Greenfield

 

A year ago I was still living in Peskeomskut Park in Turners Falls. My only friends were the still the squirrels and birds, but they were great ones. For the first time since my family had been taken, I had animals to live with and feed and talk to. They weren't my own, of course, and they weren't the stolen ones. And  living outdoors had its degradations and humiliations as well as the sweetness of the birds and squirrels. But if you must live outside -- if christian townspeople and social service agencies and your own so-called family leave you that way -- it's some kind of comfort to participate in the nature around you.

 

I resent fiercely all of the people who left me that way. I'm scarred by the humiliations and the rejection. But I think of the time spent with the squirrels and birds only with great fondness.

 

To update the Matthew stuff: I see him fairly frequently. We don't speak beyond some very insincere "hi's." Not one of the questions I've had for him since I came back to this area in April have been answered, and they never will be. His professed love has never been proven, at least not to me. And of course he still doesn't show me his ID.