Resilience.  I don't know if I am resilient.  I don't know if I ever bounce back.  You mention an adult that helped you see the world differently.  For me that would have been a high school English teacher.  We had to keep those dreaded journals.  I was very honest and open in mine.  I quoted Dad and talked about things that were going on in our home.  She made a few comments that let me know that maybe Dad wasn't...right.  Maybe he didn't have the right to talk to us the way he did.  And in fact, maybe he was wrong in his appraisal of us.

Mom did the same for me years later.  I talked to her about how hard certain episodes of our life had been.  Instead of telling me I just didn't understand what was happening, or that my memories were flawed, she apologized.  It was good to get the affirmation that perhaps I was not crazy.

I actually looked up resiliency.  What grabbed my attention was "hidden resiliency" when people don't conform to what is expected of them.  I have always suffered from/gloried in nonconformity.  That really bothered Dad.  I was thinking about his reactions to my thoughts and opinions, and to some of my behaviors.  You know, he complained when I made honor roll. Most parents would be proud.  But not at our house.   Then I would hear criticism that began with,  "For someone who's supposed to be so smart..."  I started to realize that our family motto was "Blend."  Don't do anything to stand out.  Don't do anything to draw attention to yourself.  The ideal Delana would get B's and C's.  Smart enough to do something with one's life, but not smart enough to draw undue attention.

Sometimes I thought he was jealous.  Then I would I think that he learned to be invisible in order to protect himself, and wanted us to be the same.  So what happened to him?

I have a friend who is a social worker.  She thinks perhaps he wanted us to blend so no one would know what went on in our house.  I had never thought of that...

I think resilience comes from the forest.  I think I find solace and wisdom in the trees.  I go to the forest to think, to cry, to be alone, to be in the magic of echoing woodpeckers and breezes rustling the tree tops.  I went to the woods after I finished work today.  I sat in the moss next to a tree and noticed how different the land looks when my eye level is almost ground level.   I thought that maybe this is what we are doing here.  Instead of walking through our lives and seeing the rolling landscape rush by, we are kneeling and getting a different perspective.

-Clare