E110 FA19 Class Blog

Philosophers say that similar to the sails of a boat, which harness energy that brings the boat on a journey, the propellers of a windmill do the same. They grab onto the wind, transfer it into energy, and carry the windmill on its’ “journey.” The difference is, the boat craves risk; it was designed to travel. It captures the air and with that, the boat is off, completing its’ destiny by roaming wherever it pleases. The windmill too has its tasks to complete, except it is completely satisfied with remaining immobile, not being presented with the opportunity of adventure. But as much as that windmill believes that remaining in place is what it was meant to do, do you ever think it questions what the other options out there are like?

Sitting in the back seat of a 1997 Ford Explorer, I remember as a child relentlessly begging my mom to drive past windmills. I was absolutely captivated by every aspect of them for some odd reason and I could not explain the motive for this admiration. Whether it was the hypnotic motion they spun in or the intricate designs and colors they were plastered with, during every car ride, my mom went out of her way to see my face light up when we simply passed by a windmill, my eyes glued to one for each passing moment there was.

I grew up then not truly understanding who I was in the world. Sure, part of that was because I was young, but the people I was surrounded by were all leading the same lifestyle, even my own mother. She went to high school and college, got her degree, got married, had kids and moved to the same town she grew up in. And every day either at the grocery store or the sports fields, she would run into people and catch up with them, then turn around to me and tell me how she went to high school with them. And I assumed that since my mom and all those other people had found satisfaction and happiness with what they had, that it would be perfect for me too. The image of that almost cookie-cutter life was engraved in my mind. I not only adored windmills, but without even realizing, I was infatuated with the idea of becoming one: unable to move, taking in success and utilizing it, all the while being fulfilled with my feet stuck on the same spot of the ground. 

Years later, now looking out the back window of a 2004 Mercury Mountaineer, the windmill on the corner of Godwin and Franklin was approaching, one that I was most familiar with. My mom looked at me in the rearview mirror and smiled, knowing that I recognized where we were and what was coming at the turn ahead. Turning onto the street, I was face to face with what usually brought me so much joy. But instead of a giggle escaping my lips, something unforgettable happened, I let out a scream.

(You would expect me to be frightened by a large windmill, right? No, it was the small lawn ones that gave me a fright. Something like the one pictured below).

My mother panicked and pulled over the car, fearful that something had happened to me. She turned to me concerned, “What’s wrong? Are you okay?” she questioned. I replied to her with no hesitation, “I don’t like the windmills anymore mommy, they’re scary.”

Prior to that moment, I loved everything about windmills. Then, suddenly, my whole mindset of them changed. That idea of living life like a windmill, staying put in one spot forever, was what I dreamt about, until I came to realize in an instant that deep down, being a windmill frightened me. I knew at that moment that I did not want to be tied down to the same place permanently. I wanted the opportunity to travel and experience life in an adventurous manner. My thoughts of becoming a windmill shifted to that of a boat, using the success I harness to fill my sails but being able to see things in new places and perspectives, not being tied down to any specific place. And now I think about that boat and not only dream of being one, but dream of all the places that it can take me. 

Growing up I was always told that you never know what you have until it’s gone. It wasn’t until last year when I truly knew what this meant and felt like. In October of last year, the stomach bug had been going around in my little cousin Dylan’s fourth grade class, and he thought he had it. He was sick for a few days when my Aunt Becky, his mother, decided it was necessary to see a doctor. What came next will be something she will never forget. The doctor looked into Dylan’s eyes, backed up slowly, and solemnly said, “You need to take him to CHOP immediately”. A forty-five-minute drive must have felt like forever. A few hours later we received a call saying Dylan was receiving a Cat scan of his brain. The next call sunk our hearts: What we thought was the seemingly annoying stomach bug was actually life threatening cancer scattered across his brain.

Dylan was 9 years old when his life was instantly changed forever. Basketball, video games, going to school, and even sleeping in his own bed became out of reach. Every day Dylan became weaker and more inaudible. He lay in his hospital bed now bald and pale, but one thing remained: a smile. Every time I walked into his room at CHOP I was greeted with a smile that lit up the entire room. His positivity at just nine years old was remarkable. He knew what was wrong with him and what could happen, but he always had told us he was going to be okay. Every time I walked into his hospital room I tried to push my tears back up but sometimes I just couldn’t help but sob. As my family and I sat around his bed from time to time he seemed to be the one comforting us, telling us how much he loved all of us and that we shouldn’t cry because he was going to be okay. Even though he was younger, he for sure made me look like a big baby. He was stronger than everyone of us and that strength helped him become cancer free. Dylan is now going part time to 5th grade and attends physical therapy daily. And everyday he still wears that same smile on his face. This experience has taught me to never take anything for granted because you truly never know what you have until it is gone. The simplest things we take for granted can be stripped away from us at any moment. So cherish everything in your life at every moment.

Whenever I tell someone I broke my back, the reaction never changes: a face full of disbelief. When I tell people I still have a broken back, that’s an entirely different reaction. A reaction I have not had to experience yet, as it is a recent development. Since these two instances are years apart, I have had time to grow as an individual and change my mindset about my injury, but I still have a long journey ahead.

Eleven-year-old me was a dedicated, competitive gymnast, spending 25 hours a week in the Summer training. Unlike summers prior, I felt pain in my lower back and hip, but continued practicing and training, pushing the pain to the back of my mind, until one day I had to stop. Through a series of doctors appointments, x-rays, and bone scans I was diagnosed with spondylolisthesis. At the young age of eleven, I did not understand what I was being told. All my mind could comprehend was there was one vertebrae slipping out of place, and I would never be a gymnast again.  I went through the treatments the doctors prescribed, but I was devastated. At such a young age, I was told that the one thing I thought defined me was taken away.  

It was to accept that this part of my life was over, so I took a year to come to terms with it, before moving on and trying new things. I quickly fell in love with cheer, and fast forward six years and here I am writing this as a cheerleader for the University of Delaware. A life goal to be an athlete in College has come to fruition. However, nothing is ever perfect, is it? 

I began to experience the same pain I did seven years ago this summer. Except this time, it was worse. I had the same symptoms, and pain that I did right before my hip locked in place, but I am also experiencing new symptoms. Walking, standing, even sitting for long periods of time prove a challenge. My legs now like to do this super fun thing where they now go numb and tingly at random points throughout the day and feel incredibly weak.  So, back to the doctors I go. Eleven-year-old me did not understand, nor feel the true nature of my injury as I do now. The break that occurred all those years ago never healed, so I will forever have a broken L5 vertebrae. My disk is tearing and pushing into my nerves causing the pins and needles feeling in my legs, and still, the vertebrae is out of line with the others. So what does this mean for me? It means I will live with this for the remainder of my life. It means I have to go through trials of treatments from physical therapy, to injections, to surgery, to relieve pain.  Now as an individual who has finally achieved one of her life goals, this is difficult to deal with. As this is occurring now, I do not have an answer as to how long until I’ll be cheering on the sidelines again, if I’ll cheer again, or what treatment works best. I am moving about with the mentality that everything will work out. 

Eleven and eighteen-year-old me have two vastly different mentalities on my injury. The younger me thought my world was crumbling and that was not the case at all. But of course, that is how I thought at a younger age.  I grew as an individual and branched out from what I thought I knew about myself and came to the realization that you can’t let your experience define you, let how you handle or come back from it be the defining factor. In this current moment I am handling this new discovery one day at a time. T Is this how I wanted to start the season or school year? No not at all, but it is what it is. Things happen that you can’t control, and that’s just life. While I had a broken L5 vertebrae then, and still now, the fact that I will not let this define me has not changed either.  

In 2008, at an airshow in Culpepper, Virginia, an event changed people’s lives in a split second. On average, there are about two hundred and fifty airshows a year. The variety of aircrafts and their stunts changes with every show and although most airshows are “tragedy” free, some are not. Unfortunately, an airshow on October 18, 2008 was not “tragedy” free. 

Growing up with a family immersed in the world of aviation, I frequently attend many of these shows that occur every year, so I have practically grown up going to them. The show began as any other: the first couple of performers went, including my father, and I sat and watched as he did aerobatic tricks in the sky. When he landed, he joined me at the fence and we watched our family friend, Nancy, take off. She was doing a phenomenal job with her choice of aerobatics and the crowd was in awe, and I could not wait to congratulate her on her performance. However, the mood in the air changed dramatically when she flew over the runway for a “fly-by photo,” and her wingtip struck the runway. Her plane immediately hit the ground and blew up into flames. Stuck on the other side of the fence, I watched as several bystanders including my father, rushed to help our friend escape the brutal flames of her crashed plane. When my dad left to go help, our friend Gavin stayed with me. The whole accident happened so quickly, that it was like slow motion going through my head. Seeing my dad running to the plane, the flames erupting, the ambulance sirens turning on, it was all processing so slow compared to how fast everything was actually moving; like watching glass break in a slow motion video.

Once the medical teams showed up to the scene, they worked in sync with one another to do their very best to bring her to safety. Already having a fascination with how EMT’s work, I watched amazed at what they were doing in order to get her out. It was at that moment when they put her in the ambulance, shut its doors and turned on their sirens, that I knew I was going to choose to be part of a medical team in the future because there I was, stuck on the other side of the door, wanting to know what was happening on the other side and unable to help in any way. The unexpectedness of every situation is truly something that I want to encounter and challenge myself within my future. Unfortunately, the result of this event was not what we wanted, and Nancy passed away that evening. This incident changed the course of my life, in both a positive and negative way because my eyes were opened to what my future could hold, but I also lost a dear friend. I always have known about my burning desire to help others, but I never thought about executing it in my future. After this accident, I had no second thoughts that the medical field was where I would end up in the years to come.

This event is part of why I am here today, attending University of Delaware’s School of Nursing. Although it was a tragic event and changed many people’s lives, it ignited a spark within me that directed me toward the medical field. I went from volunteering in hospitals, to visiting and talking to nurses and doctors, to then applying to Nursing School itself. I want to take up this challenge so that when someone is hurt, i’m not stuck on the other side of the door or fence. I’m right there, helping, hands on.

All days are unremarkable until it isn’t, April 22nd, 2017 was one of those days. I wish I could tell you how the morning started off, but it was truly unremarkable. The day started for me when my mother shouted to me from down the hallway, she turns her phone to me and showed me a picture of Douglas. She held a phone in her hand, shaking and pale she looks at me with such dread in her eyes. Without even speaking, I knew something horrible happened. My knees gave out from underneath me as if the air around me all of a sudden decided to become ten times heavier. She asked, “Do you know him?” Squeaking out a yes passed the knot that was in my throat. I collapsed on the floor. Tears pouring from my face. She got on her knees and held me tight. Then she said the words that would change me forever, “Sweetie, he died in a car accident this morning”. 

Every moment, every laugh, every conversation we ever had just flooded my brain. The last time I saw him was as I was driving with my mom on the main road in town. Douglas and Jaylee were opening the doors to the little kitchen. In my usual self, I screamed their names out the window, startling them. Then they turned around waving and laughing at me. Nobody thinks the last time they would see their friend would be them entering a Chinese restaurant. But then again, life doesn’t tell you how things will work out. There’s never a reason or a sign that tragedy is going to strike, and the explanation is dwarfed by the pain caused by it. And now with the loss of our friend, it makes me wonder about myself. About my own mortality and how I want to live my life before it happens. I knew what death was, but I didn’t know what death meant.

My whole life, I took pride in the fact that I never broke, sprained, or fractured a bone. Don’t jump to the conclusion that I am not a klutz though: I am extremely clumsy. I constantly trip over anything that I encounter, spill drinks and food, and embarrass myself left and right, something my campers especially enjoy to make fun of me for. I worked at a sleepaway camp in upstate New York for two summers, having the same bunk of middle school girls both years. As I stated before, I was proud making it to 18 years without hurting myself too badly, considering my lack of coordination. Therefore, it felt like the end of the world when I had my first serious injury this past summer.  

It was a sunny June morning at camp. Before going on my way, I ran back into the bunk to get a pair of sunglasses. I quickly rushed in and out of the bunk and little did I know that my whole summer would be changed after this instance. I closed the door, went down the first 4 steps, and that’s when it happened. I missed the bottom step, and my left foot flew over and landed in half. It completely rolled over. I felt a small crack. I was in shock. At first, I didn’t realize what had just happened, I thought I made an awkward move and missed a step. So, when I put my foot down again, I felt another crack. I immediately saw stars. I never felt this type of pain in my vast history of falling and tripping.  Someone older eventually came over and asked if I needed a golf cart to the camp health center, and I nodded my head implying YES. 

When I got to the health center, they took off my shoe and it looked like there was a softball on the top of my foot under my ankle. The nurses kept coming over and gasping as they took pictures of it. The main thought going through my head was “please don’t let this ruin my summer.” I was frightened that I would have to be on crutches for the remainder of the summer, or even go home.  

After hours of x-rays and different doctors inspecting my left foot and ankle, they finally told me I tore ligaments in my ankle and sprained my whole foot. I would need crutches for one week, so this was not the end of the world. However, when I got back to camp, it became clear this wasn’t going to be easy. My arms and back were sore from the crutches and my foot was not getting any better. After a week I was still not ready to walk, so my boss and I decided that I had to go home until I was better. When I got home, I saw another doctor who gave me a huge boot that went up to my knee. It was heavy and uncomfortable, but anything was better than the crutches. A long week later, after practicing my walking around my house, the doctor said I could go back and I was so excited that I didn’t realize it would still be tough to get around and do anything. I was constantly frustrated and depressed and thought my situation was rock bottom. However, my friends helped me though the tough time. Another doctor switched my boot for a small brace, and I felt better. My healing progressed.  

This experience taught me many lessons. Firstly, I learned to be patient. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t rush the healing process. I had to understand it was out of my control. Next, I learned that there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. There were times that I couldn’t see ever getting better and walking seemed so far away, but eventually I made it there. Finally, I learned to be careful when going down the stairs.

        For 18 years I have been surrounded by a family who has been hiding the biggest secret from me. All these years I felt like I was living in the perfect home with the most ideal family, but soon I discovered it wasn’t all that simple. My family consists of a very loving and caring mother and father, and two older brothers that I am forever grateful to have in my life. My brother Matthew is 20 and brother Joey is 31. As the youngest I became extremely close with my brothers, especially Joey who I built such a strong friendship with. He is the true image of a brother.   

Joey and I were inseparable growing up. We constantly would spend time with each other and he was always there for me. I had my struggles growing up and Joey was the one who was always in my room talking to me and telling me it was going to be okay. He left for the military when I was 10, news that would leave a scar on my heart forever. Even though I lost my best friend when he left, distance could never break our friendship.    

            The day before I left for college was a day filled with emotions and stress about leaving home. Although, this day also included my father having a very serious talk with me. Of course, I was thinking that this was going to be my pre-college talk just like every student gets before they leave, but I would soon learn differently. 

“You know your mom and I met at a very young age,” my father begins with. My heart immediately drops to the floor. I immediately feel pain in my chest. I didn’t know what he was about to say. I didn’t want to know. The next few words that he says are a total blur to me. But then the secret was revealed.

“I adopted Joey. He is not my actual son.”

I immediately went speechless. I felt my face burning up. I lost feeling in my body. I just sat there motionless when he told me. I didn’t know exactly what to think about this. Joey was my half- brother. Half? That can’t be, I tried to tell myself. 

My father explained the story to me. He always wanted to tell me he explained, my mom just thought differently. He went on and on explaining everything to me but this information was not important to me in the moment, only one thing was. Why did my parents not tell me this years ago? Why is an 18-year-old girl finding out her brother is really her half- brother? The truth is that my mother was ashamed all these years. Ashamed that Joey was not my father’s son, but someone else’s. Ashamed that she has lied to me all these years. 

I had some time to think about this. To think about me having a half- brother who I thought was my true brother all these years. I struggled to actually believe this. It was on my mind for days, but I never could make any sense out of it. I finally told someone. I thought if I told my friend it would help trigger my feelings. It helps to say things out loud, to say the truth out loud. Is it weird that I still don’t feel anything after all these days? In all honesty, I still felt like he was my true brother just like I thought he has been these past 18 years. I can’t change these past 18 years now, and I don’t want to change my years ahead.

I was told a secret 18 years too late. I found out I had a half- brother. I was 18 years old when I discovered the truth about my family. This secret taught me more than I would’ve ever learned. It doesn’t matter what someone’s real title is or where they come from. When you love and care about someone so much, it doesn’t matter who they really are. In my heart Joey is still my complete brother, and he forever will be. 

Hi my name is Zach Kramer. I am from Oceanport New Jersey. Some of my hobbies include rowing, going to the beach, binging game of thrones and hanging out with friends My major right now is currently undecided, but I am probably going to end up majoring in some discipline of business. I am also a part of the crew team here at UD. The crew team at UD is what drew me to the school; It is a really fun competitive group of guys that I am really excited to be a part of. I am also excited to join new clubs and have new experiences at UD. I am really excited for this semester!

Hello everyone, my name is Jamie O’Neill. I am from just north of Wilmington Delaware in a town called Arden. I am excited to get started here at the University of Delaware, but I originally started school at the Miami University of Ohio. After my first year there I took a gap year where I was able to work and live in Costa Rica, Chile, Malaysia and Ireland. Coming back from gaining experiences and seeing my foreign family I am looking forward to being in college as much as I was when I originally left high school. I am planning on being a Management Information System Major, but we will see where my path leads to. I love playing and following all different sports including football, basketball, soccer, baseball, MMA, chess and poker basically everything but hockey It is hard for me to describe myself but hopefully my fellow classmates will get to know me this semester.