The End of Something

My days at the junior college were coming to an end, but I didn't know to which university I would go. I would be able to go anywhere I wished for the state allowed a junior college graduate entrance into any state college. Deciding had never been my strength.

But two things happened before the end of the term that determined much of my future. The first was that I would need a third operation before I went back to school. The previous operations on my pilonidal cyst had been unsuccessful. I went to a second doctor who had developed a new and radical surgery for their removal. It was awful, but I would be in bed for quite a while.

The second was that I met a girl. It was nothing, really. She had gone out with a friend of mine, but now we were seeing each other at school after class and talking quite a bit. It was easy for me for I had no thoughts of asking her out.

The term ended and I had a degree. So they said. I didn't have a degree in anything, just a degree. My father and I laughed about that, but he was proud of me, I knew. Christmas came and the weather was nice, even in our cracker box house. The skies were blue and the air gentle on your cheek and the fields that surrounded us had turned a golden hue. Dusk came early and before the light was gone, I loved to watch the cars drive with their headlights on remembering what it was like to ride with my parents when we looked for Christmas presents, remembered the excitement and my feeling deeply the holiday displays that decorated the town.

But there was not much of that for me now. Tommy and Dee put up a metallic tree in their little government apartment that didn't seem to mean much. I was speaking to my mother a little now as my parents negotiated about how I would be cared for after the operation. They decided to rent an apartment close to where my mother worked so that she could care for me. But that was all. There would be no swapping presents, no Christmas celebration. And since the place I lived with my father was so small, we did not bother putting up a tree.

And so the year ended. Soon, I would have an operation and be living on my own. I registered at the local university since I would be under medical care for some time and couldn't leave town. There was no need to make a decision. Everything was uncertain.