the author of your own life ... really now?!

For the past week or so, my philosophy class has been discussing "Existentialism is a Humanism" by Jean-Paul Sartre. As I listen to the lectures, the idea that you are the author of your own life became a pretty apparent concept throughout the text. When we first started to discuss this text, I was totally on board with this idea. I truly believed that we were in control of our own lives and the choices we make define and shape who we are and the type of people we become. When I was in middle school, my best friend Kelly passed away and I had a super rough time dealing with it. I felt that I could've done something - should have done something - to save her. But even with her passing, I still believed that I had control. She was my best friend and I miss her like crazy, but I still had control over my life. The person I chose to marry, the amount of children I wanted to have, when I chose to have those kids, where I chose to marry - these and many more are things I had control over.

I don't feel this way anymore. I chose a person! He was my person, my best friend, the love of my life. We had planned everything and everything I wanted, he wanted too. We wanted children - lots of children! We wanted children within a year or so of our wedding. I wanted to be a nurse and he wanted to be a soldier. We decided that we'd live our lives together and we'd live wherever the army sent us. We were happy and we'd spend the rest of our lives happy. This was the book I wrote! The book WE wrote! And I loved every chapter of it. 

Within one phone call, the whole world stopped spinning and my co-author was taken from me. Literally ripped out of my life. Its not fair. I feel lost and alone. He left me here...alone. I feel like I need my best friend - both of them - to talk to but neither of them are here. How is this fair at all?! How is this my life?! I don't feel in control anymore. The book that I wanted to write, the book I wrote already, is no longer possible for my life. So how can I be the author of my own life?! I can't.

One phone call was all it took to change my life, to destroy my whole world, to kill every hope, every dream I ever had. One phone call and every opinion and thought that I had was changed. One accident, one attack ..and everything ended.