I wasn’t sure if things took a turn for the worse or the better when I received some news one day in July. I was coming home from my dad’s house. My mom picked me up at our meeting place, and then she told me what had been going on since I’d been gone. What she said shocked me: Bear and his girlfriend, Elizabeth Anne, were going to get married.
All sorts of things raced through my mind. Bear was only eighteen. He was my brother—brothers aren’t supposed to get married! Did this mean that I would never see Bear again? Would he pull away from me permanently? Would he be too busy with his new family to even remember me? While I was excited, I was also worried.
Bear, who was then working at a restaurant buffet down the street, had nowhere to turn for a career. He didn’t want to go to college, so he joined the Army. Now it was my mother’s turn to worry. Bear was gone, in Fort Knox, Kentucky, in basic training for almost three months until Christmas. I wrote him whenever I got the chance, and he wrote me back a couple of times. He was gone for another two months and then went to Alabama until April. Then more shocking news came: Bear was assigned to a military base in Hawaii!
In April, Bear and Elizabeth Anne got married. The wedding was very small, and I was the only bridesmaid. I wore a purple dress and almost cried when I watched Bear making his vows, giving himself away. When the wedding was over, I could not hold it in any longer. I broke down and bawled.
My brother acted shocked when he found me crying. He asked me why, and I just shook my head. I knew the reason—I would miss him so much but I could never tell him that. Even though I hadn’t said a word, he understood. I threw my arms around him and hugged him very tight. He hugged back, and we stood there for a moment thinking about everything, until finally he broke away. He stood there looking at me and smiled. I was so proud of him at that moment, in his Army greens, smiling that same mischievous smile that he never outgrew. I looked at him and wondered for the final time if our relationship would ever suffer. Would he neglect me again, this time for his new family? Would he forget about me? Would he ever begin to comprehend how much I would miss him?
And then, as I hugged him one last time before he left for Hawaii, I rested my head on his shoulder and smiled. Because standing there with him, I knew the truth. A lot of people will come and go in my life, but no one else will ever be the best brother in the whole world to me . . . except Bear.
Katie Beauchamp, thirteen
[EDITORS’ NOTE: As Chicken Soup for the Preteen Soul 2 goes to press, the best brother in the world, Bear, is serving our country, stationed in Iraq.]
Moving On
If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we aren’t really living.
Gail Sheehy
It was an early November morning when we said our final good-byes and pulled out of my grandparents’ driveway. I was leaving my lifelong home in Wisconsin and heading to our new home in Arizona. Crying as I waved good-bye, I thought about all of the memories I was leaving behind. I already missed my friends and family and we hadn’t even reached the main highway. They had been everything to me. I simply had no idea how I was going to survive without them. I knew this would probably be one of the most difficult journeys of my life.
For the next four days, we drove and drove and drove until, finally, we pulled into the driveway of our new home in Arizona. I was surprised to see that all of the houses in our neighborhood were the same and that there was barely any grass in the yards. When we got into the house, everyone chose their new bedroom. That part was pretty exciting.
Over the next few days we unpacked and moved in. About a week later, my brother, Nick, and I started school. When we got home and compared notes, we discovered that we both hated it there. Especially me. I had just started going to middle school in Wisconsin, and now I was going back to elementary school because there were no middle schools in my city. It was really awkward, and I felt like I didn’t fit in. At first, my brother and I were totally depressed, but we pressed on and tried to adjust, and over time it got better.
I was too shy to ask anyone to come over to my house, so I just waited until someone invited me over to their house. Finally, one day, a girl in my class asked if I could come to her sleepover birthday party. I was so excited, I couldn’t wait to finally go somewhere other than my house.
The night before the party, I went to bed early so I wouldn’t be tired the next night. Well, around 1:00 A.M., I woke up to get a drink. When I opened my door, all of the lights in my house were on. I thought that was kind of weird, so I checked my clock again to see if I had slept into the afternoon. It definitely said 1:00 A.M., so I went to my parents’ bedroom and found my mom packing clothes into a suitcase.
“Mom, what’s going on?” I asked. She motioned for me to sit on her bed. Then she told me the worst news I had heard since we moved. My great-grandmother, who had leukemia, was in the hospital. My mom said that she didn’t have much longer to live.
My family and I were always very close to my great-grandma, so in our minds, there was only one option for us. That same morning, my brother, Mom and I got on an airplane and flew back to Wisconsin. Sadly, we got there too late. Great-grandma had died that morning at 9:30. So, we stayed in Wisconsin and attended her funeral and visited our friends. I was really sad about the death of my great-grandma, but I was also happy that I was able to visit everyone that I had missed so much.
Well, after ten days, it was time for us to go back to Arizona. I was so sad on the plane ride home, I tried really hard to hold back tears. I missed my friends and family, but most of all, I missed my great-grandma. I never even got to say good-bye to her, and that hurt.
When we finally got back home, I became really depressed again. I cried almost every night. Every weekend, I’d talk to my friends on our cell phone. They were always talking about how much fun they were having and how they wished I was there with them. Every time I would even think about my friends, I’d get so sad that it felt like someone had ripped my heart out and stomped on it. I missed them all so badly.
Over the next few months, I realized that I couldn’t have my old life back, no matter how badly I wanted things to be the way they had been. Realizing this, I gained a lot of courage, and I started to go up to people and talk to them, and I actually made a lot of new friends.
Now, almost a year later, I am a lot happier than I was when we first moved. I feel a lot better now, and I have a lot of friends. I still miss my friends and family, and I would much rather move back to Wisconsin than stay here, but I know we can’t.
I learned a lot over the past year. I’m a lot less shy and a lot stronger now. I realized that when I moved, I wasn’t leaving my memories behind; I would just treasure them now more than ever before.
Ellen Werle, twelve
My Problem
I wish they would only take me as I am.
Vincent Van Gogh
I’m an eleven-year-old, overweight boy. I have felt down in the dumps, felt bad about myself, felt left out and confused at one time or another over the past four years.
I’ve been overweight since I was three years old. My mom, dad, brother and sisters all worked at different times, and they didn’t realize that when they came home and ate at different times, I would eat with each one of them. No one realized what it was doing to me until I was overweight.
When I started school, the kids made fun of me. They called me “fatso,” and “fatty, fatty, four by four.” This made me feel sad, mad and upset. Sometimes I wanted to hit them and tell them to leave me alone. Instead, I would walk away, and at times, I would go home and cry with my mom. I never let anyone know this because they would have just teased me for it instead of realizing how much I was hurting.
In sports, I was always picked last, making me feel like I couldn’t do as well as the other kids. This, I believe, is part of the reason I don’t enjoy sports very much.
When I was eight, my mom and I joined TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly), a weight-loss support group. Since
I’ve been in TOPS, I’ve learned to exercise and to count calories. While I was in TOPS, I became a Division winner for weight loss for my age group. I was proud to be on stage for this, especially knowing part of my TOPS group was there to support me. I’ve also learned how great it is to have my family support my efforts, as well. I try to give the same support either by talking to someone who has weight issues or by giving hugs to people who need them.
I now set small goals for myself, and one by one, I find that they are easier to achieve than really big ones. They all add up to a bigger change in my weight eventually. Seeing the success as I go also has helped me to believe in myself more than ever before.
Still, following new ways of healthy eating can be really tough. Sometimes I just want to eat everything in sight. It’s hard when we go out to eat or go to functions where there is food. I know I can have some of whatever I want, I just need to watch how much I eat of it. Sometimes it doesn’t seem fair being a kid and having to think about this!
I think because of what I’ve been though, I am more aware of how a person with disabilities feels. I try to help others and talk to them in a way that shows them respect. I never want to hurt anyone’s feelings the way mine have been hurt.
My family and TOPS friends have taught me to treat people with respect. If I could say anything to people who make fun of others, it would be not to just look at the outside of a person. You should get to know them on the inside—get to know them for who and what they are.
Also remember, if you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t say anything at all. I might laugh at your joke about my weight, but inside . . . I might be crying.
Allen Smith, eleven
[EDITORS’ NOTE: For more information regarding weight issues, log on to www.kidshealth.org (key word search: “weight”).]
Waiting for Katie
Time is the wisest of all counselors.
Plutarch
My sister, Katie, has always been there for me, and I look up to her. She has been my hero. She has always been beautiful and kind to everyone and everything.
Two summers ago, I went off to camp knowing that my sister was sick. I knew something was wrong. She was too skinny. Two shrimp, three carrots and maybe an apple were her daily food intake. My mom, dad, brother and I told her that she needed more food to keep herself alive. She didn’t listen to us, though, so I yelled and screamed at her out of love, not hatred. My parents did the same. My parents threatened to take away the number one thing that she loved: horseback riding.
When I came home from camp, sure enough, she was in the hospital. I went to visit her and give her the things that I had made for her at camp. That’s when I noticed that something was really different about her. She wasn’t nice to me anymore. She never opened up enough to try to help me understand what caused her to end up in the hospital. She never allowed me to help her by having honest, heart-to-heart talks.
My friends would always talk about how they went out shopping with their sisters, but that was out of the question for my sister and me. I felt ripped off by life. Why did my sister have to get sick? I’d think. Doesn’t she realize how much I love her and hate to see her so skinny and in the hospital?
Sadly, I decided that she wasn’t my hero anymore. She had ruined her body, and that wasn’t anything I could look up to. I no longer envied her like I used to.
When she finally got out of the hospital, I thought that things would be better from then on, and that our relationship would bounce back. But boy, was I wrong. Every Thursday, I would tremble with fear knowing that she had clinic. I constantly wondered, Will I see her when I get home from school, or will she be back in the hospital? Then there was my mom who spent endless hours seeing that my sister got her every need met. It was hard to see her put so much love and energy out, only to have my sister continue to struggle. I wondered what our lives would be like if Katie wasn’t anorexic. Would there still be the horrible fights? Would my brother still have gone to boarding school? I’d cry myself to sleep at night and worry about her so much that I couldn’t think during my classes.
Then there was the fighting when I’d get home. It was unbearable. All I wanted to do was get away. Sometimes I would take long walks until my mom and sister were finished fighting. The anger bounced back and forth. When my sister would cry, I’d start with the tears, too. No matter what we’ve been through, we will always have a bond and a history, and I will love her—no matter what.
Eventually, I will adore my sister the way I used to. I will look up to her and we will even go shopping together—but only when she gets better. It might take a long time to get there, but I will be here, waiting for her.
Erin Shirreff, twelve
[EDITORS’ NOTE: For more information about eating disorders, log on to www.kidshealth.org (key word search: “eating disorders”). ]
© Reprinted with special permission of King Features Syndicate.
Bad Hair Day
As the Santa Ana winds blew in the fall, I started fifth grade at a new school in a new town. My parents had divorced a few months earlier. I was both excited and bewildered as I entered the classroom in my plaid jumper and crisp, white short-sleeved blouse tucked neatly inside. This would be my uniform for the year. My last school was public; this school was private and Catholic, complete with a nun standing at the blackboard. She was actually very nice, and I honestly felt she wanted me to fit in as she introduced me to the class.
“Class, I’d like you all to welcome Kerry.” Quick whispers from a few kids buzzed in my ears while she was talking, and through the corner of my eye I noticed a couple of girls passing a note near the back of the classroom. Overall, the kids didn’t look too mean.
The one saving grace about moving here was that we were living in the beach town where my sister and I had spent occasional weekends when Mom wanted to get away. Now that the divorce was final, we would be here permanently. So, no matter how bad school might turn out to be, I could look forward to playing in the ocean after school, on weekends and holidays.
By late November, I had done all right, made a few new friends and even found a love note on my desk from the cutest boy in class. The schoolwork was hard; I just managed to keep up. However, I excelled in volleyball. I met a girl, Janie, who laughed a lot and we became instant friends—best friends, eventually. We both loved volleyball, the beach and boys.
Christmas vacation was the best. I was so happy that Christmas vacation came a week earlier and lasted five days longer than at public school. I spent the entire two weeks with my older sister, Mary, at the beach, while our mom worked at her new job.
The one thing my sister was responsible for during that vacation was me. The one thing she forgot to remind me to do every day was to brush my hair. My hair was long, to the middle of my back, straight as a board, brown and streaked by the sun. By the end of vacation, a large rat’s nest of matted hair had formed at the base of my neck. This thing was huge, I’m talkin’ honkin’, humongous.
When Mary discovered it, sheer panic set in. School would be starting back up the next morning, so she had to do something. She carefully picked at it with a comb, but soon realized that it would take about a year to undo the knot that way. So, she held the whole knot as tightly as she could and then yanked at it with a brush. No progress appeared to be made, so she tried hiding the knot by brushing some hair from the side of my head over it. My head was beginning to throb when I suggested we use peanut butter. “It takes gum out,” I reminded her.
After that failed, she came up with one last, desperate idea—cut it.
At this point, I just wanted to get it out. My sister searched the house for scissors; Mom was due home at any moment. “Ah ha!” she yelled, signaling her victory. She sat me down on a chair and said she would have to cut it pretty short because the knot was so honkin’. Then the cutting began. When she’d cut my hair halfway around my head I noticed she was using Mom’s pinking shears, which have a zigzag pattern on the blades.
At that very moment, the door flew open and Mom zoomed in on us. I’ll never forget the look of horror in her eyes as she yelled, “What in God’s name are you two doing?”
The last thing you want to do after your mother gets a divorce is upset her in any way. Too late. Now, not only was my hair a jagged mess, to make matters worse, my sister was grounded for a week. After my mother cried and brought out pictures of my long hair in braids, she had an idea. Early the next morning, she’d fix it. But overnight my hair went into total shock and was standing on end with static electricity. My mother stared at me.
“This will look so cute,” she said. “Sort of like Betty Boop.”
Oh great, I thought. I’m ten—not four!
First she had to even up the cut, which took it up to my ears. Then she greased the little bit of hair I had left to my head and plastered curls along my face, framing it . . . just like Betty Boop. Like I said, I didn’t want to upset her, so I smiled at her when she dropped me at school that morning.
I had a sickening feeling as I walked into the classroom. The entire class stared; some kids dropped their jaws, others immediately gathered and whispered with friends. I took my seat with burning hot ears (my ears always burn when I get embarrassed). I lasted for three, maybe four seconds before leaping up and running out of the classroom and down the hall. I sat crying in the corner of the girls’ bathroom, vowing never to leave.
Ten minutes or so passed before our teacher, Sister Ursula, showed up and sat in the corner with me. She held my hand and told me it didn’t matter what my hair looked like, that true friends will like you for you, not your hair. She went on to say, “It’s not what we look like on the outside that’s important. It’s what’s on the inside that matters. When things like this happen to your hair, which is a little shocking,” she added, “it becomes like a test to see who your real friends are.”