Volume I: My North Star
Morality is inherited. It's a family heirloom crafted in antiquity, using a pointed arrow to guide us toward waypoints like a brassy compass pointing north, glinting in starlight through ominous nights and the thick rolling fog of uncertainty. I was heir to chaos, a Geiger meter excited only by the cancerous presence of radioactive danger, illuminated by ions frantic to disintegrate every whole and lovely thing in my life. My father gained his sense of righteousness after his father attempted to forge him in steel. Each punch met his son’s face like a blacksmith hammering shapeless metal.
In my formative years, I viewed my father with reverence. He was intimidating, towering near door frames that his soft brown hair nearly grazed. His voice was unique and rumbled through the room with bass while pitching in a rusty lilt. He was softer on me than my brother, and I only remember a single instance of being spanked. We visited my dad on an arid summer weekday in the modest bungalow house he shared with his girlfriend and her son, Keenan. At the age of 5, I was a rough little thing, less than half the size of my aggressive older brother. My feistiness kept me as safe as it could from him, and I shared the same penchant for violence that seeped through our familial blood. Keenan was a couple of years older than me and began telling me I couldn't play with him because he was doing boy things and girls aren't tough enough. I punched him square in the face, highly offended by the notion that a boy is inherently tougher than me. His nose began trickling with the evidence of my crime, a rich red offsetting the tears brimming in his brilliant blue eyes. I anxiously awaited my dad’s call as Keenan stormed off to tell him. I heard his voice, and it cut my anticipation with relief. “Amber, come here.” It wasn’t the thunder of anger I expected. He called for me in an airy, humorous tone. I was surprised to see his gentle smile and eyes twinkling with pride. He asked me if I hit Keenan, and I denied it. His face darkened with mischief, and he said, "I saw you do it. I don’t care that you hit him, but you never lie to your dad.” He gave me a few gentle swats, chuckling with me to ensure I knew his discipline was an obligatory consequence of lying and nothing more. His subtle delight in my aggression taught me to value it, and I was honored by his praise. In my naivety, I peered up at his strength and the protection it provided and saw none of his imperfections.
As an adult looking back on this reverie, I have the benefit of hindsight. His sense of justice was meted out by following a twisted sense of honor and retribution. He was careless with the law and served paltry stints in jail before landing a ten-year sentence for attempted murder. I was left with my mom and brother, barred from my father’s security. In his absence, my brother’s abuse became unchecked, volatile, and cruel. One night, after my brother was coming down from a binge, I hid from him in our mother’s closet. It was the only place I could go in our tiny apartment. I sat mutely in the darkness, atop shoes and cluttered clothes, sickened by the smell of sweaty soles and leather. I felt as empty as that leather taken from the husk of some pitiful creature. Light seeped through a gap in the door and glinted on something partly buried in clutter. I uncovered our family Bible, discarded and forgotten, and felt a surge of sorrow for it. I hugged the gold gilded pages tightly to my chest and silently pleaded with God for my dad to return, for his protection. My silent prayer went unanswered, and over the decade of my father’s absence, I slowly realized the folly in my plea. Emptiness gave way to searing resentment, melting the steel forged in hostility mirrored by father and daughter, ancestral ties knotted and torn with generations of brutality. I finally understood that what I saw as his strength was truly savagery. I had a choice to either emulate or dissolve every vestige.
I’ve spent my life burning away that steel, a fire of compassion melting down the faulty moral compass I inherited. From this transformation, I have forged my own North Star—a guiding light rooted in empathy and clarity. Where instinct once urged me to harm, now there’s a steady desire to understand, each step illuminated by a gentle, resilient flame. My past, once a source of chaos, now reflects lessons that light the way forward. With purpose and peace, I follow the path shaped by my own hand.
Reflections Under the Starlight
This is the first essay I wrote as a returning student in English 101, and it helped me rediscover my passion for writing. The prompt was to describe one person or place in two different ways, and I debated what subject to write about. I toyed with the idea of writing something light and playful, but ultimately, I gathered the courage to write about something more meaningful. Before deciding to go back to college, I struggled extensively with my mental health for nearly a decade. I had to process through all the muddled beliefs of my family and dismantle what didn’t fit with the person I chose to be. Without that journey, I wouldn’t have had any emotional space to pursue my goals, and I wouldn’t have had the capacity to sit down and write. This essay is a glimpse of the process that led me here. I described the hard parts that I needed to cull away, and in doing so, showed how I viewed my father as a child and how I viewed him as an adult, sorting through my childhood beliefs. I also described myself in two different ways and attempted to weave the converging descriptions together. After I finished my first draft, I felt a cloying urge to add an additional paragraph to make it more “positive” and add more positive aspects of my father. While there are many positive lessons I learned from him, overall, they were learned from accepting harsh realities. My final edit strengthened the conclusion, the silver lining that is offered in every adversarial situation we all ultimately face.
