It’s been eleven years. Four thousand and seventeen days. Ninety six thousand, four hundred and eight hours. Most would not even bother with the maths, but it comes naturally to me. I have learnt, unlike many others, to rely on my instincts, for I fear I have not much else to offer myself. Everyday I awake, conscious of the fact that I’m not as privileged as I was, as privileged as I want to be. People around me have been and are going through so much worse, but that that does not lessen my sorrow. It only helps me to come to terms with my disability and acknowledge the fact that I’m not alone, that others are missing out on crucial aspects of life too.
Today is Monday, the 16th of September, 2016. There is one day to go. One day left before my life is turned back around, and I am not impaired anymore. At last, I will not feel like a broken chair, a crooked smile, a cracked wall, a splintered door. I will be a freshly baked cake, a brightly coloured flower, a jar of spilling sunshine. Tomorrow, on 17th September, 2016 my life will flip like a pancake, and I will cook on the other side as well. Today is the last time I will be as I wish not to, and the future holds for me that which has been waiting, locked up behind the doors all these years. What is it, you may ask. Well, you shall see. And so shall I.
Morning brings not the shining sun - well, at least, not for me. Instead it brings, specially for me, wrapped in bows of silver and gold, darkness. A black so dark and deep, it is as though it had had promises it did not keep, and now, its countenance is a window to the subterfuge of the past. A black so abysmally unfathomable that all thought and emotion is lost. I rise and shine - but nothing shines before me. The black tunnel I stand in is so extensive it may even be endless. At last, today, I will find an end to it. An exit, that will usher me into a life so new and chromatic. I shall know my world differently, much more vividly than I do now, as vibrantly as I want to, as kaleidoscopically as I used to - eleven years ago. It has been quite a wait, and its weight has been crushing me. Finally, I shall be at liberty, not suspended on that string that had me bound. Subsequent to the riddance of this hindrance, I will run into the open arms of my newly discovered self.
When I open my eyes again, I consider for a second my location to be the afterlife. How else could I witness that which I had not for almost my entire life? That which is so common for others, yet so distant to me? My world has transformed - it has jumped off a roof and landed on one toe, it has toppled over and been absorbed by the carpet, it has cartwheeled one too many times, and has eventually come to rest in front of me as a palate of colours. Half of this mesmerising palate is covered with a sky blue, and among that there are dollops of fluffy white. In one corner there is a piercing yellow, which I forbid myself from looking at for too long. A considerable amount of grey-brown buildings has come up since I last had the fortune of looking at the totality of life and structures around me. I behold meadows embracing rows upon rows of flowers. Colourful, bright, beautiful, demanding a gaze from each passer-by, commanding over any and everything they set their eyes on. I am almost unable to handle the overwhelming wave of images. After eleven years, colours are unknown to me - black has been all I could ever see, all I have seen for the major
part of my days. My entire life has been not the truth, but a veiled version of what really is. Now, today, this very moment, I see blues and greens, yellows and oranges, whites and pinks, reds and purples, teals and silvers, lavenders and magentas, turquoises and plums, browns and greys. I see boys and girls, old people and younger ones, cars and houses, shops and roads, grass and bugs, animals and birds, clouds and the sun. I see too much to list. I see too much to even remember.
I see.
After all this time, it is unbelievable.
I can see.
