay, and I'm not sure it's something that requires repayment.
Here's what I do know: I found my voice, and it couldn't have been done without my friends.
I found Love. And that's the only thing worth finding.
-t
