I never witnessed an acorn falling from a tree
The first thing that comes to my mind when associating imagery to the word "swing" is a snowy playground adjacent to the chain-link fenced backyard of the suburban house we were renting in Anchorage, Alaska. Every morning, there would be fecal evidence of wandering caribou from their previous night's visit littering the backyard. Snails and daddy longlegs decorated the crannies and crevaces of this two story house with their movement along the walkway to the garage and mom's garden on the side. The park was surrounded by a creek that entertained kayakers, and hot air balloons would routinely sail over the top of the house and land somewhere beyond the pines in the horizon. I was living in a cartoon winter wonderland, and I assumed that the rest of the world was this joyous. Mom would take me out to the park with my younger brother and we'd run towards the swings immediately. It was always a goal to make that full rotation around the bar supporting the swings, even though the highest peak we could ever achieve was a 90 degree parallel with the ground below. We were so small that it felt like such a thrilling height, not once paying attention to fearful ideas of slipping out of the seat and cracking our heads on the iced-over tundra.
My first day at the new school in Anchorage was memorable for all the wrong reasons. My mother dropped me off late to my afternoon kindergarten class, leaving me in a barren hallway to scream in horror. This was the first time in my tiny life that I realized I was all alone. Every school child within earshot of this episode took note and distanced themselves away from me for the remaining 2 years we would spend there. I played alone in a playground full of children, I ate alone in a cafeteria full of children, and I shelled myself in my imagination becoming oblivious to the world around me. I taught myself to read, and occupied myself with painting and drawing. Teachers began to wonder if I was autistic.
30 years earlier, in Ritzville, Washington, a young boy, the only son of two 1st generation German-Americans, started his tumultuous school career by boarding a bus from his family's farm. A group of brothers from another german american family, the Oberheim boys, took note of his big ears and his light curly hair as opportunity to torment him. My father didn't have siblings before this negative social experience, and his parents were always working so he essentially had only his imagination and his trusty beagle "Dustybutt" to keep himself entertained on the wheat farm. The Eckhardts were not a rich family either, and this made it more difficult for him to find acceptance with the other children. To this day, he is still aloof and antisocial despite his best efforts to entertain his family members who hereto have abandoned him with his wife in their big house in Sun City Grand. He continued through the same school, graduated with the same class, and went off to college with the same classmates, finally leaving these people at the acquisition of a Bachelor's in Poly Sci to join the Marine Corp.
Every 3 to 4 years I would have to start over. New schools, new assholes to deal with, new insults, new layers of skin to grow. Impenetrable by the 8th grade, and a nihilistic athiest by the time I entered high school in AZ. Oddly enough, the other students mistook my aloof antipathy for self confidence, and it was easier to make acquaintances and friendships, or reasonably mistakable facsimiles thereof. Starting it all over again in college proved it moreso, only this time I was able to surround myself with true freaks and individuals who were just trying to find a way to exist for themselves instead of putting on aires and playing the "my life sucked more than yours did" game.
I think the difference between me and my father, socially speaking, is I had the opportunities to start over. I had a reset button that was pressed every 4 years that allowed me to travel around the country and understand by meeting all these assholes, that it wasn't me who was flawed and deserving of the isolation.
And people wonder why I don't want to have children.
My first day at the new school in Anchorage was memorable for all the wrong reasons. My mother dropped me off late to my afternoon kindergarten class, leaving me in a barren hallway to scream in horror. This was the first time in my tiny life that I realized I was all alone. Every school child within earshot of this episode took note and distanced themselves away from me for the remaining 2 years we would spend there. I played alone in a playground full of children, I ate alone in a cafeteria full of children, and I shelled myself in my imagination becoming oblivious to the world around me. I taught myself to read, and occupied myself with painting and drawing. Teachers began to wonder if I was autistic.
30 years earlier, in Ritzville, Washington, a young boy, the only son of two 1st generation German-Americans, started his tumultuous school career by boarding a bus from his family's farm. A group of brothers from another german american family, the Oberheim boys, took note of his big ears and his light curly hair as opportunity to torment him. My father didn't have siblings before this negative social experience, and his parents were always working so he essentially had only his imagination and his trusty beagle "Dustybutt" to keep himself entertained on the wheat farm. The Eckhardts were not a rich family either, and this made it more difficult for him to find acceptance with the other children. To this day, he is still aloof and antisocial despite his best efforts to entertain his family members who hereto have abandoned him with his wife in their big house in Sun City Grand. He continued through the same school, graduated with the same class, and went off to college with the same classmates, finally leaving these people at the acquisition of a Bachelor's in Poly Sci to join the Marine Corp.
Every 3 to 4 years I would have to start over. New schools, new assholes to deal with, new insults, new layers of skin to grow. Impenetrable by the 8th grade, and a nihilistic athiest by the time I entered high school in AZ. Oddly enough, the other students mistook my aloof antipathy for self confidence, and it was easier to make acquaintances and friendships, or reasonably mistakable facsimiles thereof. Starting it all over again in college proved it moreso, only this time I was able to surround myself with true freaks and individuals who were just trying to find a way to exist for themselves instead of putting on aires and playing the "my life sucked more than yours did" game.
I think the difference between me and my father, socially speaking, is I had the opportunities to start over. I had a reset button that was pressed every 4 years that allowed me to travel around the country and understand by meeting all these assholes, that it wasn't me who was flawed and deserving of the isolation.
And people wonder why I don't want to have children.