Maybe I should begin this chapter of my life with a disclaimer? It is not a story of self pity, it is not a story of all children, it is only a small look at my days as a child being alone in a world I hardly knew was out there.
Keep this in mind as you read on, I had only a very tiny little world and was not even aware of the world that goes beyond. I say that because as we all know, hind sight is 20/20.
As a child, alone, with no siblings, no one I was close to, all I had was a glimpse of what my reality was. I did not know that there were other ways, other worlds, and as a child I doubt that I cared. I knew what I knew as I lived each day. Not looking beyond what I had, never questioning why things were the way they were, never realized anything beyond my tiny and minuscule corner of the world.
I didn't question anything because I never knew there was anything to question. What I saw was what I lived each day and because I was alone in it I had no reason to think there was more. I only knew what I had, what I saw, and all I saw was me, alone, going through the days and nights, never changing, never wondering. Naive. And alone.
I guess you could say I was content. I didn't know anything else. I got up each day. I ate cold cereal if I was hungry. But most of the time if it was warm outside I just put on some clothes and went outside to play. I had dolls. I liked to make mud pies. I liked to go down to the swamp and sit on the bank looking at the water.
If you are wondering where my parents were? Allowing a child to be on her own without supervision at such an early age. (preschool) Well, my dad made his coffee and left for work. My mother didn't get out of bed until almost noon, when the soap operas came on. If she happened to be up when I came back inside the house for some reason, I don't recall if she ever asked me what I was doing.
I came in if I got hungry but that wasn't very often. Back then I thought that eating was a waste of time. I had no interest in food, except maybe at Christmas time when my mother and her sisters made goodies for the holidays. We are Norwegian and traditions surrounded holiday baking. I did have a sweet tooth.
I played with cousins on farms and swam in the river and loved being around all the farm animals. We didn't do a lot of soul searching or ask each other the whys and why nots of things, we just played together. Some of that came from the old adage of children were to be seen and not heard.
At least for the girls, we were timid and shy. The boys might have been different. And as I grew up and went from elementary school to becoming a teenager and discovering boys, my world began to change too.