Have you ever had one of those moments when you suddenly and unexpectedly encounter something out of the deep recesses of your past? With a sudden rush you can feel life as it once was, the sun on your back, the smell of the house, the flash of faces, how big everything seemed and how small you were.

I walked into my room at my parents house tonight and found a little tiny pink drawer set I used to keep homemade doll clothes in. The clothes are long gone, but the drawers are filled with other trinkets. Shells from a beach I probably found 15 years ago, barrettes that I used to wear in my braided hair. The smell reminded me of climbing trees and of finding snails on damp leaves while I walked to Japanese school. In the movie camera of my mind I saw my blond head bobbing among in the sea of black ones, I saw a little girl wondering why she could never blend in, becoming more and more self-conscious as the world around her magnified her every action, skill and shortcoming. I saw confusion.

I remember running back to class after recess and hoping that I would fall and scrape my knee so I could get out of class and go to the nurse. I remember being terrified of the bathrooms; I wasn't sure I could use a squatty and not dirty myself. I remember being both the class mascot and the class fool; the curiosity who attracted crowds and the retard who couldn't even say "how are you." I started fighting those who taunted me, I even chased boys into the boys bathroom so I could give them a solid kick in the shins. I fought to prove in action what I could not prove in language. I am something. I am someone.

It's funny the memory things bring back.