Jordan’s story was about a pair of astronauts exploring Mars in the flesh for the first time in the history of humanity. The two were father and son. Of course the setting was many decades beyond 2001 and the story was full of descriptions of high tech devices, complications, emergency procedures, and dialogue between father and son about back home. Most interestingly, a complex alien civilization lived just under the surface of the red planet, which proved to be both friendly and curious in the strange visitors from above. This wasn’t Jordan’s first attempt at writing but it was the first time she had really taken it seriously and put some energy into the task.
At only twelve years old, she had little idea if writing was something she wanted to do as an adult – like, for money – but it certainly was something she found relaxing. Her home life was stressful. Mom and Dad fought – a lot. Sometimes it was about his work. Other times it was about her work (or lack thereof lately). Still others it was about her siblings, the private school bill, the lawn, the dishes, the weather, it didn’t matter. But the more Jordan wrote, the more she felt as though she could break away from the world she was given and enter into a different life. It calmed her and that was the most important thing pretty often.
That morning Dad had stormed out of the house and yet again she had to help her Mom with her sisters. Jordan hated dealing with diapers and pee and smells and body parts but it seemed like whenever her mom asked her for help, that’s what came her way.
“You’re becoming a young woman Jordan. You need to learn how to do these things,” her Mom had said.
She didn’t want to be reminded of the changes beginning to happen to her body but that was pretty much impossible. Over the course of the previous spring and summer Jordan had “shot up like a weed” (as her grandmother from the Eastern part of Washington State liked to say), growing 6 inches in height to an extremely lofty (for a 7th grader) 5’8″. In addition, she alone had begun to notice what she knew to be other signs of womanhood on her body. And as much as she liked the respect and responsibility of being the oldest child in the family, the young girl was terrified of the thought of becoming a full-blown adult woman.