Family

 Author's note- This is my final essay for our group novel- Life As We Knew It.  In this piece I describe the theme of the book.  I never come outright and just say it, but I hint multiple times as to what it is. 

Lead in- Once upon a time everybody died.  Do you love your family? Too bad, they're dead. Your friends? Them too.  Ha! And you thought you were so tough!? What are you doing, crying in the corner with your head in your hands? You sit there and feel sorry for yourself while everybody else is dead!  Why would you want to live when you life isn't even worth living? Open you eyes! What is a hollow life but a shell of death and despair? You want to live now?  You're crazy.

Sixteen year old Miranda is faced with one of the greatest tragedies mankind has and will ever face.  With death around every corner family is the only thing standing between life and death, or even worse, insanity. With earthquakes and tsunami's racking the earth in search of blood people are terrified.  Food is so scarce that people are cutting down to one meal every other day, but even though a little goes long way, it doesn't go forever.  People are so desperate to live that they have gone so low as  to eat a poor innocent pet cat! No one is safe, and, quite frankly,  no one even remembers  what safe means.

I think that in my novel, one of the main themes is survival and the will, not necessarily for yourself to survive, but for the others that you love to survive.  Family is always there for you.  They hold you and comfort you, and even though sometimes you just want to knock them senseless, you love them and you don't know what you would do without them.  I have a large loving family at home.  They accompany me when I want to be alone, the make me smile when all I want to do is cry.  Honestly, without them, I don't know where I'd be today, other than knowing that I surely wouldn't be where I am.  Not only the Physical factor of them not feeding me and all, but the quilt I would feel if they died would surely kill me too.  Especially if I was placed in the position of Miranda in my novel. 

Miranda's family stands by her and she loves them so much that I know without a doubt she would give their life so they could live.  Jonny, Matt (her brothers) and her mother would do the same.  Honestly, as sweet and touching as that is, it is definitely not very efficient. Do you see the problem yet? If they all die so the others could live then they'd all be dead and no one could live! Starving, Miranda's mother believes that if she gives up all her food her little kids could survive, but they can't! Not without a mother! If my mom just went and died without a second thought, my brothers and I would be, for lack of a better term, dead.  We can't live without a mother, no matter how  "Mature and responsible" we are.

Life and death are the immortal equalizers that turn our innocent sweet minds into dark gloomy pits of despair and worry.  Will I die soon?  Will other people I love die while I'm alive? Will I have to watch? These are the questions that no matter how many times you kick them out they will still manage to creep back into your head.  Sometimes, though, these terrible questions that we are too terrified to think about just happen to answer themselves.  And when they do- beware, you can hide from questions all your life but you can never hid from answers.  They find you, they always do.  Surviving might be tough, keeping sane, even harder, but coming through on the other side unscathed, that's impossible.  The will to live is what kills us.  The will for others to live, that's our only hope.