Privileged

My journal says "We are made of stardust" on the cover. I made it clear as a child that I wanted to be a writer when I grew up, so I received at least one notebook per year as a Christmas or birthday present until I graduated high school.

It's amazing to think about—how matter somehow came into being, condensed into an impossibly small sphere, then incinerated the nothingness around it when it couldn't contain itself any longer. And when the dust settled, as it were, what should appear but us? It seems that life cannot help but rise from the ashes. Then again, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, as they say. I suppose I'm an optimist, although I have to be when my entire life has gone up in smoke. It was only by sheer luck that I didn't return to dust myself that night.

I was stricken by one of my many bouts of insomnia and decided to get creative with it instead of going through my social media like I usually did. I grabbed my journal, wallet, and keys and headed to Waffle House in my pajamas. The sullen waitress kept me supplied with coffee while I scribbled nonsense in my little book, hoping something would snowball into a decent idea. Alas, I had no such luck, or so I thought as I made my way back home to get ready for work.

The first thing I noticed was the acrid smell. Then it was the flashing red and white lights. Finally, it was the relief in my neighbor's voices as I pulled up to the charred remains of my home. They said they didn't know my house was on fire until the sound of shattering glass woke them up.

The firefighters told me it was probably an electrical fire, and that I should buy a lotto ticket with the kind of luck I had. Interestingly enough, my neighbors suggested the same thing. What an odd thing to tell someone whose house has just been destroyed, that they're lucky.

The firefighters' guess wasn't an unreasonable one, given that my house was a bungalow built when it was in vogue to drink cocaine and shoddily flipped when it was to smoke it. Maybe I would've done more research on the house if I had featured it in a story. I was just excited to be a young homeowner, and my parents never got the chance to teach me the ins and outs of adulthood.

After giving the firefighters as much information as I could, I decided to call off sick from work. I didn't tell them what had happened, knowing they would get all worked up and start a pity fundraiser or something. They're nice people, but I'm not the kind of person to take handouts that aren't from the government or a corporation. So now the first order of business was resupplying myself with the essentials.

"I'll need to see some ID," the gas station clerk said, eyebrows raised. I didn't have the willpower to look ashamed as I showed him my license. I thought his eyebrows would disappear into his receding hairline when I asked for a scratch-off ticket. After losing everything, what were a couple of dollars more?

Out of spite, I started scratching while the clerk pulled out my change. He watched out of the corner of his eye as I brushed the dust off the last square. I stopped and stared at the matching gold coins on the card.

"I just won five dollars," I said with a hollow voice. The clerk smirked.

"Better get yourself dressed up for a night on the town." Only then did I realize I was still in my pajamas. At least now I know my next order of business, I thought, optimistic as always. Brown paper bag in hand, I headed to the closest thrift store to replace my closet.

For the next few weeks, I lived in my car off of take-out orders in the Waffle House parking lot while insurance dealt with my claim. My clothes served as makeshift curtains and I showered at the Love's down the highway. Truck drivers really deserve more respect than they get, considering what they put up with.

I got the call while on my lunch break, sitting in my car just inches away from diving into a Hardee's Thickburger. I sighed and answered the phone, my sandwich left to steep in its greasy foil. A bunch of insurance jargon tumbled out of my phone, followed by "twenty-thousand dollars".

"Hello? Are you still there?" echoed in my ear. I swallowed and licked my lips.

"Twenty-thousand dollars? But I put eleven-thousand dollars on that house, paid my mortgage on time for four years, and all my stuff—appliances, furniture, electronics— all that's just twenty-thousand dollars?"

Some more insurance jargon that I didn't understand. In a moment of clarity, I asked the voice on the phone to pause while I looked for something to write on. I opened the glove compartment and found a small black book with gold lettering: "We are made of stardust".

The voice continued to drone on despite my polite request and I jotted down as much as I could make out, hoping it would be enough to determine how badly my insurance was screwing me. I flipped back to what I had scrawled in that Waffle House. Just snowflakes, waiting to be packed together into a snowball that would roll down the hill of inspiration into, hopefully, an entertaining story.

But as of now, I had twenty grand to completely rebuild my life outside of work. I considered it another mixed blessing that I still had a job. I had pursued my dream of a writing career throughout and after college only to end up at a copywriting agency helping others chase their own dreams. I thought about the bills I still had to pay that didn't come straight out of my comfortable paycheck. Looking at the cover of my notebook, it occurred to me that I had quelled my passion just to get by. I had crammed this journal into the glove compartment to make room for my essentials, just like I had tossed aside my creative writing time to make room for a safe, full-time job at the copywriting agency. I prepared myself to make another huge financial mistake.

"You're quitting?" my boss said incredulously. "But you're doing such great work here, why the sudden change of heart?"

The script I had rehearsed about wanting to go freelance so I had time to feed my passion for creative writing went out the window and instead, the story of the house fire in all its gritty details spilled out. The trip to Waffle House, the five dollars I won from the lottery ticket, living in my car, the insurance payout—everything. My face burned as I held my tears back to look my boss in the face. I was surprised to see a look of confusion rather than disgust.

"You had a house and you're only getting twenty-thousand? Now, I don't know your lifestyle and I'm not in the insurance business myself, but that, that doesn't seem right. My partner used to work for an insurance company before she got tired of all the bullshit she was handing out to people like-" My boss stopped, looking a little embarrassed. She cleared her throat and continued.

"Anyways, let me give you her number and she can refer you to a public adjustor. As for your decision to quit, I have to respect that; I can't force you to stay. But I do have an offer for you, besides my condolences, of course. It sounds like you've been through the wringer. This agency was recently hired by a rather prestigious client, and I was planning on handing off the project to you since you've been doing so well here. If you could just stay here for a few weeks longer and meet or exceed our client's lofty expectations, as I'm sure you will, you'll get a bonus and then you can make your final decision on whether to stay or leave."

I narrowed my eyes, unsure of whether or not to trust my boss. There was a reason she was in charge, and it wasn't from any time spent on her knees. Was I being bribed to stay on board? Would she actually follow through on her offer? Ever the optimist, I considered that she wouldn't have made the offer if I wasn't worth the time, money, or flattery. That, and I appreciated how swiftly she went through her sympathetic formalities, and apparently chose to ignore the pitiable fact that I had been living in my car. And she was helping me out financially by directing me to a public adjustor, so what did I care if I never got that bonus? I agreed to stay and finish the project.

By the time the client was satisfied, I had moved into an apartment and supplied it with the bare necessities. I had immediately regretted wasting a few precious dollars on wine and a lottery ticket, and pinched my pennies to a ridiculous degree in the weeks that followed. I did eventually receive a check for twenty-thousand, but it was a bonus from the client themselves (encouraged by my boss) rather than a meager payout from insurance.

It hit me just how lucky I was as I was leaving my boss's office after my failed attempt to quit. I had never even heard of public adjustors when insurance called, and the next person I talked to just happened to have connections to one. I might have accepted the twenty grand from insurance at a hefty loss, but now I could end up breaking even, or even in the black.

My boss's partner referred me to a reputable public adjustor in the area, and they were able to get the claim closed with a payout of almost four times the original estimate. The money that was left after paying the adjustor was more than enough to properly furnish and stock up my cozy apartment.

With the money from the bonus check, I took a sabbatical from work and used it to travel to Russia. I'd been fascinated with their unique blend of Western and Eastern culture ever since college. A literary agent actually accepted a novella I wrote while in Russia and I received a small royalty bonus, although I'm not holding my breath on earning much more off of it beyond that. I'm still working at the copywriting agency, but I've set aside my royalty bonus into savings, and with each paycheck I get a little bit closer to another sabbatical. Now that I have dealings with an agent, I have hope that I can make a living off my passion alone.

Since my house burnt down, I've come to realize that achieving success isn't about what I do with my money, it's about what I do with my time. Of course, with more money comes more free time; my three-month sabbatical experience made that clear. But before the fire, I spent my weekends cleaning my house and watching Netflix or YouTube to unwind from the workweek. Now I just put on a movie and tidy up on Friday evenings, then spend the rest of the weekend brainstorming and writing. It was a challenge to get out of the habit of simply consuming rather than creating, though the notion that I could have succumbed to fumes while mindlessly scrolling through Twitter or Instagram has done a damn good job of keeping me out of that rut. I had failed to realize that I was lucky to be alive the day of the fire, even after all of my neighbors and the firefighters told me so.

No, life seems to have risen me out of the ashes for better things. After all, we are made of stardust.