Today I’ll start off by saying; I’m not really sure where this entry will go. I say this because most of my blogs have gone in a different direction than originally thought.
Last night I had a conversation my dad regarding my lack of memories of ages 12 – 15 years of age. I really only know things happened, but I don’t actually remember them. For example, I know my aunt died of Leukemia and my cousin was killed in a car accident, but I don’t remember the funerals or my reactions to these events.
Apparently, my aunt died only 6 weeks after my cousin was killed and my mom underwent her second round of chemotherapy during all this. This of course could explain why I don’t have memories attached to these events; with the entire trauma going on all at once, I imagine I was very overwhelmed being only 13 years old, according to my dad’s timeline. It still frustrates me though; I want to remember no matter how traumatic. I don’t remember anything at all, not even the friends I had and what we did for fun. I don’t remember school either, I know which teachers I had, because I have pictures, but even those pictures don’t spark any recollection.
Dad told me last night, when I was 12 years old; our family went on a trip to California to see my mother’s family in San Diego, and Riverside. I have very spotted memories of this trip; I guess we drove down from Calgary, AB down through Utah and over to Oregon, then down the coast of California. I remember going to one of my relatives home and playing billiards with my uncle and swimming in their outdoor pool. I remember there was a heat wave going on and the temperature was 115 degrees Fahrenheit. The pool was the only thing to cool me off. I remember I spent hours in it just sitting the water being too exhausted from the heat to really swim. My sisters were too young, by my parent’s standards, to not be supervised by the adults who were quite content to stay inside under the air conditioning. We also went to Laguna Beach that trip. This I have proof of. I have a picture of myself and my littlest sister sitting in the water letting the waves come up over us; it looks like we’re both happy and screaming about it. This is strange to me though, because I am deathly afraid of large bodies of water where I cannot see the bottom, also of sharks. So the fact I am sitting in the Pacific Ocean and having what seems to be fun is a bit perplexing.
I have bits and pieces regarding the summer of age 14. I remember I went to a summer camp with Young Women's and all the girls I went to school with were there. We went to the Kananaskis Country and camped by a river in tents. Now, I am by no means an outdoors kind of girl, so camping in a tent in the middle of nowhere was never fun of me. I remember I had brought all my makeup, hair products, and smelly stuff with me. Now pay attention, I’m in the wilderness with all the animals and critters that come along with this environment, so smelly stuff, not the smartest thing to bring with me.
Long story short, a lovely black bear decided to come for a visit to our camp. He proceeded to rampage through all our tents and food cupboards while we were on our hike. We come back to this scene of horror and discover he has bitten through my bag, ripped open all my smelly stuff and strewn this all over our tent and made quite the mess. So we had to then stay in the camp kitchen on site, where while I am trying to go to sleep a mouse runs across my face and down my chest. Screaming, of course, I jump up and wake up everyone else. I do not sleep that night or for the rest of the trip in fear of a re occurrence of previous events.
Needless to say I do not like camping. Trauma … trauma … trauma. It seems to follow me around as if I’m its target. I can admit I should not have brought all that smelly stuff with me, but was the bear really necessary??
Any way, that's all for now. Although, maybe more later today as I'm really bored and have lots going on in my mind.
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