Everything is in constant flux.

One cannot escape change, because change is inevitable. As I think back on who I was 1, 5, 16 years ago, I see the constant growth and transformations I have gone through. Right now, right this second, I am not the the two year old being spoiled by her grandparents, or the six year old wearing sun dresses, or the 10 year old picking forbidden flowers to gain her mother's love, or the 14 year old outcast, or even the 16 year old I was a month ago. My identity, my body, my life is ever changing. In the words of Heraclitus, "Everything is in constant flux." And it is.

It is said that the human body rebuilds itself every 7 years. Whether 7 years is an exact time, an approximation, or even a completely made up number is irrelevant. It is still fact that certain parts of the body change over time. The outer layer of our skin is changed daily, the water in our bodies is changed approximately every 96 hours, and our tissues alter their structures according to cell production. Even if none of this is true, one still knows that the body grows. Isn't growth still change? If one can prove that the physical aspects of our lives are changing, can the same be concluded about the mental aspects? It can be argued that the mind is the only thing that truly remains the same, or constant. I have read somewhere that the nerve cells in your brain last a lifetime and do not multiply. Does this alone disprove my whole argument?

The mind transcends the brain and does not limit itself the way the brain does. I believe that the mind grows the same way that the body does over time. Not in the literal sense, but through education, knowledge, and experience. As I look back on the years I mentioned earlier, I can say that in each stage of my life, both my body and mind were different. As a two year old, I was thin and small; I only spoke Polish, my mind was not aware of any other languages until more change occurred; and the most important things in my life were ice cream and cartoons. As a 6 year old, I was still thin, but taller; I spoke English, a language that still seemed foreign to my mind; and I'd help my mom take care of my newborn sister, a change in my life that I learned to love. As a 10 year old, I grew wider and taller; I resented the language I was born into as well as the mother I was born from for giving my sister more attention than she gave me. At 14, I began to resent myself. All of these physical and character traits were temporary. If these two elements have changed, what else is there to account for?

Some may disagree, but I believe I am made up of a body and a mind; the two are in constant flux whether or not I want them to be. I will continue to redefine myself until death. Tim O'Brien may believe that there is something else that makes him up, a soul perhaps, that is unchanging, that the essence of "Timmy" still remains, but I beg tot differ. I am no longer who I was in the beginning, and who knows who I'll be in the end.

Why I Write

by "Irene Gut Opdyke"

Sitting at an empty dinner table, stripped of the cloth used to cover it - with a red and white background and the Polski orzeł, Polish eagle, neatly stitched by Mamusia - my sisters and I helped make pierogi with nothing but our bare hands. We made hundreds a day, pushing patterns and folding circles into crescents of dough, cheese and potatoes. Back then, I never thought I would be a writer. I spent many years of my life being everything but. I was just a girl, a nurse, a Catholic, a patriot, a rescuer, a friend, a wife, and a mother. My roles have shaped me in many ways, but I knew it was my turn to shape the truth in my own hands. With this in mind, I wrote.

I write because of ignorance. Not my own, but that of others. I fear that one day my story will lose its voice and be taken over by those who do not know, those who deny, those who cannot tell the whole truth. This lost voice, I back up on paper. I write with detail, emotion, and fervor; I write for permanence.

I do not write for myself. My story is not about me, or for me, although I label it so. It is for the lives I was meant to protect, the lives that through the grace of God, I saved. It is for Mamusia and Tatuś, for my sisters, for the Poles, the Jews, even for the Russians and Germans. It is for anyone who is willing to listen.

I write to remember what I'm hoping to forget. Babies torn from the hands of mothers and thrown away, their pulp coloring the ground, two straight lines of Jews and Poles, handpicked by the Nazis and labeled "traitors," a mysterious trench dug deep in the forest, swollen from the number of bodies it must hide. I write because there are no more reasons to hide.

I've been recognized as brave, rebellious, and somewhat of a hero. But I am just a woman. One who's seen evil and put her foot down to force it to the ground. I am just a woman who told the truth. My story is my truth, their truth,

and I hope it will be your truth. Jak pozwolicie. If you let it.

Z Bogiem. Go With God.