Life is a mess of stars.
It’s a sudden accumulation of gas and gravity, a happenchance of astrology and space dust. A star is thrusted into the world. It shines as soon as it’s born, unsure of where it is and what it is⸻it is only sure that it’s moving forward in time, spinning through the universe. It glides across the sky, sailing through childhood and the places it calls home like rocks skipping across a lake. Speeding through life, sure, but with the uncertainty of a shy child. It’s only sure to look forward to the first day of school, to the first day of break, to the first day of summer, the next birthday, the one after that. Moving so fast it takes it years to realize it can look back and see the constellation it’s traced along the way.
We all start from the same beginning⸻and this beginning is only the beginning; a birth in an aseptic hospital room. A thousand, no, a million, no⸻an infinite amount of ways a star can be born. It could’ve been born to a family in Asia, a family in Europe, a rich family, a poor family, a white family, a black family, a religious family, an atheist one; maybe it wasn’t born into a family. Maybe the star was born a girl, or a boy, not exactly either, or maybe both; maybe born in the morning or evening, at midday⸻maybe born perfectly healthy or maybe it was struggling from the start.
Each star rocketed into existence, so fast it is disoriented for years. Maybe its parents forced it to attend after-school studies or sports⸻maybe they had their own problems and didn’t care about the star at all. Maybe it found its passions early and felt decisive about its actions; maybe the star has been floating around space, unsure what to latch onto for what seems like too long. Maybe it's been taught to not cry or to cross its legs, told that it’s too old to play games or too young to understand⸻maybe it's listened to little bits and pieces of advice, or maybe it's rebelled against all of it.
All it can do is bounce off each meteorite and swing around each planet. Living, reacting, ignoring. It learns to not stick its fingers in mouse traps, to say “please” and “thank you”, to hug and say “it’s ok” when it isn’t. It likes to pretend that it isn’t growing up, that its heart isn’t ripening into something more mature, apprehensive, cold and cut off.
Then at some point in its life, it will hit a surface. It’s suddenly hurling in a direction it never knew it would travel⸻a life-altering accident, a surgery gone wrong, a family member lost, a diagnosis, a sudden breakup or divorce. Every certainty it had before it hit that bump is now gone⸻it’s back to square one, that sterile hospital room.
It could’ve happened at any moment, but it happened then. You cannot describe a star’s trajectory around space⸻it’s impossible to predict.
All I know is since the day you were born, up to the moment you’re reading this, you’ve been traveling in the universe, bouncing off each obstacle, propelled into territories explored by no one else⸻at least not explored the way you are exploring it. You can share the same stories as all the other stars you collide into⸻share the same glow. Your paths may have crossed, but have they traveled the same exact path as you? Do they know and understand everything you do? Each constellation is unique in strength and structure⸻no one else has drawn it the same way you have.
To be a star is to be a mirror.
Isn’t that what we are? A mirror, a pale reflection of the world around us. I am a portrait of all the people I’ve known. A little dash of my father in the way I walk, a hint of my ex-best friend in the way I laugh. There’s a bit of my mother in my temper and a bit of my brother in my humor. I learned to pick up the little bits and pieces of stardust they’ve left behind. I learned to take care of my bruises from the playground, I learned to work hard from my peers, I learned to hold the elevator for others the same way a stranger held it for me.
We are all mirrors of each other. Our reflection is a ghost of hundreds, maybe thousands⸻bright streaks of each other’s constellations⸻rope-like shreds of the moon smeared across nightfall. They pulse and dim and brighten; their luminosity gives us the shine in our eyes, the richness of our hair, the curve in our smile.
How sad it is to be a star, to be human.
We have egos⸻disillusioned that the paths we’ve traced was all up to us. That the constellations we’ve made were by pure conscious choice.
Not because the stars happened to be there, that we happened to be born, that we just happened to be there at the right time when all the things occurred for us to turn into us.
Mirrors do not create what they reflect. They simply shine back what already existed⸻we glow of everything nearby, but not of ourselves.
There is no real me. I am all the people I've known⸻I am all the things I’ve learned⸻I am all the things I choose to be⸻
I am the simple consequences of my circumstances. I am the whole sky around me.
Author Notes: 1st part of my larger project called "spacing out"
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United States • 18 years old