"leave me on the healing side." SheDAISY, Healing Side

I wrote this on September 2, on the way home from the coast.

She always felt the forest was her home.
The pine trees and ferns whispered her name and secrets no one else knew as she walked past.
Well, one person knew. But He is more than just a person.
She stared at the trees with her strange beauty.
They were just like her, branches jutting out in random places. Only her branches were soft.
She loved the seasons and how everything changed yet remained the same.
The leaves fell off in the fall but always grew back in the spring.
It was the same for her.
She fell apart in the winter but glued herself back together in the spring.

She lived a strange life, yet never felt ashamed of her choices.
She grew to ignore the silly opinions that were only said out loud to hurt.
She has flourished, finally, and can breathe in her own life.
No one’s holding her back from reinventing better dreams.
She found the old ones typical of poor children, as she was once, and has realized there’s more.
“My gosh, this road is bumpy!” she exclaimed one day.
She’s learned to accept what will not change and love the “unlovable”.

She looks to the mountains and madrones, when they’re around, for inspiration.
Madrones are sparse in these parts.
Yet she always finds great inspiration in her elders
“Elder” does not necessarily mean grandparents or anyone else over the age of fifty.
She uses that word to describe her admiration for some of her closest and dearest friends, who just happen to be years older than her.