I sit here in my room,

As I have each day,

And I thoroughly contemplate,

What has this year meant to me?

 

Why do I ponder this today?

It could be because this is Barry’s last day in office.

An era I spent over half my life,

It ends tomorrow.

 

It could be that my twin brothers’ birthdays are the day after that.

They will be thirteen:

Teenagers,

In Trump’s America.

 

I thought a lot about politics this year,

But I didn’t just get “into politics”,

I started thinking about human nature.

I started thinking about the future--a scary prospect for a sixteen-year-old.

 

What a lot of people don’t know about me…

Is that I’m an oracle.

I predicted Lebron’s move to the Cavs, the Cubs World Series and,

Yes, it was me...

 

I predicted that Trump would become president.

 

The Infamous 2016 was infamous for me, too.

I broke someone’s heart,

But my heart was broken twice, no--three times,

So I guess I win.

 

I learned that my father is an Alcoholic.

I also realized that there is a fine line…

The one between denial,

And the one between acceptance.

 

Before I denied that there was a problem,

Now I know damn well that there is a problem.

I still live my life and love my Dad,

But now I’m just a little wiser.

 

What they don’t tell you about getting wiser is that it makes you sadder, too.

Everything is just a little sadder,

My catchphrase became, “It’s how it goes.”

In honor of a satirist that never knew an Obama administration.

 

So I crafted a lifeboat.

Every time I found my father’s stash,

I inhaled a breath of bitter air,

And filled my lifeboat with, “It’s how it goes”

 

What a lot of people don’t know about me,

Is that I’m an old soul,

I’ve been on this earth many times,

And I know how souls work.

 

This year,

If I can say I did anything

I can say…

That I cemented this idea:

 

When God (Or whatever) creates a new soul,

He makes a new mold.

Then he breaks it, every one.

But God is also a recycler.

 

This is where reincarnation holds merit,

Because when someone dies,

Their soul doesn’t disappear,

It explodes.

 

Old Souls, like me, are made of 36 (or so) pieces.

That’s why we’re good at empathising.

That’s why people like us.

We contain the souls of people that their souls loved before.

 

That is what happens when we die.

Have you ever met someone,

And you see a part of someone you love

inside their eyes?

 

It happens to me all the time.

 

That boy that broke my heart?

He broke my heart because he was reckless.

He was reckless with the parts of his soul that were

Also parts of my soul.

 

He was reckless with the parts of his soul that were

My Father,

My Grandfather,

My Brother.

 

But It’s how it goes.

 

Souls became important to me this year,

Just like politics.

All that politics is,

Is convincing souls that you’re good at leading other souls.

 

One of my practical jokes this year

Was to convince someone to write my name

In the voting ballot.

As a joke.

 

What I did not predict,

As an oracle,

Is that “Pajer 4 America”

Would be on the lips of every student at MacArthur High School.

 

In other words,

What a lot of people do know about me,

Is that Athena Pajer,

Is going to be the President of the United States, someday.

 

So six months before January 19th,

When this mess was at its peak,

I was sitting in this same room,

Wondering how I would forge my path to the oval office by 2040.

 

My classmates didn’t believe me when I told them about the election results.

I had a whole half a year to hate my country before they did.

A whole extra 3 weeks…

To experience the acceptance.

 

A very rare type of acceptance,

The one that pushes you forward,

The one that provides clarity,

Was bestowed upon me at the most opportune time:

 

I love this country.

 

And it is a cool time to be a high school senior.

This shiny new-year, I am going to start my new life.

I’ll have a fire in my belly,

Because I don’t want to live in Trump’s America.

 

A benefit of being an old soul,

Achieved through thorough contemplation,

And a vicious balancing act of crooked pieces of old soul,

Is that you have good “common sense”.

 

(It’s true. My head is screwed on tighter than anyone else I know. I’m happier, too.)

 

When someone told me to “Strengthen your strengths,

Instead of fixating on weaknesses,

Because that makes you stronger.”

I said, “Duh.”

 

Incidentally, this means contemplating even more.

Being even more thankful.

Being smarter.

Being calmer.

Being wiser.

Being sadder,

 

But loving even harder.

 

Christ, folks!

Love is everything.

Love is what it’s all about.

Love…

 

Love is hearing my little brother laugh.

Love is meeting someone with soul-pieces of old friends.

Love is the Color in Gray Spaces.

Love is everything good.

 

And yes, there is evil.

It is rooted in the hypocrisy,

Of the “love that cannot be moved”,

Of the people that let it happen.

 

BUT FOLKS!

Hypocrisy is not the ice-nine of love,

In fact, my friends,

It is quite the opposite.

 

I learned that in 2016.

I love so deeply,

I love everything

With everything I’ve got.

 

So..

No election result,

No sadness,

No heartbreak.

Nothing can freeze my heart.