Seventeen
I had wrapped myself in a fur coat the Irish had brought from their island and sunk into the cold grass while starlight illuminated the night. I allowed my heart to bathe in this place where my humanity lived—let the flood of memories crush over me, remembered my parents and the short years of bliss we were allowed together. For a moment, it felt like I watched myself from a distance. I couldn’t sleep. All I could think of was how the notion of doom rose inside my chest, the approach of something that was final, yet somehow infinite.
During the last months, I kept thinking about Callanish. About the last words my father had whispered to me before he, too, left me alone to figure out the meaning: To Death condemned, nailed to the Cross, by his own Nation, slain for bringing life
