The first time literature forced me to look at myself was when we were made to read "A Separate Peace" in high school. My best friend, who had been since birth (we were born the same day in the same hospital and his Mother borrowed my name: I'm Kelly Ray, he's Kelly Jay) and we grew up in the same town, WAS Phineas. Seriously. That magnetic, that popular, the best athlete in the school (routinely all-state in three sports and a state track champion in multiple events). And I realized, reading that book, that I harbored the same feelings for him that the protagonist did for Phineas. I could see myself pushing him off a tree branch. An 'unfortunate' accident. I had to face it and own it and turn from it. It changed everything for me with respect to him and it worked a pretty serious revolution in how I saw myself. Until that time, I'd never accepted what was buried deep inside. That book made me do that. We're still best friends. Have always been. And I did, some years later, tell him this. He laughed.
Kelly
Kelly
