We get to enjoy all these things – emotions,  wealth , and power. We can dabble in all of them – we can become any one thing. The only price that existence asks is for life. We must cash in our ticket for this roller coaster of a ride – our ups, our downs, our screams, our euphoria – we must stand in line before the existence of this experience. Not knowing what to expect, for those feelings do not exist within us yet. Those memories which we will make do not compute, for we have no means to make them compute. Then, our turn comes, and we sit in those seats. We’re strapped in to our chairs, and locked into our places. We rise to the drop, we climb to the peak. And before we drop, we become a void of memory where we know nothing of what to expect. Then we drop, into this world of twists and turns, never knowing when to hang on, or when to throw our hands into the air and scream with excitement, or grip the bars with terror. We go through and through these ups and downs, soon finding ourselves to understand the drops ahead, a little bit wiser, and a little more prepared. By the end of the ride we are exhausted and indifferent. We see the ride, with all its hot rails, and glory. We descend and slow on the rails. We approach the same darkness we came from before the lurch of the cart and start of the ride. We see new faces. We see the excitement of those standing in line, eager to give their ticket for that chance to feel what we have experienced. We see faces. Some full of fright, some full of excitement, and some full of bewildering blankness – but, they all maintain to be full of the same life  that we who have ridden the roller coaster:  had, have, and for the next moment until we get off this ride to allow for the new generation of riders, still linger with.  Behind our eyes we feel wiser with this experience. They ask us in the moment, how it was. What to expect. Any tips from our battle stripes of knowledge- and in the moment as we are pushed down the exit lane, we answer as many as we can. We had no time to contemplate it. We had no time, except that moment until we saw the ending to understand it. We had analysis of its effect on us as a whole. We simply rode the roller coaster that is our life, and we had our experience – our own, our own, our own – experience. And, now, as we turn our backs to the humming excitement and growling stomachs about to enter the drop of  the roller coaster we have stepped off, we turn around for one last smile, and one last glimpse of the ride we have just witnessed – first hand on the edge. Some of us smile, some of us linger quietly, some of us laugh – but all of us keep moving along – exiting just the same – and remember the Summer rays and blast of cool wind  blowing in our face before the drop.

By: Patrick Bairamian