When I was eight years old, I developed a crush over the summer on this girl I often saw at the park. Her carefree attitude and complete confidence in herself immediately captivated me. Over the next couple months I grew to know her better. She loved to climb trees. The park had several trees. Among them was a single pine. Nearly every time I saw her, she would be resting in the field next to this pine tree or somewhere among it's branches. I had a dizzying fear of heights (falling) at the time. I was bedazzled by her ability to ascend to ever greater heights seemingly without fear. I think that even without my crippling fear, I would have been terribly awestruck. I very much was a child of the internet; at the age of seven I had lost my faith in God and began to hold many of the cynical values that I still hold today. I spent far less time outside than the average kid of the same age. As such, it's somewhat embarrassing to consider how many afternoons I spent playing with her.

I remember one afternoon she was sitting a few feet above the ground on one of the lower branches of the pine tree, and she beckoned me to join her up there. I was a wracked with fear, but I found the resolve in me to make the attempt.

Unfortunately, this isn't a story about how through my crush I overcame my fear of heights or how I got hurt in my pursuit of her. Neither of those things happened. To be honest, I don't really remember what happened next, but I do know that for the first time in my memory I had made an attempt at climbing the pine tree. I feel as though I attempted to climb onto that first limb but failed due to a lack of upper body strength—whether that be because I genuinely lacked the strength to pull myself up or because I was so overcome with fear that I couldn't find the strength. Nevertheless, whether I succeeded or not in climbing onto that branch, I soon descended to the ground, yet to try again.

She wasn't very pushy about it—she may have even never asked again—though she had certainly asked many times prior. Her requests were always invitations and never demands. She seemingly always knew what answers I would give as well. She was always very empathetic towards me for my fear of heights and my many other issues. I always felt very comfortable in her company. Her patience with me was truly incredible. I have many memories of our short time together, but the memory of my failure to climb the tree often calls out to me. I don't think I would have even bothered trying for anyone else. To this day I have still never climbed a tree. When I climb a few feet up a ladder, I begin to shake, but I always return to my memory of her and somehow muster up the courage to clamber up a few more rungs.

She moved away at the end of the summer. In the days before she left, she gave me a kiss. I never saw her after that. I think kid me wanted to marry her. Kids don't really understand what love entails, though. I have no idea where she is now. The anxious part of me worries that we are no longer in the same plane; i.e., she died. Either way, I hope she's doing well now. It's been many years since then, and so I figure both of us have changed greatly. I think about the characters from my past and how they contribute to who I am presently quite often. Among all the figures from my past, it seems she has contributed the most to my present character, and for that I am eternally grateful. Tragically, it seems that among the people from my past, she is the one I have forgotten the most about. I no longer remember the color of her eyes, the color of her hair, the shape of her face, or the constellations that her freckles formed. Considering how much she made me who I now am, I find this failure of memory to be most painful.

I remember too little about her now to ever contact her in a somewhat normal way. I remember where she lived, but I would find looking at the property records to be distasteful (read as stalkerish). I think I remember her cousin, who may still live in that neighborhood, but asking him would be more than odd. Even if I could contact her—which I wish to greatly—I'm not sure if she would want to talk to me. That doubt would probably hinder me from ever reaching out to her. If it turned out she changed unequivocally for the worse, as perhaps I have in many ways, it would break me. If I could look upon her though, for but a moment, I'm sure my memories of her would restore—or at least my brain would conjure up plausible enough fakes.

If my memory could be restored to its former condition, I would never again take for it for granted. Even if it turned out that she was never the person I thought she was, I could at least relish in the results of it.

P.S.
Originally, for the past few weeks I had been writing a much grittier post on the way we carry memories, but I couldn't finish it, so I wrote this instead. I expect she and some other figures from my past will show up in future posts. I've told very few people about her, and among them I've told none her name. While writing this I could feel a hint of dishonesty beginning to flow into my writing, as it had with my other posts. Though I haven't lied about anything, I feel my writing hasn't been as genuine as it could be. To remedy this, dear reader, or at least as a token of gratitude for reading thus far, I will tell you her name. Her name was Promise. I find it to be ironic considering how many of them I have broken. Nonetheless, I find her name to be very beautiful, and I hope you see how in my manner of speaking of her it's fitting poetic.

Alas, sometimes I wonder if she was ever real. Good night.