I had the privilege of visiting my best friend in New York City recently. A year younger, Cathy was my sisters’ classmate and came over to our house one day after school. We smoked pot, blasted tunes and danced. We clicked, and have engaged in a strong bond ever since. We were 15 and 16.

That summer we decided to hit the road and spent two months hitchhiking all over BC. Got as far north as Prince Rupert, where the sun remained high in the sky until 10:30 at night. We were extremely resourceful.

Is there any better way to survive in this world than to be oblivious? I swear that’s how I got through myriad misadventures and a long, misspent youth. Child murderer? What drought? Night Stalker who? Crack epidemic, where?

Screwed up I know but I was in my own world. And lived to tell the tale of my trials and tribulations, things like sexual assault, addiction and a toxic marriage though my poetry and novel, The Town Slut’s Daughter.

FOUR THUMBS OUT

 Crime was never truer.

Vaguely aware

though thoroughly unconcerned,

fresh meat risk takers

roamed BC highways

for two prolonged teenage months.

 

With haplessness and gall

we made it all the way to Prince Rupert,

partying enhanced by lingering dusks

and belated sun downs.

 

What saved us

from casual misogyny

and monstrous vanities?

We had no protection.

No knives or mace.

 

We were tall, clever, formidable.

I was angry, seeking revenge,

a raging Amazon bent on freedom,

bent on compensation for years

served in a prison of a childhood.

 

What saved us

before crime was trendy?

What saved us

from the jealous girlfriend

brandishing a switchblade?

What saved us from the stalker’s

pursuit of the youthfully new?

 

By that summer I excelled

at sensing danger,

deciphering contorted twists of intent,

trained eyes appraising drivers

while combing the periphery.