Weird Clouds and Sequels
by Olivia Seward
My life feels like it's split into four parts, like sequels to a video game. The before, the
middle, the after, and the now. The first one is fantastic. A stunning piece of art that the world
will never forget. Then, the creator tries to bank on that and create something new only to fall
short. The game succeeds, but only because people remember the first so fondly. Then the third
comes out and it’s just terrible. Makes people lose faith in the series. Finally, years after the third
train wreck, comes the fourth. It’s a breath of fresh air, and the game the series needs to get back
up on its feet again. Sure, it has a few bugs and glitches, but doesn’t everything?
The Before.
I thought I had a pretty good childhood. I had a lot of siblings, so I was never alone. My
parents had decent jobs. We moved a lot. I mean a lot. The same city too. I was too little to
remember most of them, but I have favorites of the ones I do remember. The kindergarten house
had a fireplace in the kitchen and a small backyard full of plants. It was nice. I can barely
remember any of the houses before that though. One is across the street from an old house turned
restaurant. The house used to be a part of the underground railroad. The restaurant, not my
house. The only thing I remember about that house is that my oldest sibling threw a party and
somehow managed to get all our patio furniture onto the roof. The first-grade house was cool,
and I remember it the most. Probably because we stayed there the longest. It's right next to the
high school, so I always see it and be reminded of those times. It had massive yard I would spend
hours running around. Pretending to be a superhero, or fairy, or anything magical really. That’s a
good identifier for me. I have always had a fondness for magical things. I would pretend my top
bunk bed in that house was a cloud floating, or the old wooden play set in the backyard was the
Jolly Roger from Peter Pan. Always somethings with flying. It was sweet. Of course, I have no
clue how it really was. Rose-tinted glasses of child innocence and all. My older siblings and
mom tell me that it wasn’t as great as I say,
“Mom was never there,” would be my elder siblings bitterly reply.
“Your father is a dead beat,” my mom still says to this day.
They were old enough to notice these things. I was too naïve. Just a little girl who kids at
school thought was weird and left alone. The strange little magician floating on a cloud.
I eventually grew up a bit in that house. Started noticing things. My mom wouldn’t let me
watch the same things as my brother. I couldn’t play with the same games or toys either. I wasn’t
allowed to watch Power Rangers or play with nerf guns. I had Barbie and Hannah Montana. I
mean I enjoy those things a lot and they’re the reason I love music and art. I just wonder what I
would be like if I could play ninja turtles with my brother in that old house instead of pretending
house with my little sister.
The Middle.
Divorce. Thats what creates a new part or a new game in my story. My father left and I
grew up a bit more. Still naïve, but less so. Mom started to take all of us to church more and
focused more on us. We started buying lunch like the cool kids at school did. This still didn’t
help me fit in. I certainly didn’t make things easier on myself. In fact, I was a lot worse after the
divorce. I was angry all the time and started to act out. I was very violent and loud and didn’t
care about anything. Mom put me therapy. My therapist was the mom of one of the kids that
bullied me. Yeah, even eight years old me knew that was wrong.
So, divorce. I didn’t really understand it. Mom took me to classes at our church to ‘help
me’ understand.
“It’s not your fault. Your parents still love you.”
Blah blah blah. It was just a way to babysit us while one of our parents was upstairs
getting the adult version of this. We had games and candy, they didn’t.
My future stepbrothers were in that class. In fact, my mom met my stepdad in their
divorce class. He was nice. Had a really good job and his three sons were fun to play with. You
see he didn’t have any daughters, so whenever he watched us, I could play boy-games. We
wrestled and ran and screamed and did all the things I wish I could have done when I was
younger. Things my mom said little girls don’t do. Things that got me weird looks in school. I
got better and stopped acting out as much in school. I still was the weird kid, can’t erase history,
but I was okay with it. Mom got remarried and we moved again to my favorite house. It was big
and I had my own room. I never had my own room before. That time in my life was okay, but it
wasn’t as good as my clueless beginnings. Rocky start, but after leveling it got easier.
The After.
All good things come to an end. Oh boy, the truth in that statement could never be truer.
The After is my middle and high school days. Yeah, those were bad. Stepdad lost his job and
couldn’t find another one. My stepbrothers stopped coming over. My eldest sister moved out and
we moved to a smaller house. The house I’m writing this paper in.
Middle school was just awful. I was a naive child that floated along, not knowing what to
do with myself. It didn’t help that kids started changing tactics. They went behind your back
instead of in front of you. I guess it was better in a way. I didn’t know people were talking about
me. When I did though, it stung a bit more. My siblings started to call me weird as well. Then
my mom. I pulled away from my family after that.
My early high school years were a very bad mistake. I made ‘friends’, but I realize now
that they were toxic. I didn’t know what friends were supposed to do. I flowed along with their
schemes. We drank, and stole, and did other stupid teenager junk. I loved it though. It was a fun
adrenaline rush fueled by people who didn’t call me weird as often as everyone else. They still
called me weird though.
It wasn’t until my junior year that I got my shit together. For three reasons. One, my best
friend made me join a club, Campus Life. Two, that club was linked to my current church. Three,
the teacher in charge of that club helped change my life.
My best friend, the only good thing to come out of middle school, never called me weird.
She let me be myself around her and gave me a chance to find my own personality. The teacher
was my senior sociology teacher. I took the class because he taught it. He was nice and always
smiling. He was funny and made learning fun. He made me think that I could be better.
One of the kids on my harassed me for years. It got to the point that he started to attack
my siblings too. We started to get rides from my mom when she went to work. Because of that,
we were always ten minutes late to first period. Genther had a strict late policy, but when I told
him what was going on, he never gave me a detention. Once and a while he would ask me to stay
after class and ask me how I was doing. He didn’t want other students to see he was giving me
special treatment. That was one of the first times I noticed a teacher really care about me. I never
told him any of this. I still think about him from time to time and wonder if I should email him
and tell him all of this.
The club and church were the best things that could have ever happened to me. I met
friends in those places that I would have never been near before. I worked daily during high
school and didn’t have time to socialize outside of it. My friends found ways. My sixteenth
birthday, I had to run another club and couldn’t make it to mine. My friends grabbed me from the
club and dragged me to the other classroom. They bought me a cake and sang Happy Birthday. I
hadn’t had a cake in years. That was the first time I cried in front of someone in years too.
The club gave me a chance to find myself. The church gave me a chance to understand
myself. I learned about why I was weird. It’s kind of find that it took church to help me accept
my sexuality and a club to understand my faith. Fast in reverse. I embraced my weirdness and
used it to my advantage. These years were terrible, but they turned into something that shaped
who I am.
The Now.
I still have no clue what I’m doing. I know what I want to do and the vague idea of how
to get there. It's the details I’m missing. I’ve always been like that. I’ve always had some sort of
blinder on that kept me from seeing the big picture in life. Some things push me in a specific
direction. My sexuality pushes me away from my parents. It floats me towards my friends and
church. My interests push me away from some of my siblings and towards others. Just a giant
game of push and pull, but that's life. A series of pushes and pulls of a current moving you in a
river. It drives you to the next part of your life.
All my life I have tried to make others happy. Play girly games, smile, talk about boy
bands, draw flowers and rainbows. I still play girly games. I still smile. I talk about bands. I draw
flowers and rainbows. My flowers have thorns, and my rainbows are full of pride. My bands are
vintage, and my smile is my own. I am myself and I haven’t felt this good in a long time. Not
since the little cloud magician drove the Jolly Roger to save the day. I still have dark moments.
Illnesses I can’t explain that choke me and drive me under the water. I can push through those
moments. I can get stronger and beat this part. It's the next part I worry about.
The fifth game of the series. The one that hasn't been released yet. They release trailers
on it, and it looks good, but you’re wary of it. The past games weren’t the best, so why would
this be any better? You get anxious and worry about whether it's going to be good. Whether it's
good or not, you’re still gonna play it. That’s the only way you can decide if it's good or not.
The world is changing. The river has slowed to a crawl and the next game hasn't been
released yet. Who I am now could be entirely different then what I will be years from now. New
people will make new changes and more games will be released. So, I’ll just keep floating down
the river with my head in the clouds, waiting for the next game to come out. I heard it was gonna
be great.
middle, the after, and the now. The first one is fantastic. A stunning piece of art that the world
will never forget. Then, the creator tries to bank on that and create something new only to fall
short. The game succeeds, but only because people remember the first so fondly. Then the third
comes out and it’s just terrible. Makes people lose faith in the series. Finally, years after the third
train wreck, comes the fourth. It’s a breath of fresh air, and the game the series needs to get back
up on its feet again. Sure, it has a few bugs and glitches, but doesn’t everything?
The Before.
I thought I had a pretty good childhood. I had a lot of siblings, so I was never alone. My
parents had decent jobs. We moved a lot. I mean a lot. The same city too. I was too little to
remember most of them, but I have favorites of the ones I do remember. The kindergarten house
had a fireplace in the kitchen and a small backyard full of plants. It was nice. I can barely
remember any of the houses before that though. One is across the street from an old house turned
restaurant. The house used to be a part of the underground railroad. The restaurant, not my
house. The only thing I remember about that house is that my oldest sibling threw a party and
somehow managed to get all our patio furniture onto the roof. The first-grade house was cool,
and I remember it the most. Probably because we stayed there the longest. It's right next to the
high school, so I always see it and be reminded of those times. It had massive yard I would spend
hours running around. Pretending to be a superhero, or fairy, or anything magical really. That’s a
good identifier for me. I have always had a fondness for magical things. I would pretend my top
bunk bed in that house was a cloud floating, or the old wooden play set in the backyard was the
Jolly Roger from Peter Pan. Always somethings with flying. It was sweet. Of course, I have no
clue how it really was. Rose-tinted glasses of child innocence and all. My older siblings and
mom tell me that it wasn’t as great as I say,
“Mom was never there,” would be my elder siblings bitterly reply.
“Your father is a dead beat,” my mom still says to this day.
They were old enough to notice these things. I was too naïve. Just a little girl who kids at
school thought was weird and left alone. The strange little magician floating on a cloud.
I eventually grew up a bit in that house. Started noticing things. My mom wouldn’t let me
watch the same things as my brother. I couldn’t play with the same games or toys either. I wasn’t
allowed to watch Power Rangers or play with nerf guns. I had Barbie and Hannah Montana. I
mean I enjoy those things a lot and they’re the reason I love music and art. I just wonder what I
would be like if I could play ninja turtles with my brother in that old house instead of pretending
house with my little sister.
The Middle.
Divorce. Thats what creates a new part or a new game in my story. My father left and I
grew up a bit more. Still naïve, but less so. Mom started to take all of us to church more and
focused more on us. We started buying lunch like the cool kids at school did. This still didn’t
help me fit in. I certainly didn’t make things easier on myself. In fact, I was a lot worse after the
divorce. I was angry all the time and started to act out. I was very violent and loud and didn’t
care about anything. Mom put me therapy. My therapist was the mom of one of the kids that
bullied me. Yeah, even eight years old me knew that was wrong.
So, divorce. I didn’t really understand it. Mom took me to classes at our church to ‘help
me’ understand.
“It’s not your fault. Your parents still love you.”
Blah blah blah. It was just a way to babysit us while one of our parents was upstairs
getting the adult version of this. We had games and candy, they didn’t.
My future stepbrothers were in that class. In fact, my mom met my stepdad in their
divorce class. He was nice. Had a really good job and his three sons were fun to play with. You
see he didn’t have any daughters, so whenever he watched us, I could play boy-games. We
wrestled and ran and screamed and did all the things I wish I could have done when I was
younger. Things my mom said little girls don’t do. Things that got me weird looks in school. I
got better and stopped acting out as much in school. I still was the weird kid, can’t erase history,
but I was okay with it. Mom got remarried and we moved again to my favorite house. It was big
and I had my own room. I never had my own room before. That time in my life was okay, but it
wasn’t as good as my clueless beginnings. Rocky start, but after leveling it got easier.
The After.
All good things come to an end. Oh boy, the truth in that statement could never be truer.
The After is my middle and high school days. Yeah, those were bad. Stepdad lost his job and
couldn’t find another one. My stepbrothers stopped coming over. My eldest sister moved out and
we moved to a smaller house. The house I’m writing this paper in.
Middle school was just awful. I was a naive child that floated along, not knowing what to
do with myself. It didn’t help that kids started changing tactics. They went behind your back
instead of in front of you. I guess it was better in a way. I didn’t know people were talking about
me. When I did though, it stung a bit more. My siblings started to call me weird as well. Then
my mom. I pulled away from my family after that.
My early high school years were a very bad mistake. I made ‘friends’, but I realize now
that they were toxic. I didn’t know what friends were supposed to do. I flowed along with their
schemes. We drank, and stole, and did other stupid teenager junk. I loved it though. It was a fun
adrenaline rush fueled by people who didn’t call me weird as often as everyone else. They still
called me weird though.
It wasn’t until my junior year that I got my shit together. For three reasons. One, my best
friend made me join a club, Campus Life. Two, that club was linked to my current church. Three,
the teacher in charge of that club helped change my life.
My best friend, the only good thing to come out of middle school, never called me weird.
She let me be myself around her and gave me a chance to find my own personality. The teacher
was my senior sociology teacher. I took the class because he taught it. He was nice and always
smiling. He was funny and made learning fun. He made me think that I could be better.
One of the kids on my harassed me for years. It got to the point that he started to attack
my siblings too. We started to get rides from my mom when she went to work. Because of that,
we were always ten minutes late to first period. Genther had a strict late policy, but when I told
him what was going on, he never gave me a detention. Once and a while he would ask me to stay
after class and ask me how I was doing. He didn’t want other students to see he was giving me
special treatment. That was one of the first times I noticed a teacher really care about me. I never
told him any of this. I still think about him from time to time and wonder if I should email him
and tell him all of this.
The club and church were the best things that could have ever happened to me. I met
friends in those places that I would have never been near before. I worked daily during high
school and didn’t have time to socialize outside of it. My friends found ways. My sixteenth
birthday, I had to run another club and couldn’t make it to mine. My friends grabbed me from the
club and dragged me to the other classroom. They bought me a cake and sang Happy Birthday. I
hadn’t had a cake in years. That was the first time I cried in front of someone in years too.
The club gave me a chance to find myself. The church gave me a chance to understand
myself. I learned about why I was weird. It’s kind of find that it took church to help me accept
my sexuality and a club to understand my faith. Fast in reverse. I embraced my weirdness and
used it to my advantage. These years were terrible, but they turned into something that shaped
who I am.
The Now.
I still have no clue what I’m doing. I know what I want to do and the vague idea of how
to get there. It's the details I’m missing. I’ve always been like that. I’ve always had some sort of
blinder on that kept me from seeing the big picture in life. Some things push me in a specific
direction. My sexuality pushes me away from my parents. It floats me towards my friends and
church. My interests push me away from some of my siblings and towards others. Just a giant
game of push and pull, but that's life. A series of pushes and pulls of a current moving you in a
river. It drives you to the next part of your life.
All my life I have tried to make others happy. Play girly games, smile, talk about boy
bands, draw flowers and rainbows. I still play girly games. I still smile. I talk about bands. I draw
flowers and rainbows. My flowers have thorns, and my rainbows are full of pride. My bands are
vintage, and my smile is my own. I am myself and I haven’t felt this good in a long time. Not
since the little cloud magician drove the Jolly Roger to save the day. I still have dark moments.
Illnesses I can’t explain that choke me and drive me under the water. I can push through those
moments. I can get stronger and beat this part. It's the next part I worry about.
The fifth game of the series. The one that hasn't been released yet. They release trailers
on it, and it looks good, but you’re wary of it. The past games weren’t the best, so why would
this be any better? You get anxious and worry about whether it's going to be good. Whether it's
good or not, you’re still gonna play it. That’s the only way you can decide if it's good or not.
The world is changing. The river has slowed to a crawl and the next game hasn't been
released yet. Who I am now could be entirely different then what I will be years from now. New
people will make new changes and more games will be released. So, I’ll just keep floating down
the river with my head in the clouds, waiting for the next game to come out. I heard it was gonna
be great.