Part One: Light in the Darkness.
This is the first part of a story that I wrote. I hope you enjoy it.
I am Nano. I live on Onnas, an island near the coast of what many call the Philippines, where a fascinating people dwells that I myself would like to make more acquaintances with. But I am digressing. I came here to write. Not just anything. But to write my story. My life is one that many would call chaotic and clique, but I find my story astounding in the nature of history, a subject I have not yet been familiarized with, something I mean to do in this life, if possible. Speaking of my admiration for history, I must start with my history.
As I said I live on Onnas, I also was born there. In fact, I never saw the land of another country or state until just recently. This island was my home and my heritage. The land was my home, but trees were my abode. To my elation trees were populous as rabbits in Australia (someone had informed me when visiting there that it was certainly a thing. They had said that you could hardly even see your garden back in the day. Truly fascinating). As I was so intently trying to inform you, trees were everything to me. More than that I have an interesting birth story regarding them, perhaps the reason for my enrapturement.
My mother, at the prime of her pregnancy, had been gathering the scarce amount of vegetables in her garden, when she heard the faint hints of a living beast nearby. Having no place to retreat to, she shimmied up a tree, with a belly the size of a watermelon. Just as she reached the top, the pains of labor exploded through her frame. As she tells the story, she was so occupied with pain and being noiseless, she had forgotten the danger beneath her. A panther glided by, a shadow in the growing darkness. My mother claims she was well into birthing me, before she slid down the tree and hobbled home. She gave birth to me that very hour. And that was how I was born.
The land that surrounded my house became my treasure for the next five years, until I expanded. To the pathways. To the village. And finally, to the forest. Sometimes I would disappear to the forest for hours. Where I found solace in the peace of the trees. I could do almost anything I wanted in those trees. I would even bring my Tomahawk up into the trees.
Now on the point of my heritage. Let me start with my family. I was no son of the chief, nor even close. My father had been a young man, just recently married to my mother, when he perished. I will not deliberate over this subject, for his death practically meant nothing to me for I never knew him. Only when I was older did I realize the importance of a father. Yet, something inside me desired to my utmost soul to lead. To lead the people was my aspiration. In my youth it was something of mutiny, but as I grew older I sought only reform.
Aside from these things, my life was what one of the islands of Onnas called normal. I worked when I needed to. I ate. I slept. Nothing much happened.
The only thing my life, not only that but the whole village, needed was peace. There was never peace. War after war. Killing after killing. Nothing but pain and hurt. Even when the chiefs of the island said peace, there was no peace. No one in my village, nay the whole town, ever felt true peace. Every day every person watched his back knowing that moment could be his last. That was what was wrong with my village. With my life. There was no peace. And I had known it all my life.
Part Two will hopefully come soon.
