My Alaska Experience Part 2

Part one is down below.

   So here we were about to start our trip to Alaska. It would take approximately a week to get there driving. The route was from Dallas Texas, through Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, up into Canada, and then looping down into Alaska, to a tiny little place between Soldotna, and Kasilof, on the Kenai Peninsula. 

   Little did I know that the next 7 days of my life, were going to get stranger and scarier, and eventually climax into a rescue mission to get me home.  

 

   Leaving Dallas everything seemed okay, except for the amount of space maybe. Leeann and Lana were in the front of course, then in the back was Abigail and I, and in the third row was Ethan and Peter. In this day there were not all the portable DVD players in vehicles that there are now, so entertainment was slim. The kids had some hand held video games, and I had “Chicken Soup for the Teenagers Soul” for the next 7 days.

   Leeann and Lana had not seen each other in several years, so they had a lot of talking to do. It did not take long before I heard them talking about religion and the saints, especially mother Mary. I read often, but also sat and looked out the window, thinking about my friends, and my sister at home, what they might be doing and the fun they might be having. I fantasized about my return home with everyone thinking I was pretty cool, because I spent time in Alaska over the summer. I talked with the kids, and shared video games, and played I spy and other car games with the children. Now, not everyone is a car ride kind of person, but as a child it was exciting sometimes, and sleeping was never to fun on a car ride, but it passed time, and it was always exciting to wake up and see where you were now.

   As we entered Arizona in the early morning, I woke up to see a beautiful sunrise and plateaus, and canyons, just like you may see on a post card. I remember the butterflies and excitement I felt, just from seeing something so pretty that I had never seen before. It was so big and open, and you could see for miles, to the end of the earth in some places. At this point Leeann and Lana were taking turns driving. As the trip progressed, and we were on our way into Colorado, I remember Leeann and Lana talking quietly amongst them selves, at this point, I already felt as if I knew they were talking about me.

   Colorado was something to see. I had a sketch pad with me in the car, and I remember sitting there in my seat drawing mountains and hills, and the clouds. Staring out the window looking at the different shapes in the clouds made me want to go home. About the time we reached Colorado, things really started to change. It was as if we had reached some invisible barrier, and the switch had been flipped, the “welcome to hell switch.”

Lana made it apparent that she did not like me, she would ask me questions, and then interrupt me, or cut me off in an aggressive way. I was no dummy, I knew her hostility towards me was on purpose and directed at me. If I heard Lana and Leeann talking and I felt like getting in the conversation, I would in fact wait for the appropriate time to enter that conversation, only to be told by Lana that I was not to interrupt. I started wondering what the heck was going on. All of a sudden it was as if this grown woman was picking on me, and right in front of Leeann, and yet she did nothing. I was in shock, and then of course you start to question whether or not you are reading things correctly. Could it be I was in the wrong, and I was the one being rude? I thought about it, every time it came up, and it became more and more obvious to me that she was insane.

The most puzzling thing was of course, why Leeann, my friend, my second mother in a sense was letting her sister brow beat and bash me verbally, and in a car with her own children no less. We rarely stopped, which still to this day freaks me out because you would think with a car full of kids, you would have children that needed to use the bathroom. Now we did stop every so often on the side of the road, and the boys would pee, no big deal. For a girl however, there is a little more skill required to pee on the side of the highway, and for a 15 year old the idea is not at all appealing. I had decided that in most cases I would hold it until we needed gas or Lana had to pee. See if Lana had to pee, we would find a bathroom, if I had to pee, I was just expected to pull down my britches and go on the side of the road. Of course I saw a problem with this, I was 15 and had in fact been treated very much like an adult by my mother, or at least respect. Why should she have more of a right to a facility than I did? At one point I was in pain from holding my pee for so long, and I had to go. I of course kept this to myself, because anytime I had anything to say in that car, Lana acted as if it were a crime against God, so I quickly learned to keep my mouth shut so as to not have any confrontations with her. Leeann had stopped to get gas and go inside to pay. I started putting on my shoes and went to go open the door to get out, and Lana hit the automatic locks so I could not get out. “Where do you think you are going?” Lana asked. “I have to pee really bad.” I said. “Stay here!” She said. With a half smirk on my face, and of course thinking, who the hell are you, I said, “Lana, I have to pee.” Lana then says, “There are three children in this car smaller than you and they don’t have to pee, what’s the matter with you?” What’s the matter with me? All I needed to do was pee, was it that big of a deal? “Lana, let me get out so I can use the bathroom please!” I said. “No” Lana said. “If you ask me one more time……” “Lana this is crazy, let me out and go pee, what am I supposed to do then, just sit here and pee all over the seat?” Well, that was it, that set her off, and I could see it the second it happened, this woman I had barely known for 3 days or so was about to hit me. I saw it coming, I saw it like in a movie, in slow mo, she reached back, and swung her hand at me and hit me right in my face. “Don’t sass me!” Was her reply.

 

   This will be part 2, because believe it or not I can not write anymore on this tonight. I re live it when I write it. I feel the confusion, and the frustration, anger and sadness, and I find myself back in that place, at that moment, being 15, and trapped in a vehicle, hundreds, maybe thousands of miles away from home. Lost and scared. The feeling I get the most when in remembering this, is utter and complete sadness, and all I wanted was my mommy!