Live and Let Be

Susanna Sacks, Prozdor Grade 10

In fifth grade, I met an amazing girl. She sang beautifully, she was pretty, she was smart, she was funny, and she liked people to play with her hair. She still does.

Kelsey and I became best friends really quickly, and really easily. She was the person I could talk to when my parents’ fighting would wake me up in the middle of the night, and I would feel guilty for being alive, because they had to spend money on me. She was the only person I felt comfortable crying around, being honest about myself with.

Then, in ninth grade, she did something stupid. And I was judgmental. And she did the exact same thing again, and I tried to force her to see what she’d done as I saw it. Although there was never any direct confrontation, we stopped talking. We’d started growing apart, and then we stopped talking.

It took me six or seven months to realize what I’d done. And what I’d done was unforgivable, although she did forgive me. Kelsey has always been pretty, smart, a wonderful singer… but she used to be incredibly complacent. She let me and her older sister and her other friends tell her what music to like, what friends to have, what to wear...what to be. When we’d entered high school, she decided not to do that anymore, and I didn’t quite adapt. Instead, I tried to force my views on her. I couldn’t accept that she’d heard what I had to say and simply didn’t agree. And I basically killed our friendship.

After that, I began to understand what I’d always told myself: it’s okay to tell people your beliefs, so long as you don’t force them on those people. To do otherwise is disrespectful, and possibly detrimental.