Jane

There were so many days where Jane was at the top of the world.  

The day she hit the solo perfectly in the band competition junior year, down in Myrtle Beach.  One of the cool girls came up to Jane afterwards and said "Way to have grace under pressure!"

The day she found out she made the varsity team on cross-country, after lagging behind the pack for so long...

Many days at the summer camp, where she was enveloped in hugs, where she heard the sound of her bassoon blending perfectly with the woodwind quintet, when she sat in the CIT lounge with Mike, holding his hand and feeling new tingles all through her body...

The night when she snuck the car to drive over fifty miles to see one of Mike's school concerts, then before he left his lips touched hers for the first time, setting her afire...

Many days and nights where she roamed the college campus with friends, never having known a full social life before - constant knocks on door, phone ringing, girls' nights out, going around town and knocking on the door of everyone they knew, dancing and singing through the dorm basement at 3 am, no alcohol involved...

The day she jumped, first in line, from that C-10 plane to be blown away like a leaf in the wind, then float above the earth for one sublime glorious minute before executing a perfect landing just like she had been taught...

So many days.  Jane had known what it was like to be invincible.  To be surrounded by love.  For life to make perfect sense.  For her to feel that she was right where she needed to be, surrounded by people she couldn't dream of living without.  To feel beautiful, sexy, powerful....like She-Ra!

Many years went by.  Jane grew older.  The only calls she got were from spammers, bill collectors, and occasionally from her dad.  No one came to visit.  Jane's husband died.  Jane discovered that widows are pariahs in and of themselves.  People fear death and loss.  They have to protect what's theirs.  Who wants to hang around a widow who could curse you or be bad luck?

Even so, Jane was still lucky.  If it wasn't for her dad, Jane would be out on the street.  The difference between people sleeping on the cold hard street, sometimes dying there, and sleeping within four walls, in a nice warm bed?  Maybe just one person full of love, or who just cared.  Where was that person in the lives of all these homeless?  Did that person get driven away by alcohol, drugs or abuse?  Or maybe because the street person was just unlikeable?  Or did the street person do nothing at all to deserve it?

Jane, and everyone else, whether on the street or not, were still created human.  Social creatures not made to be alone.  Jane was taught that all she needed was God.  But her soul still cried out for human, earthly companionship.  One day she told someone, "I'm probably the most unlikeable person you will ever meet.  Don't repeat my mistakes.  You need other people in this life."

So Jane sat there in her lonely room.  Jane was mortified to even leave it.  When she looked in the mirror, all she saw was a fat, ugly, old hag.  She had tried to lose weight for years, mostly to have any kind of redeeming social value.  No one liked Jane otherwise.  She had nothing else people wanted.

And still Jane tells herself, "God is all you need.  It's just because you're weak in the flesh that you need or want these things from other people."  So she writes and puts it up for all to see, thinking that even though it's ignored today, someday (even if it's after she's gone) someone will read it and be able to use it.  Maybe they'll say - "This is just what I needed!"  Maybe it will pull them out of a slump.  Maybe stop a downward spiral leading straight to the street.  Maybe Jane did have something to offer after all.