By Sarah D. Park

There is a certain story in my life that I wish was at peace. I wish that story was over because it had found satisfying resolution and I don’t have to think or worry about it ever again. It really has been told too many times, so on to fresh and better stories.

And yet, time and again, as I do the work of getting to know myself better and meeting myself where I am, it’s dawning on me that perhaps stories do not work like that in real life. The terrible things that happen to us are messy, sneakily tangled up in other stories, and I keep finding new knots to stare at in wonder as to how I ever missed them.

I don’t want to call it trauma. If trauma had an out-of-town cousin, might we call it one of those random life turds that hit you out of nowhere? And is still dribbling now?

Perhaps the secret lies not in putting the story to rest but in making my peace with it being my story. The question is less “Why is this still a part of my story?” and more of a “How do I keep holding the story that I have?”

Sarah D. Park is a freelance writer whose work focuses on the cultivation of cross-racial dialogue with a Christian faith orientation. She is also a story producer for Inheritance Magazine and manages communications for several organizations. She currently calls the Bay Area her home but is an Angeleno through and through.