2014 Space Blogacy

a place to hide

Prompt: Most of us as children had a secret place to get away from our family.
Do you have a secret place now you go to avoid real life?
If not, do you think you need one at times
We lived in a very small cabin. Dad converted the attic into two bedrooms for my brother and me. Before my room was finished, I fortified a rotten log at the bottom of a cull log pile with snacks and comforts of home. I know it sounds extremely dangerous for a little girl to crawl into a cave of rotting logs. In my pea-size brain it was a perfect place to nap or escape trouble I sensed brewing.

Later as a teen-ager, we lived on Wrangell Island in Alaska. Mother was struggling with her mental illness, our nation was bleeding and my need for escape screamed so loud that it echoed back from the moon.

I was raging inside. I was more alone than I wanted to be. My grandmother wrote and said that walking gave her comfort. Walking along the beaches saved me. Or maybe it was the splendor of the world in its raw nakedness that soothed me as much as it scared me. It was not quiet with the ocean slapping the jagged rocks and Eagles squawking as they rose from the water with salmon in their talons. Nearly every tree top was heavy with birds.

Later, many years after my exodus, I learned to meditate. I have returned there in my mind for peace.

I like Joy and others, no longer have the NEED to hide anymore. But, sometimes my 40 year old daughter does.
OMG, some days I tell her to go get a hotel suite and relax. Maybe she has put in 8 days of 12hr. shifts as an ER charge nurse. She drags herself in the house and is instantly bombarded with 5 kids each who must tell her everything. In an orderly fashion of course. (Ummm not) Drama, demands, needs. She will get to it all but for her sanity I beg her to get some rest first.

Just this morning we (her and I) were discussing just this thing. A few hours of pure quiet. Well there is a tank of salt water where with a croupon and 35 bucks you can climb in and the shut the door, turn off the lights, you and float in complete silence for a full hour. She is going to give it a go. I told her it might do her more harm than good. She may come out a blubbering idiot. I mean, I don't think she can go the entire hour.... without her phone. lol