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Here is the first in a series of Member Cover Stories, in each member's own words. The subject can be something personal, or a fiction piece...poetry; Maybe the story behind a photograph. If you would like to contribute: please consult these guidelines.

Slavic Gypsy

My father moved us
around to find work when I was a kid, we moved 8 times by the time I was 12,
and that was my introduction to my way of the gypsy. It is a part of me I
now enjoy, the ability to experience and adapt to change while maintaining a
home within.

Of course this didn't become clear to me until I was older. I didn't like
being a gypsy when I was a kid. Nobody likes to always be the outsider and I
became quite introverted, with a tough shell of protection around me. That
was how I survived.

Inside that shell I was very frightened. I never felt secure. I never
knew what to expect and when something went wrong I didn't have any real
home to run to. My home base was my family and I couldn't rely on them to
provide me with the emotional security I needed.

When my father finally settled us down in a rural town for my junior high
and high school years I perfected the art of outward serenity, everything
bottled up tightly inside in my secret place. It was my only way of
distancing myself. I threw myself into my studies and tried to bond with
other outsiders, with little success. I was the straight A priss and subject
to much jealousy and hatred. I was the nameless valedictorian with a speech
in the yearbook that didn't have a signature. Many people made those years
a living hell for me. Of course, I, the brilliant martyr, took it all in
stride without complaint, as I had already learnt that my complaints would
fall on deaf ears.

I suffered
much emotional abuse in those years. I didn't speak up because I was used to
running away. The frequent moving of my gypsy childhood had taught me I
could simply solve a problem by removing myself from a situation. Thus, when
we settled I internalized this. Ever time I got called down I would stand
immobile and quiet while inside I was the gypsy running fast, far away from
the pain.

Now you'd think I must have been very cold and incapable of affection. I
was and I wasn't. To those I mistrusted, I was distant and polite, defiant
in my silence. To those I befriended, I was fanatically loyal and guarded
them fiercely from injustice. I accepted them unconditionally. Given the
people in my world at that time, I would have had to. Otherwise I would have
gone through with the suicidal thoughts that were always in the background.
Somehow I saw beauty and love even in that darkness. I wasn't strong enough
to see it in myself, but I saw it in others. That beauty is what gave me
hope. It is what I was running to.

The great thing is
that I never gave up. In searching for that beauty, I finally ran into
myself and stopped. I listened to all that I never heard before. I gave
myself something nobody else can. I gave myself freedom of speech, the right
to be heard.