I feel used, sometimes - used up - but I stand, I walk forward. I am me.
- galenkp -
It was always quiet in my world; no voices, no human sounds. Just me.
The breeze whistled through the pine trees creating soft music, a soundtrack to that moment of my life, a familiar sound that spoke of comfort, belonging and safety. It was soothing then and I can still hear it in my mind now, feel the breeze that touched my face as it passed on its way, the scent of pine and country air.
The branches occasionally rubbed on the roof but rather than interrupting my moment of solitude it augmented it, punctuated it; thin needles scraping in time with the breeze, like a clock ticking, a metronome setting the tempo of the moment and my life. But time stilled when I was there - I was apart from the world and within my own, one of my own creation - the laws of the other didn't apply here, not even time.
As the sun warmed the tin it would click and pop as it expanded and contracted each time the sun popped out from and went back behind the clouds. This alarmed me at first - it was a long way down should the roof collapse - but I became accustomed to it; just another small part of the world to which I'd removed myself, another element I'd later remember fondly.
There were birds. I'd sit so still and quiet and they'd flutter down and alight upon the branches. There they'd nestle, at first furtive, then comfortable I was no threat. I think they loved the place as much as I did...We shared it and I liked to think of them as my friends.
I was nine years old; a quiet boy, a little intense, a furrowed brow, often deep in thought and very shy. I could be cheeky and funny, but my experiences at school had stifled that part of me whenever I was not around trusted others.
I'd been terribly brutalised from the age of five - It seems I was so hideously different from the other kids at school, due to my name being funny and my skin being a little darker, that they had to outcast me, throw rocks at me. It seems people spitting on me, as a five year old, is an acceptable punishment for my differences. So I retreated mostly.
I found places I could be safe, feel safe. I created a place that was mine. No one knew of it - I would have got into a lot of trouble for being up there - and I liked it that way. It was mine and I could be, just me.
My place was on the top of an outlying tin shed upon the property on which I was raised. It stood beside a stand of tall pines and that's how I accessed the roof; I climbed. I was a small chap at the time, my size came much later, and it was an arduous climb, but once up I knew I'd found a special place and I made it mine.
I found an old wooden box with a lid. The leather-hinges only just holding it on. It wasn't easy hauling it up there but even then, at nine, I was determined and rarely let a task defeat me. In it I stashed my treasures. It wasn't much: A cup for my juice or cordial, a small canvas-covered pillow for my head, a torch (yes, even then I was prepared for eventualities), a few quartz rocks that I liked the look of and an old chipped tin plate which I'd eat my lunch off. I didn't need much more in my world...Just a book.
I'd spend a lot of time there.
Growing up in a small rural town in the 1970's meant kids had a little more freedom and it wasn't unusual for me not to be seen for many hours - All day sometimes. In the school holidays I spent more time there but if weather permitted I could be found there - I should say, I would be found there if people knew where I was.
I'd make myself a picnic - simple fare of a cheese sandwich, some cracker biscuits, small container of sultanas, an apple, orange, almonds - whatever I could scrounge up and fit into my little sack. It wasn't ever much, but it sustained me through my solitary adventures. I took a flask of water, juice or cordial and I'd climb up into my world and stay there, safe, secure and content. It might sound sad, that I felt the need to retreat as I did, but to me it was wondrous. It was a place I made, I owned it, and there no one could reach me as I delved into other people's worlds through my books.
I read my first real book up there - The Hobbit. I'm sorry but I don't have the words to describe what that book meant to me or what having Tolkien's world as an escape truly meant. My world and his combined and there seemed little to distinguish one from the other. I know now that it's the many tiny, and not so tiny, moments of life that shaped me into the man I am today but it was through that book, and that place in which I read it, that I discovered so many things about myself.
I had learned very hard and usually painful lessons at school and at nine years old was still learning them the hard way.
Being an outcast, unwanted or needed, the person no one wanted to play with, talk to, help, take pity on...Being those things was easy - Humans made it that way.
Being me, the boy who had to process that, live through it, make sense of it, accept it and accept myself was not easy...I only had myself for that and it was through moments spent in my roof-world and the books I read there that helped me do so. The Hobbit was the first of many.
I read Roots: The saga of an American Family by Alex Haley next. I was still nine and the the book horrified me. The brutality of slavery, the mistreatment of people for their colour and the characteristics of a human seemed so unreal - But I knew it was not...I cried a lot during that book...And when done I had found that I possessed a deeply protective nature, that I felt so strongly about holding a shield over those who could not do so for themselves. I wasn't to know then, as that little nine year old, that that trait would stay with me forever and become one of the cornerstones of my nature.
Next was the Lord of the Rings Trilogy and through it I learned about courage, honour, sacrifice, selflessness and the beauty and purity that comes from doing the right thing. I learned about love, how to give without the expectation of receiving, of cause and effect, hubris, ego, greed, but also kindness, generosity, chivalry and more...Lessons my father and mother also gave me but in my world, through my books, I was learning for myself.
It was 1980 now, a new decade, and I was a new boy...The same really, just different - I felt new though.
Sometimes I'd lay there, dappled sunlight coming through the pines warming me pleasingly, the breeze-symphony soothing me and the clouds scudding across a deep blue sky overhead.
In those clouds I saw shapes and figures and they were always different - Everchanging. There a dragon, now a battleship, over there a dinosaur - Everything was there, and sometimes nothing. Just clouds.
I loved those moments in which I felt so content, so removed from the hurt and rejection, the pain humanity had brought me and the shame of being who I was - Just clouds and me, the warmth of the sun and the tree-song of the breeze and pines. I was deepening as a boy. What I didn't know is that that boy would reside within the man until this very day, and it is the boy who helped shape the man I am now.
I'd sleep too. Oh how I'd sleep. Looking back now I can say it was one of the only places I have ever felt able to fall completely into the nothingness of sleep. One moment it was clouds and blue skies and then nothing - Blackness. I long for that sleep now because my sleeping hours are sometimes shadowed by a different type of blackness. When I'd wake though, I'd blink to become accustomed to the brightness and feel new. How I wish for that sleep now.
I think about that place a lot. I remember the bed of brown pine needles I'd lay on, the dappled sunlight and shade that warmed or cooled as needed. I remember the lunches, some of the finest foods I've ever eaten were on that roof - Or so they seemed - Simple fare in a moment of beauty made the food wondrous.
I remember the branches I'd stand on to get there, each bringing me deeper into my world and further from one that seemed not to want me. I remember the pine sap on my hands that lingered for days. I didn't mind, it reminded me of where I'd been and to where I'd retreat soon enough. I remember my clouds, my books and the deep sleep of the contented that I would experience. I remember the peace and quiet, the aloneness, the everythingness of nature in which I was cocooned.
I think about returning. I think about being there again, physically and emotionally, but life had other plans for that little boy, for me. I went to many places, did many things and have been left with many memories, scars too. Each is just a thread in the tapestry of me, each a moment of light or darkness, of colour or shade. I'm not new anymore. I feel used, sometimes used up. But I stand, I walk forward. I am me.
Yes, I think about returning to that place but life moves in one direction only and so the little boy who found himself moved with it and became me.
This post has been written for my WE80 posting topics concept topic one, four and five combined.
Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default - Tomorrow isn't promised so be humble and kind
Discord: galenkp#9209
The images here are my own.
