week 3

This is much more than the common car, train, bus and air rides many consider travel. More than walks and bikerides and motorcycle ventures. Much much more.

I moved more with my mother than I ever did in DHHS care. Strange, right? Wrong. Not for me. We stayed in one place an average of 2-4 months, though we didn't always get a new school. At first traveling from one place to another was great- until I learned why we moved. Moving to keep the secrets, always changing everything from schools to therapists was more travel than a young girl could handle.

Travel soon made me feel like we were all fugitives running from the law, which in a way we were. From all over Augusta to many other cities and towns, I found that my mother was trying to keep up a reputation that wasn't her own, trying to hide us from people who could possibly save us.

My sister and I rarely unpacked, knowing if we did our stuff would be left behind in the next move, and when we did travel to another place, my sister soon found out traveling wasn't as great as it first seemed. She lost many good friends in moving,and soon began begging to at least stay in the same schools. "Kerrie" got her wish and had to be driven from one town to another to get to school.

The things we saw in our travel didn't mean as much as the new lives we were about to live. Traveling soon began to mean to me that things were about to get worse. Traveling meant trouble as a young child. I didn't focus on the different trees we passed by or the weather the sky was displaying, nor did I focus on the cars passing by, but rather the possibilities that were opening up. By the age of 10 I knew I needed to do something to stop the traveling- to stop the danger that came along with it. We landed in a town called Vassalboro, and it soon became my mission to take the bus to school and search for someone trustworthy to confide all of my fears to.

Travel was soon to become a good thing. Running away on the railroad tracks hidden in the woods so I wouldn't be caught as I escaped to another town became a several days a week occurance. On those railroad tracks I knew I couldn't get lost, but danger was around every corner. Every house I saw between the trees as I walked became the possibility of being caught escaping. I knew if I was caught they'd send me back, so I picked up giant old rusty nails from the track, hoping it would protect me from any danger that came my way. I was less afraid of the coyotes in the woods or any other animal than the strangers who would see me and send me back. Traveling the railroad tracks was my temporary getaway.

Then shortly after I started running in the night, hoping the dark would hide me from anyone and anything, but I made the mistake of coming out from underneath the blanket I took from someone's garage while someone was out searching for me. Traveling that road where trucks sped by, where there wasn't anywhere to go without getting lost, I began to think my mother was purposefully living in areas I couldn't escape.

Only when I traveled to a temporary placement from DHHS, the sixth time in that place, did I find travel could be a good thing. When I was sent to an emergency shelter in Lewiston I found travel relaxing. It was no longer the sign of things getting worse, but instead travel was the sign of things getting better. Knowing the place was temporary I expected travel to take me anywhere but back. Travel became the sparkle in my eye, as I moved from home to home.

What was the best part is it was more permanant housing in DHHS care than it ever was living with my mother. Travel became less frequent, and more time was spent in each place I lived. Soon travel became clothing shopping, school and fun activities we did in the places I stayed. I began to look forward to travel, where before DHHS care I dreaded any travel. Today travel is more than car, bus, train or air rides- it's proof I'm headed for a better life.