sentient_loom, 1 year ago

We moved around a lot, almost always rural. I had a big family so they were always a close crew, but also always very strained and stressed. We had a Nintendo and bicycles. I usually had friends around until I was 11, but then we literally just moved out into the forest where there was nobody else. For 7 awful years I was like in a prison. I lost the ability to communicate, but not the desire. I dreaded the summers because I knew I wouldn’t see a single person outside my family. My parents were constantly stressed, always on a sour mood. The forest was hard on them too. I would mostly try to entertain my siblings amd read books. Depression became the biggest feature of my life. There was just nobody. Then I would go back to school in the fall and I didn’t know how to communicate anymore, and was constantly sad and lonely. But I denied those feelings because I didn’t want to be a bitch.

My very young life was awesome. Until I was maybe 7 or 8 we always had tons of family and friends around, including when we lived in rural villages. We were poor but so was everybody else. But we had to keep moving to chase work, and I always lost those relationships. And then as I described above we moved out to the absolute woods and my brain started to rot. I really have no idea what “hope” could even have looked like.

There were good times too. My siblings and I would explore the forest. We followed a river up a mountain until there was no river anymore (its weird to see it getting smaller and smaller until there’s nothing). We built sledding tracks. We found an abandoned cemetery from the 1700s just in the middle of the forest.

Mostly I just read books. And that’s still what I do.