Microstory 2099: That Slacking Pays Off

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Like I said in the last post, I moved around a lot as a kid, as well as into adulthood, and it had an effect on my schooling. For kindergarten, my parents sent me to a hospital academy in Springfield, Missouri. They had some sort of connection to someone there, but as I was so young, I don’t know much about what it was all about, nor whether it was any better than a regular public school. I ended up moving on to that public school the next year, though, for first and second grade. We moved to Lawrence, Kansas before third grade, so I attended a school where we would walk through a tunnel underneath the street, which is not all that common in Kansas, since we tend to have more space. We moved to Overland Park a year later, so I switched schools yet again. Then for fifth grade, they built a brand new school in the district, and I was zoned there, while most of my peers were not. Notice how I said peers instead of friends. The last person I could confidently call my friend was in Springfield, and he grew up to become a republican, so that relationship was doomed to fail eventually. Anyway, most of the kids in my fifth grade class went to the middle school right next to it, but they rezoned the district again, and I ended up going to the middle school that was generally fed into from the elementary school that I went to for fourth grade, which placed me back with all the kids I thought I would never see again, and in many cases, hoped I wouldn’t. Funny enough, three years later, they built a brand new high school, and most of the kids from my middle school didn’t go there with me. I actually think we technically lived closer to the older high school, but somebody was apparently gerrymandering the school district. I guess it can happen in all levels of government, eh?

After I graduated from grade school, I took a gap year. I didn’t call it that; I doubt I even knew that that was a thing that some people did. My parents didn’t think that I was ready for college, and they were probably right. We didn’t know at the time that I had a diagnosable learning disability, which led to a lack of skills in maturity and socialization, which teachers don’t get paid enough to focus on, especially not since their funding is often dependent upon their students’ standardized test performance. Instead of continuing my education right away, I flew to California, where I volunteered on a farm. The greater organization provided livestock to developing regions of the world, and this particular location was designed to promote awareness of their mission, and educate visitors. My autism bit me in the ass when I was having trouble getting along with the other volunteers, so they kicked me out. I won’t tell you what the organization is called, but they made up these lies about how lazy I was, and how I didn’t do any work, which anyone could see were lies, because they kept changing their reasons. So they’re assholes, and I hate them. I’m the type to hold a grudge, and the only reason I don’t hold more of them is because I have a terrible memory. But I remember this traumatic experience. I’ll never forget how they treated me, and I’ll never support them again. It turned out to be a blessing, though, because Hurricane Katrina destroyed the gulf states soon thereafter, and I decided to take classes with the American Red Cross, and fly down there right away. That’s why I’ve been to Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. I went home after one round, developed my first staph infection, got it cleared up, and then went back, this time being assigned to Florida, so I finished out the southern row.

After that second stint with the Red Cross was done, I enrolled at my junior college for a few classes, only one of which ultimately transferred properly to my four-year school, which I started the following summer. It’s annoying, really. When you do the math, I am quite certain that I could have graduated from college in three years, extremely plausibly in two. I kept taking summer classes, and took a full load for each term, plus I failed out an entire semester, plus several other classes after that. If everything had gone well, I’m really sure it could have taken me less than three years, I just had too many credits when considering how much I had from dual enrollment during my high school career. I failed too many courses, yet still made it in four years, for that not to be true. If I could go back in time, I would have graduated by the time I turned 21, I’m sure of it. In the real timeline, I graduated in 2010 with a degree in Linguistics, barely eking by with the minimal requirements. For the final semester, I was taking a geography class, because I thought it would be fun, but it turned out to be too technical, so I dropped it, and switched what I thought would be an extra linguistics credit. I literally signed the paper on the very last day allowed, and had to take a test with everyone else on my first day of the new class. I aced it, by the way, even though I had zero time to so much as open the book, so don’t act like you’re not impressed. A few weeks later, I was talking to my advisor when I learned that I needed an A in one of my linguistics classes and a B in the other in order to make the minimum GPA for graduation. If I had not switched classes at the last minute, that would have meant an entire extra term there. Thank God Geography 101 was so boring.

I didn’t learn a whole hell of a lot in school, if I’m being honest. I know that people will argue that I’ve retained more than I realize, but I dunno. I did a lot more studying in the decade afterwards than I did in the four years I was there. I did learn a valuable lesson once. In one of my linguistics classes, I was notoriously absent. I only showed up for tests, and other students’ presentations, because I wanted to be respectful. I didn’t do well on the assignments, and only kept myself afloat with my superior writing skills. That’s a bonus lesson that I learned; that teachers’ standards for writing had to be so low that I could get an A on a paper even if I phoned it in. Give me enough time to craft my words, and I could probably figure out a way to convince you that liquid water was dry. But that’s not the lesson I learned in this class; I already knew that I was a writer by then. No, what I learned there was far more valuable, because it applies to everyone. The other students were more interested and focused, so they formed a study group that I was not a part of. I would like to think that they would get up to entertaining shenanigans like the characters on the show Community, but I will never know. Still, I benefited from their hard work. The final exam was an open notes test, and someone in the study group let me have a copy of their study sheet. I can’t remember how well I did, but it was well enough to pass the class, when really, it should have been another failure. So what did that teach me, that slacking pays off? No. It taught me to trust and believe in others, and to accept help when it’s needed. I don’t have to do everything all on my own, and I shouldn’t want to. Humans are a tribal species, and community—there’s that word again—is the only reason we have managed to advance to the point of dominating this planet. So instead of ignoring people, or dismissing them, try to listen, surrender to their expertise when warranted, and let’s all work together to build a better tomorrow. No one gets through this life alone, and it would suck if they had to.

Oh, PS, I took a few more classes over the years after getting my degree, but we’ll talk more about that in the next post, because I signed up for some of them in the pursuit of figuring out what I could do for a living.

Microstory 2098: Where I was Living

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I was going to crack a joke about being born “at a young age” but it seems that joke has already been made. Or maybe it wasn’t a joke, but written by someone incredibly, incredibly dumb. Either way, it’s as true for me as anyone. My family lived in a small town called Derby, Kansas, which was a suburb of Wichita, which is where the hospital was. I’ve asked my mother multiple times where else exactly we lived after that, but I don’t think I wrote everything down, and besides, I don’t have that information with me, do I? But I know that we moved around a little before I was old enough to retain memories. I was three years old when I first became self-aware. I recall playing in the leaves at my house in Springfield, Missouri, which was where we lived for about five years. My father’s time as a teacher was ending, so we moved back to Kansas. I learned years later that he was applying to jobs in both Topeka and Kansas City, so we lived in Lawrence for a year while we waited to find out which it would be. Once his employment was settled, we moved to Overland Park, and we stayed in that area up until the day I disappeared, though not always in the same house. Overland Park is probably the largest suburb of KC, and they’re all sort of mixed together. You can drive on the highway for less than half an hour, and pass eight different cities without realizing it. This has all complicated my education history, and been complicated by it, but I reckon that I’ve lived in eleven places. That’s not even counting the two months I volunteered on a farm in California, the five different dorms and apartments I was in during college, or the two months that I house-sat for my aunt in Michigan.

I didn’t always get that most people don’t move around this much. As adults, they can return to their childhood bedrooms to find them just as they were. The last room I slept in before leaving the nest is my dad’s home office now. I never stopped moving. Once I was making enough money at work, I moved to a studio apartment.A year later, my parents invested in rental property, and I was their first tenant. It was a two-bedroom house with a yard for a future dog, though it was never a great setup, because the only way to the backyard was through the garage, or from the side yard. So I moved again, this time to a four-bedroom house. That’s where I was living when I got my dog, Daisy. Since I’m a temporal alternate, I’ll just tell you that my other self lives in yet another house now. It only has two bedrooms, but the den (living room) has a door that leads to the backyard, which is perfect for Daisy. She hangs out right by the door, and never dirties up the rest of the house, which is important, because we’re allergic to animal dander, and we have OCD. This is only about my original life, so I won’t even get into all the different worlds I’ve visited since becoming a bulk traveler, but that’s all added a lot too. As I mentioned, I moved schools a lot too, and not always because I moved houses, but won’t get into that until tomorrow. Here’s a list of other states that I’ve visited, in the order that I remember them: Michigan, Colorado, Illinois, Arkansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Florida, Ohio, Minnesota, Indiana, California, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Iowa, Tennessee, Washington, Alaska, New York, and Hawaii. Here’s a list of other countries that I’ve visited, in definite chronological order: Japan, France, Canada, Egypt, Panama, and Peru.

Microstory 2086: And Even Chaotic

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I have been trying to figure out, not only where my co-worker went, but also where everyone else has gone. One person has mysteriously disappeared from Kansas City every day for the last month and a half. None of them showed signs of wanting to go somewhere before their disappearance, they leave no trace behind, and the authorities have not categorized any of them as suspicious. One thing they seem to have in common is that their respective friends and family aren’t extremely surprised by the development. The cops eventually stop investigating entirely, because none of them is a child, or someone else at high risk, like a dementia patient. They’re all self-sufficient adults who have been known to be a little bit flaky and unpredictable. They also come from different jurisdictions, so no one but me has any hope of seeing any of this as a pattern. In some of the stories I was writing before I disappeared from my own world, I came up with this organization called the Kansas City Metro Corps. It’s a police agency that operates in all of Kansas City, even across state lines, which to my knowledge, is not something that exists in the real world. There are federal agents, of course, but no one that can carry out investigations regularly between only two states. They might do it occasionally, but in that case, two different departments will have to liaise with each other, which can be complicated, disorganized, and even chaotic. They don’t have anything like the KC Metro Corps on this Earth, so no one is talking to each other, or seeing the connections.

I have been doing my own investigating, and I’ve come to a startling discovery that made me throw up in the middle of my shift. Don’t worry, I made it to the bathroom in time, because I was already in the break room, but I don’t know if I can live with myself anymore. It’s me. I’m the cause. I don’t know how I’m doing it, but it’s definitely me. Tracing the disappearances have been difficult, because no one witnessed anything strange happening, so their true locations aren’t so cut and dried, which is why I didn’t see it before. But if I add myself to the map along with all the others, and adjust for people’s hypothetical movement after the last person to see them loses sight of them, then I am at the epicenter. Every disappearance happens from that point, and has continued outwards in a spiral formation. The pattern would be beautiful if it weren’t so sickening. They all happen early in the morning, which makes sense, because that’s when I first arrived on this world. So I’ve already missed today. I’ve not heard anything yet, but I’m sure whatever mysterious force is causing this has struck again, and I have an idea of where. I can’t save that person, or anyone else we lost before, at least I might not be able to, I don’t know. But I know that there’s a chance for me to save whoever is meant to go missing tomorrow. I’m taking the day off, which is something that I didn’t want to do this early on at my job, but I don’t think I have any other choice. I’ve asked the high school girl to fill in for me, since it’s Teacher Planning Day. I’m going to the store today to gear up. I don’t know what I’ll be going up against.

Microstory 2060: Of Opium Floating

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Finally got a call from the garden this afternoon. My boss tells me she can’t pay me very much, because of my lack of experience, but she’s sure I’ll start getting raises after I prove myself. Unfortunately, the place is a little strapped for cash at the moment, so they’re going to make-do without the help until the end of the month. Still, I’m not going to complain, because I’m pretty grateful for the opportunity. In the meantime, I’m learning more about the history of this Earth. A lot of it sounds pretty familiar, though I was never good at history, so any number of details could be wildly different, and I wouldn’t know the difference. If you told me that Monroe was the president before Madison, I would believe it. And if you told me the opposite, I would believe that too. I’ve still not yet figured out what went wrong here, though. Why is it so boring? There’s no war, but I think that’s because nobody cares enough about anything to fight over it. The poor stay poor, and the rich aren’t all that wealthy. They spend it on whatever they need, and when they die, their assets usually end up with the state. You don’t seem to have the concept of charity or inheritance. It’s all very strange. I’m beginning to worry that there’s something in the air that makes everyone so chill, and not in a good way. I read a book and watched a TV show adaptation before I came here where they went to a magical land that had a little bit of opium floating in the atmosphere all the time. I suppose if something like that were the case, I would be feeling the effects. I’m no longer immortal, but I feel the same as I did before all of this, so that doesn’t necessarily explain it. In at least one universe, men don’t have scrotums, which is not something that would be immediately apparent if you met a native. There are so many possible differences that I couldn’t even hope to detect a small fraction of them. Will do more research, and get back to you, but will probably just assume for now that dudes here have scrotums.

Microstory 2050: Minnesota

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Now, some of you may say that my papa never made it to all fifty states. He died in Oklahoma before he ever got the chance to see Minnesota. But my family and I don’t feel the same way that you do. After he died, we had a funeral service for him in Florida. My grandma has a hard time moving around. She doesn’t have ALS, but she’s old, and that’s just what happens. My aunt, uncle, and cousins all flew down to be there too. All of papa’s friends from college, the Navy, and his co-workers from the submarine company were there. Papa met a lot of people as he was going to every state. I didn’t talk a whole lot about that, but he didn’t just step over the borders, and take photos. He became involved in people’s lives, and they remembered him later. People heard of his accomplishment, and because of my dad’s work with the news, it made it into national news. Everyone knew that he had died, and they knew when the funeral was. They even had to move the service to a bigger room, because there wasn’t enough space in the one we had booked. When it was all over, we took papa’s cremains up to Minnesota. When you die, you might be buried in the ground, but they also may turn your body into ashes. It may be scary, but a lot of people want this to happen to them, and that’s what my papa wanted. We spread his ashes in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in Minnesota. Papa loved forests, so we thought that it was a good place to do it. Don’t worry, we asked for permission first. Some of the ashes are still in a little urn on our mantel. We had the special map framed, and it’s hanging on the wall right above it. The rest of the ashes will stay in Minnesota forever. I think that’s fitting. My papa went to all fifty states in the United States of America. I think that’s pretty amazing. Thank you for watching and listening to my presentation about my papa.

Microstory 2049: Oklahoma

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Back in August, my papa was sitting in his wheelchair in the dining room. He was looking up at the map where he and my dad had placed stickers to show which states they had gone to. My papa was only missing two states. He had never gone to Oklahoma or Minnesota. It was hard for him to pick up objects, but he asked me to hand him a quarter. When he let go of it, it fell to the floor. It landed on tails, which he had decided meant that he would be going to Oklahoma. I think he knew that he didn’t have very much time left, because that is where he died. He was sitting in a blue camping chair, watching the sunset with his favorite people. My dad was sitting on his right, and I was sitting on his left. Grandma Daphne, Aunt Cooper, Uncle Currian, and my cousins, Nash, Osmond, and Thatcher were all there too. Even though we knew that it was going to happen, it was sad, especially since I was there to see it. Still, I’m glad that he was looking at something so beautiful when it happened, instead of just staring up at the ceiling, or something.

Microstory 2048: South Carolina

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My papa didn’t want any more sadness once he knew that he was going to have to leave his family soon. He wanted to have one last really happy memory with us. He decided that we should go down to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. A lot of people like to go there to party, but they mostly do it in the spring and summer. This was in the winter, around Christmastime. It was the last Christmas that my papa ever saw. According to people who lived there, it was pretty cold at the time, but it wasn’t anywhere near as could as it gets up here in Massachusetts, so we didn’t mind. We couldn’t go into the ocean, but we sat on the beach, and enjoyed spending time together. We didn’t do a lot of activities, but it was nice and quiet, since the party-goers were living their regular lives in other places. We spent a lot of time in the hotel, playing board games, and just talking. I skipped a lot of school in the fifth grade. That’s okay, because I made up all of my assignments, and I wanted to be with my family. Papa was really tired all the time, but he still smiled, and he could still make me laugh. We were lucky for that too. Most people with the disease who were that far along in their journey have trouble speaking. He was sometimes hard to understand, but he could still talk well enough.

Microstory 2047: Delaware

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Papa struggled with the ALS for many months, doing what the doctors recommended, and trying different medications. Nothing was working, so they decided to go see another doctor. There was a different specialist who lived in Millsboro, Delaware. This is the one who told my fathers that the disease was aggressive. That’s the word I heard my family use a lot: aggressive. It sounds really mean. Some people can live 10 years after they find out that they have ALS, and I wish I could say that my papa was one of them, but he wasn’t. He found out in 2021, and you already know how this story ends. They did everything they could, but that wasn’t much. All they could really do in the end was make him as comfortable as possible. Delaware was not a good trip either. I will probably never go to Pennsylvania or Delaware. I might not even go to North Dakota again. Delaware was the last time that my papa could walk. He had to stay in the wheelchair for the rest of his life. It was hard to see him like that, but I would rather see him like that than not at all.

Microstory 2046: Pennsylvania

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You might have heard of ALS already. People were dumping ice water on their heads to raise money for it several years ago. They still haven’t found a cure, though. I really wish they had, because then my papa would still be here today. That doesn’t mean that scientists aren’t trying to find a cure. Massachusetts has some really good doctors, but my fathers heard of a specialist in Pennsylvania who knew a lot about it, so they wanted to meet with her. I had to stay with my cousins again. My fathers flew down to Philadelphia without me. I don’t know what they talked about, because no one will tell me, but they obviously didn’t solve the problem, because my papa is dead now.

Microstory 2045: North Dakota

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Before my papa was born, his parents would go to a forest called the Roosevelt National Park, which is located in North Dakota. It isn’t that far from the border to Montana. Papa never went there himself, but on my grandpa’s birthday, who was dead, papa wanted to honor him with a family trip. We took a plane over there, and stayed in tents. We ate outside, and we hiked, and I swam in a lake a little bit. I know that it’s a really beautiful place, but I don’t have very good feelings about North Dakota. This is where my papa started getting sick. I hope I don’t cry while I’m presenting this slide. My papa had a real hard time on this trip. He had trouble walking, and he felt very weak all the time. I remember seeing him twitch while we were sitting around the campfire. He was also talking kinda funny, like he was trying to talk with his mouth full. We didn’t know what was wrong with him at the time, but we hoped that it would just go away. He took it easy for the rest of the trip, and then we just went back home. The problems started getting worse after that, so he went to the doctor, and he was eventually diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. Most people just call it ALS, because that’s hard to say.

Microstory 2044: Nevada

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Even though he hasn’t been to all fifty states, my dad travels a lot too. He is a photojournalist, so he takes pictures for news websites. He works as a freelancer, so he doesn’t just work for one site. He usually stays around where he lives, but he sometimes has to go out to other areas. Actually, the reason that he and my papa met on the train in Kentucky is because he was there to photograph the completion of a new college outside of Louisville, which was partially funded by someone who lived in his part of Virginia. He usually only leaves the state when there’s a connection to the local area, but a few years ago, in the year 2020, he wanted to go to Nevada. Dad also went to college, and met friends. One of his friends was a soldier who lost one of his legs in the war. He lived in Nevada, and wanted to raise awareness for something called veteran healthcare, so he set about to take the longest hike on a single leg. He carried a pack on his back, and only used a cane to support himself. He walked 17 miles all in one day! Isn’t that impressive? I couldn’t even do it with two legs. My dad was there to photograph the whole journey, so he also walked the 17 miles. My papa went on the trip with him, but he didn’t do much hiking. He dropped them off at the beginning of the trail, and then picked them up at the end. I stayed here with my cousins, since I had school.

Microstory 2043: West Virginia

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After we got back from Ethiopia, my fathers started talking about all of the other places that they had been too. They ended up getting out an old map that papa’s mom used to hang in her home office. They hung it in the basement, and each of them picked a color of stickers, and started marking where they had been to. My dad has been to several states, but my papa’s stickers were all over that map. They realized that there were not many states left that he hadn’t been to yet. The closest one was Pennsylvania, but he decided to make a trip to West Virginia instead. He and my dad wanted to go down there for their anniversary, because it was really close to that museum in Virginia where they had first gotten to know each other. I went on the trip to West Virginia too, but I was 8 years old already, so I could take care of myself a little without too much help. I let them spend some time together without me. I even went to a puppet show next door to the bed and breakfast alone. We only spent one night there, and then we went back home, because I had to go to school on Monday.

Microstory 2042: New York

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As I said before, the state of New Jersey worked really hard to find out if my parents were still alive in Ethiopia. They were unable to find them, or any other family that I might have there, which is why my fathers were allowed to adopt me. When I was 7 years old, though, that changed. A special charity organization flew to Ethiopia, and started offering free DNA testing. Anyone in our country can send in a sample so a computer can study their DNA, but it’s not that easy in other parts of the world. An aunt of mine participated in this special program, and when they uploaded the information to the big worldwide database, they found that I was a match. My fathers did it for me early on after I first met them, because they wanted to know whether there were any medical issues that they should be worried about. When they found out that I did have some family in Africa, they decided that we would all three fly out there to meet them. As it turns out, my birth parents were dead, but my aunt had a husband, and they had a bunch of kids, who were my brand new cousins. They were happy that my papa and dad were now my parents, so they didn’t want to take me away, but they did want to have relationships with me. So my fathers worked really hard to help them get to the United States. It has taken years since 2019, but they are finally living here, and on their way to becoming U.S. citizens. I wish my papa was alive to see it. Oh, and we had a really long layover in New York while we were waiting to fly to Africa, so my papa was able to see it.

Microstory 2041: New Jersey

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My dad and teacher didn’t want me to put this information on the slide, and I bet she’s upset with me right now as I’m presenting it, but the way I see it, it’s my story, and I should be able to tell it. I was born in a country in Africa called Ethiopia. When I was still a baby, some men came into my village, and took me away. They were trying to sell me to some really bad people. We think that I would have grown up to be a slave for them. That’s right, slavery still happens. I was rescued, but not everyone is, and it’s going on all over the world. They found me and a bunch of other children on a big ship, and took me to New Jersey where I would be safe. But I still didn’t have a home. A group of women who worked for the state took care of us in an orphanage. Reporters talked about what happened to us on the news, so actually a lot of people wanted to adopt us, but they first had to see if they could send us back to our birth parents. It was really complicated. It usually took a really long time to find out where we belonged, because we didn’t all know our names, or who our parents were. I was there for three years before my papa and dad came in to take me to my forever home. I will always be grateful to them for that, because I love them, and I would never want to live anywhere else.

Microstory 2040: Wisconsin

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My fathers’ bad luck continued as they were trying to fly from Alaska to New Jersey. They were supposed to make a stop in Chicago, which is where my papa used to live, but that’s not what happened. On their way on the first plane, another passenger got really drunk, and started misbehaving. He was causing problems for everyone, and being really rude, so the pilot had no choice but to land the plane at a different airport to let him off. They even had to have the police waiting for him there. The closest one was this little airport called Southern Wisconsin Regional Airport. It wasn’t really built for planes like that, so it took them a long time to get through all the stuff with the police, and start trying to fly again. By the time they were ready, they couldn’t leave anyway, because of a snowstorm that had formed over Canada. If that guy had just not gotten drunk, they would have arrived in New Jersey on time. Honestly, it’s kind of scary for me to think about, though. They had to spend one night in Wisconsin until the storm passed, and then they were able to fly again. By the time they made it to New Jersey, though, the child they were going to adopt had already gone to another family. They were too late. They would have to wait a few months longer. They had to wait for me. I, for one, am glad that they did.

Microstory 2039: Alaska

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Like I said, it took a long time for me to get adopted. While they were working on it, my fathers put off their honeymoon. They got married in 2015, but it was 2017, and they still hadn’t gone on it yet. It was looking like they were going to have to wait even longer for me to be ready to come home with them, so they decided to finally go on the trip. It was almost the wintertime, but they had their hearts set on an Alaska vacation, so that’s where they went. It was really, really, really cold there, but they still had fun. They slept in a cabin, but it was heated, and they packed a lot of clothing. While they were there, they got a call from the adoption agency, telling them that a child was ready, but they had to get to New Jersey right away. They hadn’t gotten much time to relax. They quickly packed up their belongings, and got back to the airport. The problem was that there weren’t any flights until the next day. It was a really stressful time for them. They didn’t get to enjoy very much of Alaska, but they said it was beautiful. My papa used the word gorgeous to describe it.

Microstory 2038: Maryland and D.C.

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It takes a long time to adopt a child, especially one that is in the situation that I was in. My parents put in their application right away, but it was almost three years before it finally went through! I lived in an orphanage while I was waiting, and the people in charge had to first find out if there was any way to get me back to where I was born. In the year 2016, and evil man started to run for president. He doesn’t like people who look like me, or who are from countries like my home country. He thinks that everyone who wasn’t born in this country is automatically bad. Even if they were born here, if their parents weren’t, he just doesn’t like them anyway. He believes in a lot of other bad things, and a bunch of people wanted to vote for him, because they felt the same way. My fathers are good people, who feel nothing but love for everyone. So while they were waiting for me to come into their lives, they drove down to Washington D.C. to protest against the presidential candidate. Washington D.C. isn’t a state, it’s a district, but it’s pretty much in Maryland, and my fathers’ hotel was really close to the border, so they spent a little time over on that side of it, and I think that it counts. They marched on the streets to let people know that they didn’t want this man to win the election, and guess what, he didn’t! He was never a president, and I say my fathers had something to do with it. They obviously weren’t the only ones who protested, but as my grandma will say, every voice counts. I think that’s probably true. If you feel a certain way, and you want people to know it, then you should say it. That’s what it means to be in a free country. Even the bad man had a right to say what he didn’t, even though it was all bad stuff.

Microstory 2037: Florida

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So like I said, my fathers had two houses here in Plymouth. They had to move to the second one so they could take care of a child, which ended up being me. As they were just finishing up moving all the way into the second one, though, they got a call from papa’s mother. It was about my grandpa, who I never met. And that’s because he died that day. My papa was the first person she called about it, and then she called my Aunt Cooper. And then my Aunt Cooper called my papa so they could talk about it too. They cried about it together, because they loved my grandpa. They tell me that he was a great, hard-working man. I wish I could have known him. I was alive already, but my fathers had not adopted me yet. When he and my grandma were both finally retired, they left Idaho, and moved all the way down to Florida. A lot of people like to retire there, because it’s sunny all the time, and really pretty. They lived in a building called unassisted living, because they had trouble moving around too much, but they still didn’t need a nurse to take care of them all the time. My papa had actually visited a couple times since they moved there. He had even helped them move in, but I decided to talk about Florida on this slide, instead of earlier, because this is when my papa went down to go to his father’s funeral. It was really sad, and I’m kind of glad I at least wasn’t there for that part. Only a few of grandpa’s friends were able to make it, because a lot of them were already dead, and some of them weren’t able to travel. Some of them lived in Florida too, though.

Microstory 2036: Massachusetts

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I was on the news. Well, I wasn’t really on it myself. My dad would call it featured if I was, but they told my story, and we think we can see me in the background in some of the footage. While my fathers, my aunt, my uncle, and my cousins, were moving to their new houses here in Plymouth, Massachusetts, they had TVs on. We always have the TV going, even if we’re not really watching anything. We just like to have it on in the background. As they were carrying all those boxes, though, they noticed something on the news that was running. Everybody stopped what they were doing to watch. That’s how they even knew that I existed at all in the first place. Until that day, my fathers had not thought much about having children. Two men cannot have a baby the normal way, and they were both so busy with their jobs, they had not thought much about anything else. They did want kids at some point, though, and they realized while they were watching the news that they wanted to help. They didn’t know that I was one of the kids there, but they knew that someone like me would need a good home. The house they were trying to move into was small. It was really only big enough for the two of them. They were supposed to go to their honeymoon right after they were mostly done, but they decided to cancel their plans. Instead, they only moved as much furniture as they would need at the minimum, and then they started to look for a completely new house. It had to be big enough for a full family, even though they still didn’t know how they were going to adopt me yet. They stayed there for two days while they were canceling the contract from the people they bought the house from. I think it made them upset, but they found someone else to buy it all the way. Meanwhile, my fathers moved in with my papa’s sister, and stayed there until they could find the house that I live in now.

Microstory 2035: Vermont

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Vermont was the first state in the U.S. to legalize same-sex marriage. They did it in 2001. During my research, I learned that Massachusetts was the first state to introduce making it legal for gay people to get married, but it took them longer to pass it. By 2015, the whole United States said that you have to allow gay marriage no matter what state you’re in, but my papa and dad still wanted to get married in Vermont. It is a beautiful state, especially if you go there in the fall when the tree leaves are changing colors. They got a really nice outdoor spot where everyone could see a lot of the trees. It was a little cold, but not too cold, and it didn’t rain or snow. Everybody’s family was there. It sounds really expensive, but my papa was used to spending money on travel. He visited dad in Virginia a lot when they were still dating. When they weren’t in the same state together, they talked on the phone, and on the computer. Dad’s family thought it was weird that they lived so far away from each other, but they somehow made it work. They wouldn’t have to make it work like that for much longer. After the wedding, they decided to not have a honeymoon just yet. They were too busy. They first went to Chicago to pack up papa’s apartment, and then they went to my Aunt Cooper’s house to pack. Lastly, they went to dad’s house to pack up his stuff. And then they all moved to Massachusetts together. I’ll give you more details on the next slide.