2024/Natalie -

Being alone is hard, especially as a child. Defenseless, and ignorant about the world around them and how it works. When a child has to go through leaving the only person, they have ever truly loved with all their heart. It can be confusing to the child for the first time, they may not know whether to cry or be mad. But little do they know that the person that left them can miss them more than anything in the world. In my case my mother had a journal that she had for a while. It was her journal that she had when she was on deployment, and she took notes in it. when she had thrown it away, I had noticed and grabbed it before I had taken the trash out that day. When I was looking through the pages, which I could barely read since I had just recently learned cursive when I had the book. The only thing I got from the book was a couple of words here and there. Then I stumbled on a drawing that my mother had drawn. Then I realized that I was the only person my mother had ever thought about during her deployment. When I saw the picture, I remembered all the calls I had with my mother and remember the day she left for deployment I had given her a stuffed animal I loved very much.