The Scintilla Project Begins... With Me

This post is my first step in my participation in the Scintilla Project which begins today. Each day, for the next two weeks there will be a prompt provided by the project which I will respond to here on Rivera Runs Through It.

Here's what I found at the Scintilla Project Prompt page today...

Day 1: Wednesday, March 14, 2012

• Prompt A: Who are you? Come out from behind that curtain and show yourself.

• Prompt B: Life is a series of firsts. Talk about one of your most important firsts. What did you learn? Was it something you incorporated into your life as a result?

I decided to go for Prompt A.

 Who am I?

I'm the one the entire neighborhood saw this morning on a quest for her beagle, Buffy.

I'm the one who, upon returning, needs a nap, a meal and her medicine.

I'm the one who is receiving text and facebook messages about how this day, Pi Day, always reminds people of me.

I'm the one who will always be reading and writing stories, no matter the topic.

I'm the one who is conflicted about her husband forgetting his homemade lunch at home again - for one, who knows what he ate instead, on the other hand, I don't have to go crazy developing another safe gluten-free, dairy-free lunch for myself to get through until I do the same for dinner.

I'm the one who dreams of living like the Doctor, traveling through space and time, forever on an adventure discovering new things, new people, new places; but instead, lives like Boo Radley, trapped in her home due to old, wearisome symptoms, conditions and fading finances.

I'm the one who reads children's books, anticipates the release of The Muppets on DVD and is surrounded by her husband's action figures, but has not found a path to bringing our own children into our life.

I'm the one who always earned and saved money from when I was a child selling goods out of a greeting cards catalog door to door in this exact neighborhood that I still dwell, who is now doing nothing but spending to survive watching every single penny of a lifetime of savings disappear into the vapor of nothingness.

I'm the one who fears she will lose the house she grew up in because she got sick.

And yet...

I'm the one who believes everything happens for a reason. And if I could believe that about the death of my father when I was twelve and of my mother when I was 29, then these little bumps in my road should just be added scenery, not the show-stopping events I am building them up to be in my mind.

I'm the one who has faith.

I am an optimist.

So, I guess, I should sum it up:

Who am I?

I'm a girl woman, who has been through a lot of crap (who hasn't). Who's going to make it through. I can't see how right now (probably because of my crummy eyesight), but that doesn't matter. I'm the one you'll read about someday. They'll be saying what an amazing success I am and someone, maybe not you, will think, Damn, she was so lucky! because, by then all of the stings, the burns and the pains of the present will be long scarred over and some may even be forgotten.

I am Nicole Rivera and, if you stick around long enough, you might just figure out how cool that can be.