From age seven to eleven I lived with my mother and her Fiance, Mike. Mike had two sons, one was three years older than I and the other was just a year younger. Going from an only child to having two brothers twice my size was a very hard and awkward transition. I felt very alone most of the time,
but with being alone and feeling very different from
my “new family” sparked an interest I never thought
It would, nature. Nature was my new-found interest
and set a course for my life as it is now.
The place I was living before the move to Mikes, was in a small trailer park with my mother and grandparents. There I found some lifelong friends that I keep in touch with on a regular basis to this day. Either way it was my first real interaction with a large group of kids and we all considered each other pals. These friends and I grew very close, very fast. We ruled that trailer park. It was our kingdom and when we moved, well I was
dethroned from my
palace and taken to
foreign territory
that was ruled by
strange outdoors men. As a child that was very traumatic for me, so I reacted in a way of seclusion.
I felt like an outcast. Thrown into a world with which I was very unfamiliar. I felt very pressured to be like “one of the boys”. Don’t get me wrong I enjoyed some of the things they did like riding four-wheelers and playing in the pond by the house, but hunting was NOT my thing.
Since I was away from my friends I had to find ways to entertain myself. One day I just decided to go for a walk in the woods. At this point I had already lived there for about a year and knew my way around the back trails of the house. I had been back there before, but this time, was different. This time I felt like I could breathe. The feel of the wind rolling off the mountains, so cool and refreshing. I felt with every wind blow layers of stress and discomfort brushed off me.
By: Emily Shealy
Friends Among The Trees
14