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It all started with an egg. As thousands of sperm rushed to fertilize that one egg, a battle for survival began. Fortunately, a sperm was able to fertilize the egg and that union created me. From the very beginning I was a survivor. Out of those thousands of possible outcomes, that one sperm survived and was victorious. Now, you must be wondering why I’m talking about how everyone was born? Well the truth is, that since we were in our parent’ body, we were all survivors. Just imagining what could’ve been my fate is mind blowing! Would I have been born but as a different gender? Would I have still been me? or would it have been someone else being born and not just a version of myself? What I’m trying to get at is the fact that we have been struggling in life from the very beginning of our existence. From the very beginning life was out to get us!
When I was in elementary, I read a poem by Eve Merriam called “Simile: Willow and Ginkgo”. I remember it till this day because of how it resonated with me. The last line of the poem has been etched in my mind ever since. The poem talks about how different the Willow and Ginkgo are compared to each other. The last two verses are the ones I enjoyed more than the others, it goes like this:
” The willow is like a nymph with streaming hair;
Wherever it grows, there is green and gold and fair.
The willow dips to the water,
Protected and precious, like the king’ favorite daughter.
The ginkgo forces its way through gray concrete;
Like a city child, it grows up in the street.
Thrust against the metal sky,
Somehow it survives and even thrives.”
But the part that resonated with me the most was the ending:
“My eyes feast upon the willow,
But my heart goes to the ginkgo.”
At the time I was very young and only knew that I liked the poem but now that I’m in college I have come to realize that perhaps the reason why I like it so much is because it illustrates our internal struggles so perfectly. We love beautiful things but we fall in love with things that we can create an emotional attachment to. While we admire beauty from afar and know that we can’t be a part of it, we are able to admire personality traits that make a person unique. In a world where beauty is everything it’ hard not to forget that there are more important things. It’ important to remember that like the Genko we are survivors and will overcome the challenges we are faced with.