The Path of Moonlight: 1

It took me longer to get this up than I thought because I forgot all about it. Oops… And now I get it out on Christmas Eve? Ah well. At least it’s not Christmas. Today’s not a holiday so it’s still fair game.

This is my newest writing endeavor. Like I mentioned in my last post, I’m just having some fun. I’ll do my best to get them out in weekly installments but no promises.

======== The Path of Moonlight ========

I dreamt I could walk on the light of the moon.  The full moon’s light would shine down on the world and I would see the path that no one else could.  The glowing path that would lead me up to the moon and back to my family.  My family.  The sensible part of me knew it wasn’t true, but it argued in silence with my other half – the half that believed in everything unseen.  I learned early on in my childhood that it wasn’t smart to voice this knowledge.  If I did, I’d end up locked in the crawl space under the house.  It didn’t take much for this to happen though.

My mother mete out the punishments.  That is, she called herself my mother but I don’t believe she ever was.  I can’t believe it.  I studied my face in the mirror till I knew every line, every freckle, and then I would study hers.  When she wasn’t looking of course.  I could see no similarities.  I’d do the same with my father.  The difference was even more noticeable there.  Still they called themselves my parents.

I was home-schooled until high school when they were sure I wouldn’t hint to anyone the things that happened behind closed doors.  They rarely hit me and didn’t speak to me if they could help it.  The good days were when I was ignored.  They were more often than not but I spent untold hours in the crawl space under the house.  Perhaps I said the wrong thing, did the wrong thing, wore the wrong thing, acted the wrong way.  Like I said, they didn’t need much reason to send me to that cold, dark place.

It was in high school where I learned that normal parents don’t do the things they did.  I didn’t have any friends; I didn’t want any friends.  What was the point?  I listened to their conversations and knew I wouldn’t fit in or be accepted.  How could I when I had never done any of the things they did?  I didn’t go to the movies or hang out with people, didn’t listen to music or follow fashion trends.  I read textbooks for school and knew nothing about the latest book that was “all the rage” among the students.  It took me a few weeks to even understand phrases like “all the rage” and the common “what’s up” that everyone said to each other.  But I’m used to paying close attention to people in order to understand my guardians’ moods.  If I could do that well, why did I get sent to the crawl space so often?  They were unpredictable.  They didn’t need a reason to send me; they’d make one up and off I went.

It was from the other students that I learned about the idea of running away too.  I heard some of them speaking about it one day.  She hated her parents because they were strict and never let her do anything.  Her plan was to run away.  She was sixteen and apparently this meant something to her and her friends because they all gave her vocal support and said she was “totally old enough to take care of herself.”  Maybe she could come stay with some of them in turns.  That got them excited as they talked about how much fun they’d have, that it’d be like a sleepover.  When one of them was sure her parents wouldn’t mind taking her in, the others would chime in that theirs wouldn’t mind either.  The last one went so far as to say her parents would love the idea of having another daughter.

I didn’t know if any of it was true, but I did notice that the next day in class the potential runaway was excited about some new phone her parents had gotten her.  She rolled her eyes about their rule that the phone was only for emergencies and demanded her friends’ phone numbers so she could text them…which they started doing during that same class.

That night after I was lying in the dirt in the crawl space with a flashlight and a textbook (my guardians didn’t want my grades to drop), I thought about the girl’s idea to run away.  She had complained her parents were strict and never let her do anything and her friends had agreed, but had she ever been locked away in the cold and dirt under the house?  Did her parents ignore her or tell her she was an unnatural abomination that should’ve been drowned at birth?  I doubted it.  Yet she had thought to run away.

That was when the seed took root in my mind.

======== End of First Installment ========

I hope you enjoyed this first installment of The Path of Moonlight and will continue to read future installments.

Merry Christmas!

Too much free time during the holidays

Ugh. I’m sick and bored/antsy. And all this coughing is giving me heartburn so that sucks too.

Good morning! I know you haven’t been awake for 15 seconds and now that your son’s Christmas break has started you don’t need to wake up early, but here’s some heartburn. STAY. AWAKE.

Yeah, you heard me. I said CHRISTMAS. It’s probably titled “Winter Break” at his school to be politically correct, but everyone in the class was wishing each other a Merry Christmas (my family included) so I have a feeling the school is more Christian oriented. That’s not to say they ignored the other holidays though. These last couple weeks my son came home with different holiday-themed artwork and crafts. They learned about Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Ramadan. Cool.

While I’m not religious, I do enjoy holidays that allow me to give my son presents and decorate the house with festive, cheery decorations. It could be any holiday really but I come from a Christian background so it’s Christmas for me.

We’re really excited for the holidays this year. For weeks my son (he’s 6 years old) has been daily asking, “Is it Christmas?” Then something special happens and he says things like, “This is the best Christmas EVER!” or “I knew this would be the best Christmas ever!”

His excitement is seriously cute. And seriously annoying at other times. There are times he’ll be super disappointed that it’s not Christmas yet and he’ll get frustrated and declare that Christmas is never coming. Or a package will come in the mail for me or for his aunt and he’ll be disappointed yet again and declare that he’ll never get any presents.

I have very little sympathy for him at these times. We’ve all told him he can’t wrap his own presents, that his packages came a long time ago, and that we already have his presents ready. But I do empathize with his disappointment. When I was a kid I was always so excited to see a package come in the mail and was always disappointed when I found out it was for my mom (as it inevitably was). As an adult, there are times I deliberately buy things online just so I can get a package in the mail.

I’m not sure where I was going with all of that…Oh! Right. I was awake super early. I’ve actually been awake for quite some time checking my e-mail and typing away. Sucking on coffee and drinking cough drops…or the other way around. The reason this blog has been so silent is because I’ve had a job and I found it difficult to work up the creative energy to do any blog work. I thought to try a coffee blog because I was working at a Starbucks and enjoyed it, but life was so exhausting that I only got a few posts in before it fell into the background of my mind.

Although I enjoyed working to some extent, various matters made it super difficult to continue without going crazy and killing someone. It was a combination of a couple things and no longer applies. One reason it no longer applies is because I quit my job the weekend after Black Friday. Now that things are better, I’m looking for another job but have yet to get one.

In the meantime I have very little to do. I’ve been reading a lot, helping my parents, playing video games, taking care of my son when he’s home from school, and doing errands. It sounds like a lot but most of it’s pretty passive. Unlike most avid readers, I can only read for so long before my eyes die or my ears start bleeding. I also get bored after awhile despite a book being really good.

Two days ago I decided to take my dad’s offer of setting up his old laptop so I could write again. My husband took our laptop for his work when he moved away for his job so I’ve been s.o.l. in that department. My dad set up the laptop and yesterday I used it for the first time. I didn’t know what to write but I cleared my mind and started typing. There are times if I just start writing with nothing in mind, I get something after awhile. And I did this time. Sorta.

I don’t think it’s something I’d want to really put publishable effort into, but I am interested in where it could go so I decided to put it up here as an ongoing blog story or whatever those things are called. Though the first part is written, I haven’t looked back at it so it won’t be coming out for some days. I’ll do it for fun on my own terms, not as a biweekly or even weekly thing. No pressure. Just enjoyment. I hope other people enjoy it when it comes.