Journal 13 Pictures

Gene is joining the Navy.


Brinker is joining the Coast Guard.

Journal 13

I’ve been watching over Gene, I’m concerned that he is going to take this whole situation harshly since we did not have the best last couple of days together. He seems to be okay. It is June and people are arriving at Devon. Brinker brings up his father to meet Gene. When Mr. Hadley and Gene were talking I learned something new about Gene. He told Mr. Hadley, “I’ve joined the Navy and their sending me to Pensacola.” This was new to me I have been watching over Gene but not enough to know that he has made this decision. At this moment I felt a sense of pride run over me like Gene was my own son. Gene then informed me about something else as well. He said to Mr. Hadley, “And then Brinker, is all set for the Coast Guard, which is good too.” What Mr. Hadley said next made me realize that he wasn’t such a bad guy. For some reason I did not think that Mr. Hadley would be the nice type of guy. He said to Gene and Brinker, “We’re all proud of you, and we’re all-old guys like me-we’re all darn jealous of you too.” At this point Brinker got embarrassed by his dad so after he left he apologized to Gene. Gene did not seem bothered by all of this conversation. After it all he headed to the gym.

The weird thing is that I can sense what Gene is feeling and thinking. Gene feels envy towards me because he feels as though I never could hate anyone he thinks that’s what made me so special. I don’t see the point in hating somebody it uses up to much energy when you can be putting your energy to a greater use. This is also another reason why I am proud of Gene he enlisted in the war because he felt as though he had gotten rid of all his hate. After watching over gene in the war I noticed that he never even killed a man. I respect him for that, maybe he is the same as me after all.

I have never been in such peace. I feel like what happened to me was all part of my destiny. I would do nothing to change it. I blame nobody but myself for what happened to me. Gene should not feel any guilt.

Journal 12 Pictures

This is my suitcase that Gene had brought to me the day after I fell down the stairs.


I had always hoped that there was such place a as Heaven. Now I know there is.


This is Phil Lathem, the wrestling coach. He helped the doctor carry me out on the chair.

Journal 12

At the bottom of the stairs I felt helpless. Everyone was gathered over me, whispering to each other what to do. They finally decided that they’d go get Dr. Stanpole and Phil Lathem. They carried me out on a chair and brought me to the infirmary. I heard the doctor say, “It’s the leg again. Broken again. But a much cleaner break I think, much cleaner. A simple fracture.” You would think at this point I would be relieved that it hadn’t seemed to be as bad as last time, but I was angry that I had to go through the recovery again. When we got to the infirmary the doctors further explained what was going on. When everyone left my room I heard someone say something I couldn’t quite make it out so I said, “Who is it!” I then noticed that it was Gene I asked him, “You want to break something else in me! Is that why you’re here!” I reached out to try to hit him but it wasn’t enough I fell well everything but my legs fell. He pleaded, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I did not respond I was too busy trying to get myself back up. Finally, he left the infirmary. The next morning the doctor had told me that he left Gene a note to bring me my clothes. The last thing I wanted to see in the morning was Gene. I then confessed to Gene that I wish I had been in the war. He told me that either way with a normal leg or not I would not be good in the war. We then talked about the tree I said, “It was just some kind of blind impulse you had in the tree there, you didn’t know what you were doing. Was that it?” He told me that that was it, and that he would never believe it if I actually believed him. I actually did believe him I believed every word he said. He left and that was the last time Gene and I would ever talk. I went into surgery with Dr. Stanpole, for some reason I felt like this was a bad time like something wasn’t going to go as planned. That is exactly what happened. I saw the light as many people say. Truth is there is a light and halfway through my surgery my heart stopped and it was my turn to see the light and begin my journey to heaven.

Journal 11 Pictures

This looks like the snowball fight that the boys and I had.

I felt like I was being interrogated when Gene and I were brought to the Assembly Room.

This is what the stairs looked like, the ones I fell down. They were marble.

Journal 11

Before Gene had told me all about his trip, he came back in the middle of a snowball fight that I was in. I hit him with a snowball and told him, “We need you on our side even if you do have a lousy aim. We need somebody else. Even you.” We all started fighting and laughing, we were having a good time. Then I turned on some of the people on my side to add excitement. It backfired though everyone ended up ganging up on me! I surrendered of course how could I fight off so many men, it seemed impossible. Gene told me that he was concerned for my leg during that fight. But I truly felt like it was getting stronger. When we were up in the room Brinker stopped by to see how Leper was. Gene told him that he just left the war he never explained to him why. Then later that night Brinker came back up to our room and asked Gene and I to go out. They took us into an Assembly Room. There were other people in the room. Brinker then started questioning me about the accident like it was an interrogation. They had asked me what happened I simply told them, “I feel out of a tree.” They kept asking questions, questions to make the whole situation more specific more clear. It was starting to frighten me, I was thinking to myself why am I here anyways. They started asking me who was in the tree with me. They then were suspicious of Gene being in the tree. It all started coming back to me I did ask Gene to go up the tree with me after all we were both up there together. The boys in the room had mentioned that Leper was at the school so two of the boys left the room and shortly came back with Leper. He was explaining how he saw two boys standing on the limb of the tree one in front of the other but he could not distinguish who was who. Someone from room tried helping him revive his memory by saying, “The one who moved first shook the other one’s balance.” I couldn’t listen to them anymore I couldn’t hear them discuss a topic that was primarily about me when I had no consensus. I was outrage I stormed out of the room and started for the stairs and slipped and fell.

Journal 10 Pictures

Gene told me that Lepers mother made them the best turkey lettuce and cheese sandwhich he ever tasted.

This is what I thought about when Gene was telling me how he had kicked Leper's chair over.

Gene had told me how amazing the view was when they went on a walk.