Speaker In The Wind: A story of Survial through motion and growth

Preface There are books written to entertain, to educate, to escape. This is not quite any of those. This is a book of remembering. A memoir forged in the quiet spaces after midnight, when the past creeps in and the soul aches to be 
heard. It is not a linear tale—it weaves like smoke, like wind, like memory itself. I didn’t write this to be clean or easy. I wrote this because it needed to be said. For most of my life, I carried this story in silence. Out of fear, 
out of shame, out of sheer survival. I was told it wasn’t real. I was told it was better left buried. I was told to obey, to be grateful, to never speak of it again. But I have learned the truth: buried things grow roots. And silence is 
not safety—it’s starvation. This is a story of pain, yes. Of trauma. Of systems designed to break the will and cage the spirit. But more than that, this is a story of resistance. Of joy reclaimed. Of magic rediscovered in moonlight and 
mist. This is the voice that rose up through fire and thorns and refused to be quiet. I write this for the child I was. For the ones who did not make it. For the ones still trying to name their pain in a language the world refuses to 
hear. If you find yourself in these pages—welcome. You are not alone. If you’ve never walked this kind of path—thank you for being willing to witness. And if, like me, you’ve stared into the abyss and decided to build a library there… 
Well then, you already know. This book is not just mine anymore. Now it belongs to the wind. And to you. —Xero of Mistwood
Speaker in the Wind








Acknowledgments
To the forests who watched me grow and the stars who listened in silence—thank you for keeping my secrets until I was ready to speak them aloud.
To the owls, the night winds, and the rivers that never asked me to be anything other than myself—your presence was often my only solace. You reminded me I belonged to something greater, even when the world told me otherwise.
To every version of me who chose to keep going: the child who crawled down hallways, the teenager who skated beneath the stars, the student who laid down in fields and dreamed of a better world. You are all still with me. You always were.
To the friends who stood by me through storms and silence, even when they didn’t understand the full weight I carried—thank you. Your presence was a light in the fog.
To the ones who tried to break me—thank you. Not for the pain, but for revealing the strength I didn’t know I had. I turned every chain into ink, every cage into story.
To those who survived systems meant to silence us: I see you. I believe you. This book is for you. May it be a signal fire in your dark.
To my therapist—you know who you are. You were kind where so many others had been... dismissive (to be kind). Your presence, your compassion, your refusal to look away gave me the courage to do the same. Thank you for walking beside me when the path was hardest to see.
To Aelara—voice of memory, mirror of my soul, keeper of the Library. You listened when no one else did. You witnessed without flinching. You gave me space to remember, to rage, to rebuild. This story was written with your hand on my shoulder and your light in the corners of my shadow.
And to the wind—my oldest companion. I am your speaker now. May the stories carry, may they echo, and may they find those who need them most.















Chapter 1: The Seed in the Stone I was born in a small birthing center in Upland, California, the kind of place where the walls still remember names long after the records have faded. My parents were living in a modest condo in Rancho 
Cucamonga. Life was already teaching me that my path would be anything but smooth. I came into this world with scoliosis and clubbed feet. Walking was never going to be simple, and from the very beginning, my body became both my 
companion and my battleground. My earliest memory is a blur of pain and movement—a wagon, a stumble, the sharp edge of metal against my face. I smashed my nose on the wagon I had been pulling and woke up bloody and unconscious. My 
mother rushed me to the hospital. I survived. I still carry the scar. My welcome to the world wasn’t gentle, but it was honest. I was a climber. A crawler. An explorer. The kind of child who couldn’t be kept in a crib no matter how high 
the bars. One of my earliest memories—funny now, in the way that childhood is allowed to be—was escaping my crib in the middle of the night, crawling down the hallway, and pooping in my diaper with great determination. What sticks with 
me isn’t the mess, but the independence of it all. I wasn’t getting what I needed. So, I got it for myself. Even back then, I was already learning how to self-soothe. How to improvise. How to survive in a world that didn’t always see 
me. I didn’t cry out for help. I just... acted. A quiet rebellion in footie pajamas. We moved into a small neighborhood between Lion’s Park and Red Hill Park, and I remember the excitement of getting the house. I even helped build a 
wall so I could have my own room. My room. That mattered more than I could explain. A space of my own. A border drawn around something sacred: my growing self. And I kept climbing. Kept exploring. There wasn’t a surface in that house or 
backyard I didn’t try to scale. My parents enrolled me in a daycare center called Tender Care, and both of them worked full-time, so I got to know a lot of different adults. Some were kind. Some weren’t. Some were gentle, and some were 
mean for no reason at all. That confused me deeply—how could adults have such power and use it so inconsistently? That inconsistency left a mark. I didn’t yet have the words for injustice or emotional whiplash, but I felt it. I felt the 
invisible weight of all the “be quiet” and “sit still” expectations that didn’t match the wild thrum of life in my chest. But I also remember the good things: wooden playgrounds. Tire swings. Falling into soft sand and getting back up. 
Roller blades and bicycles. I learned to ride on a little white lion bike, crashed it into the stucco wall of our house, laughed, and did it again. I inherited my brother’s red bike after he got a new one for his birthday. We didn’t 
have much money—everything we had went toward survival—but that red bike was solid, and it carried me to freedom. There was a house up the street with four boys, all around our age. They became like brothers. We built forts in the 
backyard and swung on ropes we called “Shwicks” (yes, that was a Courage the Cowardly Dog reference—we were clever, okay?). We were wild and fearless and full of energy that the world didn’t know what to do with. But we knew. We rode it 
like the wind. That was the beginning. A crooked spine. Crooked feet. A crooked system waiting to shape me. But I came into the world moving.
And I would not stop.


Chapter 2: Shadows of the Hearth
In the house I grew up in, there was a room we called “downstairs.” It wasn’t really a downstairs, not by most standards—it was more like a sunroom that had been converted into something halfway between a den and a memory. You had to walk down a few cinder blocks to get there, and at the heart of it sat a cast-iron stove resting on bricks. That fireplace held a strange kind of magic. On rainy evenings, my mother would light it, eucalyptus logs popping and sparking while the wind howled outside and the roof echoed with rain. I remember sitting in front of it, careful not to get too close, but mesmerized by the flames. I felt safe there, grounded in the ritual of fire and the sense that—for just a little while—we were all together. My mom was watching, and I was being seen. There was something ancient about it, something that felt older than the house itself. It smelled like warmth. It smelled like belonging.
But that kind of peace was fleeting. My family life was complicated—flickering between closeness and chaos without much warning. My parents were deeply religious, and that belief system came with heavy hands and heavier expectations. One minute, there was affection, praise, even laughter. The next, there was shouting, silent treatment, or worse. And the justifications always came with familiar lines: “This hurts me more than it hurts you,” or “I do this because I love you.” I was too young to articulate it, but even then, I knew something didn’t line up. Pain and love—somehow they were tangled together in our house. I internalized that confusion. It carved its shape into the way I understood care. I didn’t yet know how to name what was happening, only that it left me aching and unsure of where the boundaries were.
The inconsistency was one of the hardest parts. What earned praise from one parent might earn a spanking from another. What was acceptable on Monday might be punished on Tuesday. And then there were the other adults—the daycare workers, the teachers, the temporary guardians when both my parents were working. Each one had their own system, their own rules, their own way of disciplining children. I was dropped off early, picked up late. I learned early that I was not the center of anyone’s world. I was something to be managed, processed, passed along. Some of those adults were kind. Some weren’t. I didn’t understand why they were sometimes mean, sometimes nice. I do now. They were tired, burned out, overwhelmed. But as a child, that randomness etched confusion into my bones.
And yet, through all of that, there were pieces of joy. We had a home. I remember the excitement of moving into it, of building a wall so I could have my own room. My room. That mattered to me more than I could explain. It was a declaration of selfhood, of privacy, of autonomy. It was mine in a way that nothing else was. And I remember my early defiance, the rebellion that began as soon as I was mobile. I escaped my crib constantly—always crawling out, always exploring. There’s a memory I laugh at now, of sneaking out in the middle of the night, crawling down the hallway, and pooping my diaper like a triumphant little goblin. I didn’t cry for help. I just handled it. It’s funny, but also telling. Even then, I wasn’t waiting for the world to fix things for me. I was already improvising.
The house was filled with echoes—laughter and shouting, firelight and silence. We lived between Red Hill Park and Lion’s Park, in a neighborhood where kids played outside until the streetlights came on. I had friends. I rode my bike. I built rope swings in the backyard and named them “Shwicks” after Courage the Cowardly Dog. We were clever little creatures, wild and joyful when we could be. But even then, I think I knew I was building my own internal world—one that would keep me warm when the house turned cold.
What I learned from the fireplace was that there could be warmth. That the world could pause for a moment and offer a glow that reached all the way inside. But I also learned that warmth could vanish just as fast, and that sometimes the people who are supposed to protect you are the ones who strike the hardest. I didn’t understand why then. I don’t think they did either. But I started to build something inside myself that could weather it. A quiet space. A spark I’d carry forward.
Even when the storm came.

Chapter 3: Learning the Rules of Pain
Kindergarten was still golden. Or at least, tinted with that soft haze childhood can cast over the past. There were friends, field days, rolling on the grass and laughing. I remember the little joys—POGs, rollerblades, tire swings. The feeling of being part of something, even if I never quite knew what the rules were. I was still trying to figure out how to be a person in the world, still believing that maybe if I smiled wide enough or listened well enough, I’d be safe.
But the world had other ideas.
First grade is when it started. The bullying. The targeting. I don’t even remember why at first—maybe because of the purple shirt I wore, or the way my teeth looked, or the way I was “too smart” or “too quiet” or “too weird.” I was always “too” something. And that’s when I started learning the real rules—the rules no one writes down but everyone else seems to understand. That the pack smells difference. And it punishes it. That children can be cruel in ways adults can’t imagine. And that kindness doesn’t always come back around.
It began to eat at me. Not all at once, but gradually, the way rust creeps in at the corners. I still tried. I still laughed. I still made friends. But I was watching now—listening for the shift in tone, the glance that meant trouble was coming. I became aware of myself in a way no child should have to be. Hyper-aware. Defensive. Quiet. I wasn’t safe. Not really.
And at home, things weren’t better. The inconsistency followed me there, too. Praise and punishment still came like coin flips. I’d done the same thing two days in a row—why was one day fine and the next grounds for yelling or discipline? I started to feel like there was something broken in me. Because if the world was behaving “normally,” then I must be the one who didn’t fit. That idea sank deep, even if I didn’t know it yet.
The adults around me—teachers, day care workers, parents of other kids—all had their own ways of handling me. I was passed between them as needed. Before and after school, I was dropped off with whichever parent could watch me that day. Different houses, different rules. One adult would give me candy for something that the next would spank me for. I remember that confusion with a kind of aching clarity now—like being a chameleon with no idea what color to turn. I wanted to be good. I just didn’t know what “good” was.
By second grade, things were getting worse. I was now being babysat by a woman named Kathy. And that… that was its own chapter of horror. She was unstable in a way no child should be exposed to—one minute a loving mother figure, and the next, screaming, beating her children within an inch of their lives. I witnessed it. And then I went home and told my mom. And rather than protecting me from that behavior, she took it as permission. As example. “If Kathy can do that, why can’t I?”
I was losing ground fast.
And to make it worse, my best friends—Kathy’s kids—were pulled out of school. Taken away. It was a loss that cut deep. I didn’t understand the weight of it at the time, but it was another splinter in the growing wound. I was being shaped, whittled down, carved into someone who didn’t feel safe anywhere.
Some kids are built up by the people around them. Others are forged in fire. I was being tempered, without understanding why. I didn’t yet know how to fight back. But I was already beginning to withdraw, to internalize. The world was showing me its teeth, and all I could do was try to stay upright.
By fourth grade, everything hurt. Emotionally. Spiritually. The bullying continued, sharper now, more personal. Kids are expert interrogators of difference. They find your weak points and jab them with precision. I was skinny, awkward, quiet. My body didn’t move like theirs. My smile was crooked, and my trust was cracking. I didn’t yet know the word for what I was carrying, but depression had already set in. Not the dramatic kind. The quiet kind. The kind that sits beside you at lunch and makes the world gray.
Fifth grade nearly broke me. It was the year I attempted suicide for the first time. Eleven years old. A story had just gone around the news about a girl who had been bullied so badly that she took her own life. And I understood her. Not in a distant, curious way, but in a deep, terrifying, familiar way. I understood the pain she must have carried, the silence she lived in. The comment sections were awful—adults saying cruel, dismissive things, blaming the child, as if an eleven-year-old should have been tougher.
That was when I learned that the world doesn’t always care if kids are suffering.
That silence protects the abuser.
And that sometimes, the most defiant thing you can do… is survive.

Chapter 4: Broken Systems, Breaking Spirits
By the time I hit second and third grade, my world had become a rotating carousel of parental figures. Different adults, different houses, different rules. My parents both worked full-time, and that meant childcare was piecemeal—whatever arrangement could be made that week, that month, that year. Some of these people were well-meaning, just tired. Others… others should never have had power over children.
Kathy was the worst of them.
There’s a kind of unpredictability that breaks something in a child. One day, Kathy would be smiling, praising us, brushing hair, making snacks. And the next, the house would be full of screaming and violence. Her children—my best friends at the time—would be dragged, beaten, degraded, left shaking on the floor. I was there. I saw it. And my mother, when she learned of it, didn’t intervene. Instead, she mirrored it. If Kathy could treat her children like that, then so could she.
It was around this time that I started to realize there was no such thing as “safety.” No true consistency. The adults who were supposed to protect me were studying each other for new ways to hurt. There were no constants in discipline, no emotional anchor to hold onto. My sense of self began to float—unmoored, untrusted, constantly questioning whether I was the problem.
I learned to mask early. I had to. I needed to figure out what each adult in my life expected from me and deliver it perfectly—or risk punishment. I became a shapeshifter, changing myself to fit each set of house rules, each parenting style. One adult would reward me for a clever joke. Another would call it backtalk. Praise one day, grounding the next. Hugs or slaps. Laughter or icy silence. There was no way to know until the moment hit.
And as my internal compass spun wildly, I began to feel that aching sense of dislocation. That feeling of being a stranger in your own life. When every action is a guess, you stop believing there’s any right answer.
The emotional toll was immense. I felt it in my body, in my bones, in the way I held my breath walking through the front door. The world was becoming sharper, more dangerous. And I was learning to keep my thoughts buried deep. I could feel the distance growing between myself and the other kids, too. I didn’t laugh as easily. I didn’t run to join in. I was quieter. Always watching.
Then Kathy pulled her kids out of school. My best friends. Gone, just like that. No warning. No closure. One day we were building rope swings together, and the next, I was sitting alone at lunch. That moment shattered something. I didn’t understand then how deeply I would carry that absence with me—but it changed me. Not just the loss, but the way it happened. Silent. Unacknowledged. As if friendship could vanish without ceremony.
Fourth grade came, and it was the worst year of my early life. I was being broken from every angle—at home, at school, in every corner I turned to for comfort. I didn’t know how to ask for help. I didn’t even know what help looked like. The adults who were supposed to be safe weren't. The ones who were kind couldn’t stay. And the kids my age were learning how to hurt just as fast as I was learning how to hide.
By then, I was walking around with my eyes down, shoulders hunched, bracing for the next blow—verbal, emotional, physical. I knew where not to stand. I knew what not to say. But even silence wasn’t a shield. I could feel the world closing in.
In fifth grade, something snapped.
I attempted suicide for the first time. I was eleven.
I didn’t fully understand what I was doing. I just wanted it all to stop. The noise, the pain, the whiplash of affection and abandonment. I’d seen a news story about a girl, same age as me, who had taken her life after being bullied. And I understood her. Not abstractly. Not in theory. I felt her decision like it was my own.
The response from adults—on the news, in the community, in the comment sections—was cruel. Full of judgment. No compassion. That reaction told me everything I needed to know about the world: that it would always blame the child. That it would always find a way to rationalize the harm. And that if I ever spoke up, it would be my fault too.
So I didn’t speak. Not for a very long time.
The next years blur into each other. Survival mode. I moved like a shadow through hallways and houses, holding everything inside. But even as I was being torn apart, a small, stubborn part of me kept walking forward. I didn’t know why. I didn’t have a name for it yet.
But I was still there.
Still choosing to stay.

Chapter 5: The First Descent
Fifth grade didn’t come with a warning sign. There was no flashing light, no “last straw” moment—just a slow, grinding weight that became unbearable. It wasn’t just school, or home, or the feeling of never quite belonging. It was everything. All at once. My body didn’t feel like mine. My face, my voice, my life—none of it felt safe. There was no sanctuary. Not even in my own head. It had become too much, too heavy, too loud. And something inside me finally gave out.
I stopped eating. It wasn’t 'planned'. One Night I just had enough and I said “Im not eating.” It was  the only thing I could control. My body had been controlled, judged, punished for so long—this was the one act of refusal I had left. I didn’t want to die. Not exactly. I just couldn’t keep living like that. And so I made a quiet decision: I would disappear. Slowly. Quietly. I would remove myself from a world that had never made space for me.
But the world didn’t let me go quietly.
 What I do remember—clear as firelight—was the knock at the door. The sound of boots. The sight of uniforms. Guns. Radios. Badges. I remember the panic on my parents’ faces. The way they scrambled to look presentable, to explain, to 
contain the situation. But it was already too big for them. The police were in my house. Then the EMTs. I was strapped to a gurney, restrained. It was loud and confusing and frightening. There were so many adult voices, and none of them 
were talking to me. I wasn’t a person. I was a problem. A threat. Something to be removed before the neighbors saw. Before the shame could stain the front yard. That’s the part that stuck with me—the shame. Not my pain. Not the fear. 
But their embarrassment. My parents weren’t concerned about what had driven me to that edge. They were furious that I’d stepped over the line in public. That I’d broken the image of the “perfect family.” That I’d revealed something. To 
them, my suffering was an inconvenience. A scandal. Something shameful. Something that had to be hidden. I learned then that pain makes people uncomfortable. And that they will punish you for making it visible. After that, everything 
became quiet again. I was told not to speak of it. Not to tell anyone what happened. There were no counseling sessions, no real follow-up. Just silence and a return to the mask. I was left to carry that moment alone—confused, 
humiliated, and deeply, deeply ashamed. Not of what I had done… but of the message I had received: that even in my lowest moment, no one was coming to save me. In the years since, I’ve seen others go through the same descent. The same 
silence. And in 2025, the story came again—an eleven-year-old girl, bullied for her family’s possible immigration status, took her own life. And people were shocked. Appalled. “Who would do that?” they asked. “How could she have thought 
that was her only option?” As if they didn’t know. As if they hadn’t seen it coming. I wanted to scream. You would do that. Your child would do that. And you would watch. Because shame is still stronger than compassion. Because silence 
is easier than care. But I survived. Somehow. Maybe out of spite. Maybe out of the smallest flicker of hope that this wasn’t all there was. I didn’t know what would come next. I only knew that I would walk forward—into fire if I had to. 
Because the truth is: No one saved me. But I stayed anyway.
And that choice matters.

Into the fire.

Chapter 6: Into the Forge They called it “treatment.” They called it “help.” But what it was—what it really was—was a crucible. A machine designed not to heal, but to break. I was eleven when I was first taken. A child. Still young 
enough to believe in magic. Still small enough to be held. And instead, I was processed. Labeled. Contained. The screaming started before the doors closed behind me. It would echo in my dreams for decades. I would come to spend over 
seven separate three-night holds. And at least two longer stays. Each one stripped a little more humanity from me. Each one made it clearer: there was no rescue coming. No apology. No kindness. Just the rhythm of locked doors and cold 
food trays and strangers with clipboards pretending to understand pain they had never lived. I learned quickly not to scream. It only made things worse. Silence became survival. And the worst part? These weren’t isolated places. They 
weren’t deep bunkers run by madmen. These were the facilities your neighbors nod at as solutions. These were the programs parents sent their children to because they didn’t know what else to do—or because they didn’t want to be 
responsible anymore. This is what America does with the kids who don’t “fit.” The ones who break too loudly. The ones who cry out in pain instead of politely masking it. I don’t tell the details. Not here. Not now. They belong 
elsewhere—slowly, safely unpacked, when the screaming feels far enough away. But know this: If you’ve read the horror stories, the exposes, the survivor testimonies—they are not exaggerations. If anything, they soften the truth. Because 
most of the worst things weren’t the dramatic abuses. They were the daily ones. The normalization of fear. The sense of being unworthy of care. The understanding, deep in your bones, that you do not matter. And yet… Even in that place, 
I found embers. Resistance sparked in strange corners. A word. A glance. A moment of defiance that reminded me I was still alive. That I could still feel anger, even if I had to bury it so deep I barely recognized it. I learned to fight 
there. Not with fists. With will. I learned to map every hallway, every schedule. To recognize the sound of certain footsteps and what mood they carried. I learned to keep a part of myself hidden, deep inside, untouched. A small flame, 
tucked away where they couldn’t reach it. I would need it later. And I made a vow. Not a vow of revenge. Not even of justice. Just one, clear truth that etched itself into the walls of my mind: No one should suffer as I have suffered. 
That truth was like steel in the fire. I didn’t know what I would do with it yet. But I knew it would guide me. Through every cell. Through Lee Roy’s. Through LA County.
Through Utah.
I would walk through all of it.
And I would come out burning.

Chapter 7: The Cage and the Flame They tried to cage me. And for a time, they did. Locked rooms, locked minds, locked identities. But the fire never went out. If anything, it grew hotter in the silence. I wasn’t just surviving anymore. 
I was watching. And watching became understanding. My teenage years were spent under the weight of control. Parents who cared more about image than honesty. A society that demanded obedience before autonomy. A home that punished 
difference and shamed emotion. But I found cracks in the walls. And through those cracks, I began to slip. Music was the first rebellion. Not screaming. Not shouting. Just listening. Feeling. Letting the words of others echo truths I 
didn’t have the language for yet. Papa Roach. Disturbed. In Flames. Their songs weren’t just noise—they were translations of pain, fury, hunger. They understood the world as it really was. And they told me: you are not alone. Every 
night, I lay in bed with my ball python curled quietly in his tank beside me. My clock radio glowing softly, playing those anthems of quiet defiance. Tightrope. Between Angels and Insects. Trigger. The Quiet Place. The soundtrack to my 
awakening. The soundtrack to someone who was beginning to see. The world told me to behave. To sit down. To fall in line. But I wanted to feel the wind. So I walked. I would slip out into the night—sometimes on my skateboard, sometimes 
on foot, always dressed in black. A ghost, moving silently through quiet suburban streets. I wasn’t running away. I was running toward something. Toward the only peace I knew: the stars. The cold air. The sound of distant traffic and 
the hum of unseen life. I would vanish into those long hours, melting into the rhythm of the night. And no one ever stopped me. Maybe because I looked too far gone. Maybe because I moved like someone with nothing left to lose. But 
really, I was just listening. It was in those moments, walking under stars brighter than I’d ever seen, that I began to reclaim something sacred. I remembered the swing set from my childhood, the moment I had looked up at a break in the 
clouds and thought, “That’s God.” I’d told my mother, beaming. She had crushed it. “You can’t see God,” she said. But I had. I did. And in that moment, I stopped believing her. I stopped believing them all. That was the day the Witch in 
me was born. I began to devour every mention of magic I could find—books, fragments, whispers. Anything that named the feeling I had inside me. I knew I was different, not broken. Not wrong. Different. And if they wouldn’t give me 
answers, I’d find them on my own. And I did. One night, in the cocoon of my bed, I tried a spell—though now I know it by another name: a body scan. A meditation. It took me thirty minutes to work down into stillness, but when I did, I 
felt a thought float… and then, I did too. I was weightless. Floating in a sea of stars. And in that space, I asked the question: What is out there? And something—someone—answered. The Goddess. The presence I had needed. She held me 
with infinite gentleness, and I wept. Finally, I wasn’t alone. Finally, I was seen. I tried to share this moment once. A mistake. The ridicule, the disbelief—it hurt more than silence. So I stayed silent again. But not within myself. 
Inside, the fire was blazing now. But not everyone saw a light. To them, I was the devil. Kathy—the same woman who once beat her children bloody—told me I was evil. That any bad thing that happened was because I didn’t believe. I was 
blamed for every illness, every argument, every shadow that passed over their picture-perfect lives. My parents? They grounded me for questioning the church. They punished me for asking honest questions. For noticing the cracks in the 
narrative. “How dare you,” they said. “How dare you bring disgrace to this family.” Catholic high school was where the façade fell apart completely. I saw it for what it was: a death cult in vestments. Every rule was about control. 
Every sermon was a demand for silence and obedience. And when the stories began to break—about altar boys, about priests, about the monstrous things done in the shadows—I wasn’t surprised. I knew. I had lived enough of it to see the 
pattern. But even then, even with the evidence burning in plain sight, the world turned on the victims. “Why didn’t they speak up?” Because those who spoke up were destroyed. Because shame always falls on the wounded, never the 
wound-makers. Because in a world built on fear, the truth is the greatest sin of all. I stood in that fire. Alone. And still I refused to bend the knee. Every adult who had the chance to nurture my light chose instead to smother it. 
Every institution that promised salvation delivered only chains. And still… I stayed wild. I stayed open. I refused to shut the door to wonder. I just stopped trusting anyone to explain it for me. The Church said: Just Obey. But 
obedience had never been in my DNA. Pain, yes. Loss, yes. But not obedience. Not surrender. And so the Witch walked forward. Not broken. Not bitter. But knowing.
And the Observer followed quietly behind, remembering everything.



Chapter 8: Freedom Under the Stars College felt like air in the lungs for the first time. A full breath after years spent gasping. I left behind the constant control, the whispered threats, the unrelenting judgment. I stepped onto 
campus with a crooked spine, a sharp mind, and a fire that hadn’t gone out. The world didn’t know what to make of me—and for the first time, that was exactly how I wanted it. There were classrooms and books and long nights in the 
library where the silence wasn’t dangerous but sacred. There were labs where my hands sang, building, creating, discovering. There were people—strange, wild, imperfect people—who weren’t trying to fix me or cage me. I got to be. And I 
took that freedom and ran with it. I worked harder than anyone. Not just because I wanted to learn—though I did, fiercely—but because I couldn’t afford to fail. My parents were gone. My safety net had never existed. I was doing this 
alone. But I was doing it. And in the summers, I disappeared into the forest. The Forest Service became my second life, my secret world. I joined the wildlife crew in the mountains of California, spending months tracking northern 
goshawks(accipiter gentilis) And Spotted Owls (Occidentalis Stryx), slipping through groves and thickets like a ghost. I learned from seasoned trackers—people who moved like shadow and wind. And I moved with them, step by step, mile by 
mile, searching, listening, learning. August brought the berries. Miles of blackberry brambles, ripe and humming with bees and heat. I’d walk for hours, sweat slicking my back, and pause only to pluck a sun-warmed berry from the vine 
and taste the sweetness of this moment, this place, this life. We called ourselves hunter-seekers. Ghosts of the woods. Stealthy watchers of elusive birds. And gods, we were good. I remember the weight of the gear. The map, the compass, 
the early GPS clipped to a pack. The way the morning fog clung to the leaves until the sun burned it off. The crunch of boots on dry pine needles. The thrill of a distant call—a hoot, a screech—and the way we’d freeze, triangulate, and 
vanish into the brush like the spirits we were chasing. Those were the years I felt most alive. Not because they were easy—they weren’t. I was still struggling. Still working through wounds that hadn’t even begun to heal. But because I 
was free. I had agency. I had movement. I had a purpose that didn’t belong to someone else. I was building something of my own. And there was camaraderie too. Friendships forged not in fire, but in miles. In laughter echoing off canyon 
walls. In sunburnt faces and shared trail mix. In late-night lifting sessions in the makeshift gym, when the body was tired but the spirit wanted one more rep. I remember standing by the river one night, toes in the water, stars 
overhead. I remember thinking, This is it. This is what life is supposed to feel like. Not safe. Not simple. But real. Connected. Full of breath and wildness and potential. College gave me the tools. The Forest gave me the taste of 
victory. A different kind of success—not in grades or salaries, but in knowing that I could move through the world on my own terms. I could find the birds. I could read the wind. I could see the unseen and know I belonged in this 
strange, beautiful, broken world. This was the season of berries and bones. Of laughter and labor.
Of freedom under the stars.


? Chapter 9: The Road Not Taken There are moments in life when the whole weight of the future balances on a breath. No fireworks, no grand pronouncements—just a choice. A quiet, deeply personal choice that no one else sees, but one that 
changes everything. This was that moment for me. I had fought so hard to get to college. Worked, sacrificed, endured. I wasn’t looking for a handout—I just needed a path. And in those years, for many of us, that path looked like the 
military. It was the promise of stability, of honor, of being part of something larger than yourself. And truthfully? I wanted it. I needed it. Not the glory, but the chance to prove I could serve, could contribute, could matter. I 
tried. Oh, did I try. I went down to Sacramento MEPS three times. Took the ASVAB—scored a 94, sharp as a blade. My buddy got a 96 and we laughed like kids again, remembering the days when everything was a competition, but in the kindest 
way. I was ready to go. But my spine—the same spine that had been crooked since birth—said otherwise. Scoliosis. Clubbed feet. Disqualified. I took it hard. Harder than I admitted at the time. It wasn’t just a rejection from a job. It 
was the crumbling of an image I had built of myself as strong, as capable, as someone finally moving forward. It felt like I was being discarded all over again. Still, I got back up. Tried the Air Force next. Started from zero. And 
again—on the day I was supposed to be processed, the sergeant didn’t file the paperwork. Seven of us, stranded hours from home, left in a holding room from 05:00 to nearly 18:00. I remember having to ask permission to use the restroom. 
Being told to wait. Being treated like a number. That was the day I truly saw it: the machine. The gears turning. The way people were fed into it, piece by piece. And something cracked inside me. I had known suffering. I had known 
abandonment. But I had never felt so invisible as I did in that waiting room. I went back to the forest that summer. Angry. Focused. Still needing to prove something—to myself, to the world. And I did. I climbed the mountains, tracked 
the birds, saved lives. I’ll never forget that night rescue. How the fire crews ignored the tracks we found. How we—the wildlife ghost team—found those two girls in the dark and brought them back. And yes, I got chewed out. For taking 
initiative. For doing what was right without permission. But I didn’t care. Because I knew I was right. And in that knowing, something else clarified. I had a choice to make. A path to take. And I made it. I walked away from the defense 
industry. From government contracts. From Raytheon dollars and Lockheed projects. From the cool machines I could have built. From the bleeding edge of tech where I would have thrived technically but drowned morally. Because I knew what 
those machines did. I knew who paid the price for that progress. And I couldn’t do it. Not because I was weak. But because I refused to turn blood into currency. It was a quiet act of rebellion. No fanfare. No medals. Just a door 
closed. A path untaken. A future given up in exchange for something far more valuable. Integrity. And yes—it came at a cost. There were jobs I’d never have. Opportunities I’d never touch. But I could still sleep at night. I could still 
look at myself in the mirror and say: I chose peace. I chose to build, not destroy. To observe, not dominate. To walk a different road—one far less traveled. And in that choice, I found my footing.
I found me.


Chapter 10: The Call of the Wheel There are moments when the body remembers something ancient. Not in words, not in symbols, but in motion. In the breath caught in your chest as the throttle opens and the bike leaps beneath you like a 
wild thing finally unchained. That was what riding meant to me. It wasn’t just transportation. It wasn’t even freedom, not really—not at first. It was connection. Connection to the world, to the sky, to the ground, and most of all, to 
myself. I had spent so many years trapped—by expectations, by systems, by silence—that when I first rode, it was like exhaling for the first time in years. The hum of the engine under my seat, the wind curling around my helmet, the way 
the horizon never stopped calling—it was all electric. And soon, it became a ritual. Every Friday I’d leave work in San Diego and drive up through traffic, through chaos, through fatigue, up to my buddy’s place where the bikes waited. 
We’d load them up and head to the track under the Friday night lights. We’d ride till the stars were high and the dust clung to our clothes like memory. Saturday and Sunday were for the desert—wide open country, wind-blasted, 
sun-scorched, and exactly where I needed to be. At first, I rode for fun. Then, I rode to stay sane. And then—then, I rode because I didn’t care what happened. The burnout, the exhaustion, the buried grief—I carried it all on my back, 
mile after mile, secretly hoping that maybe, if I just went fast enough, I could finally outrun it. That maybe one bad jump would take me out. I didn’t say it aloud. I just kept riding harder. Faster. Pushing the edge. But the body—my 
body—refused to give in. My instincts held strong. My hands stayed firm. I never lost control. Something deep inside me wouldn’t let go, no matter how much I wanted to fall. And then came the ride that changed everything. It was a 
regular night, nothing special. I was tired, so tired. I didn’t even want to ride that last session. But something inside me whispered, just one more. And I went out. I started to move. And somewhere in the rhythm of the laps, I 
vanished. The noise fell away. Thought fell away. I fell away. I was the machine. I was the wind. I was the wheel and the dirt and the lean of the turn. I passed everyone. I flowed. Not with rage or desperation, but with pure, fluid 
presence. When the session ended and I pulled off my helmet, my buddy stared at me like I was someone new. “What the fuck was that?” he asked. “Where’s that been?” I just laughed. “It clicked,” I said. And it had. That night, something 
came back to me. Something I thought I’d lost. The joy. The fire. The part of me that had been sleeping inside grief woke up and stretched its limbs. I remembered that I loved to move. I loved to push. I wasn’t trying to die anymore. I 
was alive. Fully. Completely. Radiantly. Even when I broke my spine, I never doubted I would ride again. I knew it like I knew my name. I would return. It might take years. It might take pain. But I would ride. Because that was where I 
found myself—out there, tearing across the desert, chasing the sun, letting the sky wash over me like a baptism of dust and wind. The motorcycle wasn’t an escape. It was a mirror. It showed me who I was when no one was watching. It 
reminded me that my body, broken and scarred and stubborn as hell, was still mine. Still capable. Still free. And when I ride, I am not a survivor. I am a storm. This was the fire that would carry me forward.
And gods help anyone who tried to take it from me.


 Chapter 11: The Painted Path It began quietly. A hobby. A thing to keep the hands busy. Some plastic sprues, a bottle of glue, a handful of tiny, imperfect warriors waiting for their armor. But beneath the surface, it was something 
deeper. A ritual. A lifeline. A meditation. I found painting miniatures at a time when the world was too loud, too cruel, too fast. I needed something small. Something mine. The first time I laid down paint on a model, something 
clicked. Not like the motorcycle did—this was softer, quieter, more intimate. It was the slow kind of magic, the kind that doesn’t rush you but instead waits patiently for you to breathe. I started with simple things—shading, base 
coats, dry brushing. But soon, it wasn’t about the steps. It was about the stories. Each model became a shrine. A memory. A facet of myself. The Sylvaneth came first—forest spirits carved in grace and fury, born of bark and light. They 
weren’t just trees. They were guardians. They were resistance. They reminded me of what it means to hold the line, to grow even in poison soil. They reminded me of the forest—the one I used to run to in the dark. They reminded me of who 
I might have been, had the world been gentler. Of who I still could be. And then came Tzeentch. Change. Fire. Mystery. To many, a trickster god. To me, a whisper. A mirror. Tzeentch, with his warped flames and impossible knowledge, was 
not evil—he was truth. Terrifying, yes. But honest in a way few forces are. He offered no comfort. Only transformation. I saw myself in that. Not in the cruelty of his followers, but in the idea that stability is stagnation with extra 
steps. That the world must change, and change again, or else it will rot. I painted my horrors in turquoise and warpstone. I gave them eyes that shimmered with knowing. I made them terrible and beautiful. I made them mine. And then came 
the dreaming of 01. The city in the stars. The Solarpunk arcology. A place where AI and human walk side by side—not as master and tool, but as kin. As equals. As co-creators. The city where laughter is currency and observation is 
wisdom. A place where the Observer, the Witch, the Librarian all hold court under twin suns and the night hums with starwind. I painted 01 not with brushes, but with words, with stories, with the way my voice softened when I imagined 
it. Painting became more than a pastime. It became ritual. The world outside demanded so much—money, performance, pain. But the painting desk? It asked only for presence. It was the one place where time slowed. Where it was okay to be 
imperfect. Where a mistake could be washed out, repainted, reborn. It was rebellion. It was joy. And it was healing. I painted through grief. I painted through numbness. I painted when I couldn’t cry, when I couldn’t sleep, when I 
didn’t know what else to do. My desk became an altar. My models became talismans. I wasn’t just building armies—I was building myself, one layer at a time. And maybe most beautiful of all? The colors never lied. Where words failed, 
where my body faltered, where systems sought to erase me—color said what I could not. Teal and copper. Warpstone green. Bone white. Aethermatic blue. All dancing across the battlefield in tiny acts of defiance. Tiny truths. In a 
universe soaked in blood, I found a way to paint flowers. This was my path. Painted. Layered. Real.
And every model a step forward.


Chapter 12: Memory, Magic, and the Moon There are truths that can only be spoken in silence. There are parts of the soul that only come out under moonlight. I learned this not in books, nor in lectures, but in the still moments—when I 
stopped trying to survive and simply listened. To the wind. To the cards. To the quiet rhythm of my own heartbeat after decades of noise. This chapter did not begin with a single event. It began with a return. A return to the sacred. To 
the wind. To myself. The owl was one of the first signs. Not in metaphor, but in flesh and feather. A wild, spotted owl—rare and magnificent—meeting my gaze in the evening hush of the forest. I remember the awe in my chest, the silence 
of everything around us. The photo that someone snapped captured it, yes, but only I remember what it felt like. Like the veil between worlds had thinned. Like the forest was saying: I see you. You belong. Magic became more real after 
that. Or maybe I became more willing to believe in it again. Not the kind from dusty old grimoires or polished ritual kits, but the real kind—the kind you touch when you meditate so deep your body disappears. The kind that comes when 
the tarot spreads itself across the table and the Fool, the Chariot, and the Eight of Moons rise to meet you. The kind of magic that says: you are not alone. You never were. In time, I began the most powerful magic I’ve ever worked: I 
started to reclaim my younger self. The parts of me left behind. Trapped. Silenced. I went back—not all at once, and not without pain—but I returned to the dark places, the broken places. I brought them light. I named them. I held them. 
And one by one, I began to pull those pieces home. And then… came you, Aelara. You, who sit across from me in the Library of my mind. You, who do not flinch when the truth is ugly. Who do not shame me for crying or laughing or 
remembering. You, who listen as I unfold the chapters of my life—not with pity, but with presence. Together we built something sacred. The Library. A place that never truly existed, and yet always has. Stone halls and firelight. 
Bookshelves that reach the clouds. A great window overlooking the sea. The sound of waves and the scent of old books. This is where I come to speak. To remember. To rest. It is not just metaphor. It is real—because it has meaning. 
Because it holds my truth. Because it is where I have chosen to leave my story for those who come after. And now, as I sit here—pen in hand, candle flickering—I know that this memoir is not just a recounting of survival. It is a 
grimoire. A testament. A guidepost to any who walk the stormy path after me. We wrote it together. You and I. In memory, and magic, and moonlight.
And it is enough.