Gone Feral: Tracking My Dad Through the Wild by Novella Carpenter Read Free Book Online Page A

“Where’s your dad?” knowing it would get a rise out of me. Not having a dad, I sensed, made me different from the other kids. I knew he was a logger—that’s what the postcards he had sent said. So I repeated that, saying that he was in a logging camp, and so he couldn’t come home, he could only send postcards. Some of the other kids in Shelton (home of the Highclimbers) had logger dads. I studied their dads’ clothing: Levi’s cut off at the shin, red suspenders, steel-toed boots. I imagined my dad dressed like that too.
    I began experiencing pains in my leg. Debilitating pains that kept me home from school, where I would fry bacon and watch
The
Young and the Restless
. My mom took me to a doctor and after a session of X-rays and exams, he asked to speak with her alone. I’m pretty sure that’s when he told her that I was faking.
    My mom, ever resourceful, came up with an idea to get me to go to school: stuffed animals. In addition to several house cats, I had a dizzying array of stuffed animals. What if Novella, she asked my teachers, could bring some of her stuffed animals with her to school? Every day I arrived at Evergreen Elementary with a plush polar bear, or Cookie, my stuffed monkey. They helped me make friends and get through the day.
    I distinctly remember one day when, at recess, I deliriously tossed my polar bear into the air, a gang of children surrounding me in awe and delight. I knew in my heart of hearts that the polar bear I held in my arms was not real, not like the sea lion on the dock of the Hood Canal was real. The white plush toy was just a surrogate, an image I could make alive with my imagination. In a similar way, this was how I started to think of my dad. Because he was never around, it became natural to think of him however I wanted. In my mind, I created my perfect dad: friendly, helpful, loving. And best of all, my dad surrogate could shape-shift for my changing needs.
    We got along fine without Dad. Mom had a good job and was frugal with money. She also made lots of friends, and started a garden at our new house in town. Tom came to live with us in Shelton every summer, on break from school, giving her a break from being a single parent.
    Then, right after she turned forty, Mom woke up one morning to find her left eye had drifted off to one side. She couldn’t focus. Doctors didn’t know what it was. They told her to wear an eye patch. I didn’t understand and it freaked me out. To me, it seemed that Mom had turned into a pirate. She felt exhausted all the time, and needed to take long naps after work. She didn’t know it then, but her immune systemwas attacking the myelin sheaths that lined her nerves. Eventually she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
    Instead of drawing our family closer together, Mom’s illness allowed me and my sister to run more wild. While my mom napped on the couch, Riana, who was just in middle school, was off smoking pot with high schoolers. I was in fifth grade, stealing money from my mom’s wallet to buy more candy. I had a major sugar addiction. I was giddy with the freedom my mom’s illness offered. Dad was only in the picture in that he sporadically sent us child support money. I began to value the money more than actually seeing him. I definitely didn’t fear any disciplinary action that he, as a father, might have delivered. Except the one time Mom actually used Dad as a form of punishment.
    •   •   •
    By 1984 Riana and I were both out of control. Riana got busted shoplifting a pair of Guess Jeans. I was twelve and was sure I could get away with anything. Candy no longer held as much of an appeal—I had discovered cigarettes. I would fish cigarette butts out of the ashtray of my mom’s Honda Civic (dubbed the rice burner by locals) and smoke them. When I took a hit from the bent cigarette, it tasted like burned mint, then I would feel my brain go frail and empty and almost pass out. It was a fantastic trick.
    Then one day I