A Child Ran From Me Today.
When I was younger, I went in search of myself in a big way. I’d been a quiet, fearful child with a sensitive heart – and I determined that being such a child was not going to help me in life. I rebelled in a big way, and left my happy home to live a life that was – emotionally and spiritually – as far from my parents’ way of life as I could be.
The only thing I’d ever been sure about, even then, is that I wanted to have kids and dogs. Nothing else much mattered to me (and honestly, I haven’t changed that much). Dogs are my happy place. And I’ve always deeply loved children. In fact, it’s why I now teach.
But one day, while living my rebel life, I walked on a small, sandy beach in my leather boots and torn blue jeans. There, I saw a little girl, maybe five or six years old. Forgetting my own appearance, my inner self reappeared, and I smiled at her.
The child’s eyes grew wide with horror and she started to cry, running back to her family on the sandy bank. And then I remembered: I’m no longer the person I was raised to be.
I had not only changed my lifestyle; I’d changed who I was.
I never forgot that little girl, looking up at the creature I’d become. And today, 30+ years later, I remembered, word for word, a poem I wrote that has been lurking in the back of my brain about that very incident.
It’s not my best writing, but it lives in my head, reminding me that once, long ago, I fought my inner self with such ferocity that even small children couldn’t see through the facade. It’s a painful memory – and one I hope I never lose.
“A child ran from me today,”
I whispered to him as we lay
making love in rows of vegetables somewhere.
“Why?” he whispered, kissing me,
but I just shrugged because he
ran his fingers down through my long hair.
And as we rode out in the sun,
I thought I felt that child run
back in the corner of my mind.
A sign said, “Grapeville, just one mile!”
(I scared that child with my smile.)
And then I turned away from all the signs.
KLMH circa 1987