It’s hard, you know. Grieving the loss of something that could have been. It is a struggle that defies comprehension — for how does one mourn the absence of what never truly came to be?

What do I have to tell of my life? Common is a word too true to define it. I’ve made it to no television, no newspaper headline, not even to the front of a classroom. The first and last occasion I’d been the center of attention was at my naming ceremony, and even that, I shared with another.