Living each day knowing it might be your last, I think the thing my siblings and I did was try not to be seen or heard we thought about everything from the way we walked to if we were breathing too much at any moment it felt as if a pin could drop, and the world would be over. Growing up in a place like that makes a child really ponder on the permanence of life. I had faced death many times before the age of four years old. This terrifying way of life continued into my older childhood. For example, my stepfather would get belligerently drunk fight with my mother, and out of anger threaten us with a gun. No child should know what the end of a barrel looks like. These are things I pondered on for a long time. Our household was split due to fear and lack of trust, so I never really had the chance to talk about what I had thought about. Over time I will share some of the insights I gained from these horrible events. It will take time though because lessons as heavy as those take a lifetime to truly understand.
I was extremely neglected educationally I could not read until I was 14 years old, and I had to teach myself how to read and write. This took quite some time, and I went into the military borderline illiterate. The lack of education I think was to keep a level of control on me, I didn’t know any better so whatever my mother and stepfather said was the word of god. The only thing that was not controlled in the more extreme way was my ability to independently think. Growing up I had many trains of thought and observations separate from that of my family. Most of my observations were regarding nature and the way things naturally are because of all the time I spent outside.
I remember once when I was 9 years old, I was sitting outside the day was sunny and the breeze was gentle, I could feel the sun gently kissing my skin it was warm and nice I hadn’t frequently felt something gentle and kind so this to me was appreciated. I had paper and a pencil I received from my stepfather on my lap. Sitting in the grass I look at the flowers next to me and see how amazingly the light hits them and how the leaves looked it was so real but so pretty and just naturally simply beautiful. Looking at this gave me a sense of calm I wanted a way to remember this moment however, I could not read or write speaking was difficult because of my home life so I tried my best to draw it so that I will always remember that moment. I learned a valuable lesson and I didn’t even know it then; the simple moments are the biggest ones of our lives. The reason for this is because that is who we are small moments put together to make something extraordinary. I am not great by any means, and I am not the strongest. The reason I’ve survived really messed-up things is that I learned from a young age to appreciate the small things in life.
Another instance of internal contemplation would be about a year and a half later, I was 10 and a half. My family and I lived in a cold place at this time, the winter hit, and the weather was cold and snowy. As usual, I and my siblings spent our time outside regardless of the temperature. A winter storm was coming, and my siblings and I were told to come inside they both went inside, and I decided to stay outside for a while at this point, I was happier outside in the cold than in. I lay down in the snow and spent some time listening to the world around me. We lived on 15 acres of land and 7 miles out of this tiny town that was 2 hours away from the nearest real town with more than 300 people. So, when I listened all, I heard was the world around me the snow gently falling from the sky the wind sweeping threw the trees. The cold on my back from the snow made a cracking sound as my body settled into it. I stayed like this for a long time thinking of life and why things were the way they were. Life is like nature the snow fell where it needed to the wind blew where it was meant to and like the snow I was born where I needed to, and I was where I was because I was meant to. If the focus stays too long on the what if then the reality of what is, will be forever lost. I learned to let go of jealousy of others’ lives because if I look at life through the lens of appreciation like I appreciate nature then nothing is ever too hard to come out of.
These still moments in time gave me lessons that helped me through some challenging moments, but they also gave some relief to my daily life in a broken home. I also gained a since of self away from the reality built by my mother and stepfather, in most instances their reality was the only reality which made It difficult to find ways to be my own person. these small moments helped me break away and build my own foundation of what reality was.
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