I Wonder

I Wonder If She Knows...

Life had a way of rescuing her by inviting her out to play. Sometimes I wonder why it is so difficult for me to remember the moments of my childhood that taught me the most about who I am today. People often use the word lost as if it is a bad word... You don't want to be lost in this world, you want to know exactly how to be found. At any given moment, your life must be a narration that tells exactly how things will turn out with a beginning, middle and happy ending. Everyone has a plan but not all who wander are lost.

The Desire to Learn

The desire to learn what no one was willing to teach me. I loved walking to the pond and catching tadpoles at 5 years old. Growing up on a tiny island, the whole world felt like it was mine. I ran a lot. I didn't laugh a lot. My german shepherd was my best friend. My brother tagged along because I wasn't allowed to wander off into the bushes by myself. We played in silence, a lot of times with no plan, no direction which way to go. We jumped on our bikes and went in the direction of the wind. It was always like this on days after school. We would stay out until just before sunset, when the evening breeze felt cooler. Time had no purpose, it wasn't set for us. No time to be home for dinner.

Butterflies

In the first grade, I learnt about butterflies and the metamorphosis of caterpillar to butterfly and my obsession began. The silky smooth feeling of a caterpillar, some of them black and yellow with little red noses and whiskers all over their bodies. I loved caterpillars and I collected them in jars, waiting for them to become butterflies. They would crawl on leaves. I wanted to see it happen before my eyes. I placed the jar on the windowsill of my bedroom window, with a breathable covering, rubber band holding it on top of the jar's opening so that they wouldn't escape. The caterpillars rolled on top of each other, I would watch them move. I would wake up some mornings hoping to see a butterfly, of course, that day never came. I figured that they were shy, just like me, they didn't want me to see them change into butterflies, so I let them go.

Flowers

I learned how flowers spoke to each other and pollinated. I learned how hummingbirds took the nectar from the flowers and other flowers would grow. I knew that life was connected in ways I didn't need to understand. I could feel the harmony of the trees. I liked to climb trees, maybe I knew I was a monkey before I became a little girl. I would pick the fruit off of trees and eat as many guineps as possible. My favorite time of day at school was lunch time because I got to go out, climb on a tank and sit among the tree branches. The world felt like mine, I had an inner explorer that couldn't see past the vast escape that I wanted to know inside out.

Off- Roading

The time spent with my Father felt like an integral part of my mission. He taught me how to ride a motorcycle before my feet could touch the foot pedals. He took myself, my brother and my friends off-roading in his range rover jeep. We drove through swamps and on the sides of hills with no paved roads. It was a safari and we were the animals. Our only mission was to be there for it all, experience life head on with not a fear in mind.

The Beach

I had two dogs now, I must've been 8 years old and my brother 10. We would walk to the beach which might've been 5 miles away. Once at the beach, we would run up and down the shoreline of white sand beaches. Walk out into the shallow ocean as far as the water wet my waistline. My favorite drink was a coconut punch and my brother's was a pineapple crush. Cold, iced, refreshing, most times served with a cherry on top. Life was sweet. All we needed were each other, our dogs, the beach, our bikes and great smoothies.

Escape

Were we hiding, or, escaping the reality of what lay waiting each time we returned home from school? The unspoken truth was that words hurt at home, so we opted for a life without having to hear them. "Children were to be seen and not heard." Growing up with this mentality laid heavily upon me communicating with my eyes. I hoped to take in as much as possible visibly to create in my imagination what felt good to me, what felt safe and what felt like home. I would escape on an unknown path each day that felt more like finding my way home than actually living in a house with a Mother and a Father who was not always there physically, mentally or emotionally. Finding home was my mission, embracing all that I could outside of those four walls that felt more like a cage than a home. My rabbits had cages so that our dogs wouldn't eat them. I remember how scared they were, their hearts would beat so hard, they would cry if the dogs ever jumped on the cages and chased them around the yard. They didn't want to escape, so I loved them and I let them find home in their cages. I had a turtle once too, his shell was his cage. I understood animals and nature better than I understood my Mother and Father's relationship. They felt like they were going against nature. I would ask them to hug and to even kiss each other sometimes just to see if it was possible to feel the harmony that I felt alone...

Alone

Now I question my safety when in the room with someone else. It could be an Aunt, a sibling, a boyfriend... I choose silence and I lose, but silence makes me happy. Silence makes me believe that if I explore other spaces, the one I occupy with this person will lose it's meaning and I will find harmony out there, somewhere, alone. I'm connected to being lost because I know that one day, I will find home. In my imagination, I will find a place where I feel welcomed, where I feel like leaving isn't necessary and belonging is worth occupying. My friends have questioned my free-spirit over the years and I finally can tell a story as to why feeling free is my only way to find home. Am I the caterpillar in the jar, rolling over everyone, trying to escape or am I the caterpillar who I've been waiting for to become a butterfly? I feel like I'm in the cocoon right now, silence and growth are my best friends, my lifelines... Being alone is only as beautiful as finding my wings and preparing to fly.