The Cow jumped over the moon

In 2016 I conquered some pretty big hill to defeat some emotional ones. This is what I learnt.

As I stumble up a slim barren path I see an opening in a line of trees.

“f*%$en FINALLY” I think in my head.

My breath is heavy and my brow has become a small salty Niagara Falls, the only difference is tourists definitely aren’t interested but scientists or Ripley’s Believe it or not may give me an offer.

I unlace my boots and peel my socks off.  God it’s been a hot day, I never thought I could feel so dry that a small desert could voluntarily form in my throat.

In all this heat, this sweat, repulsiveness and expended energy there’s a method to it all. You see I would rather be out here, hungry and tired, than in some black pencil skirt with panty hoes so far up my a*s I can’t function anymore. Yes, I would rather stand at the foot of this mountain all over again than stand in a Starbucks coffee line for an hour everyday while Sandra orders her personalized concoction.

 

A woman cried to me on the night of the 26^th of August 2016. It was a Wednesday. It was near the end of the school term.  She said I was the cause of something that I believed wasn’t my fault. I didn’t ask for it. All the kings horses and all the kings men, couldn’t put Mollie`s life back together again.

To some I may seem lost, but at the very heart of it I know where I am to be found. When you forget WHO you are that’s when you`re truly lost.

 

So who am I?I am a 17 year old girl who thought it would be a good idea to see if she could conquer a mountain to prove a point to herself. Not to anyone else, just to herself. Prove that I am so much more than what my parents think I am, or what they think I will ever be. I am so much more than a call to unstack a dishwasher or a reply to a name on a roll call. I am a human of this earth who can walk, talk, hear, think and anything else I feel like doing.

I am not pretty.

But I am brave, courageous and happy.

I eat when I’m hungry, I cry when I feel like it and when I`m in a good mood I don`t just conquer mountains; I move them.

 

I thank the small brown rock in which I had perched myself on for its hospitality, like Little Miss Muffat eating her peanut- butter Cliff bar. I look out over the valley and a gust of wind knocks itself into me. Where had that wind been? What earth has it carved, what water has it stirred, how many people’s days has it made or ruined? It has made mine, a fine piece of air conditioning with a 5 star energy efficiency rating.

I finally find a place to camp and I set up my tent. Other hikers begin to walk in and set up too. The stars are so big tonight I think I can see them burning.

 

My Aunty used to tell me that we can walk to the stars if we keep following the sun. The Sun rests at the end of the earth and jumps from one end to another every day. She told me that if one day I run really fast to the other side of the earth and meet the Sun it will put me on its back and when it jumps to the other side of the earth, it will give me a lift to the centre of the sky where I can meet all the stars.

So every day onwards I would look at the sky at 12 o`clock, when the Sun would reach the centre of the sky and introduce someone to the stars. After a while I didn’t get to see the sun in the middle of the day. I would look up and see florescent light bulbs. Florescent light bulbs don’t jump.

 

Today I saw the sun, I felt the sun. At times I think I even tasted it. Wherever the sun is, that’s where I’ll go. Up mountains, over logs, through ancient forests and who knows I might even meet a soul or two here and there.

One day a cow jumped over the moon, and a girl followed the sun to prove she was more than what the world thought she was.