wild Wild Boy

The Cage

It was 1842. I was a happy man. Being middle-aged was not as bad as others warned me about. Of course, life was hard. We lived in a time when so many people were struggling to get by. It was a time when the ordinary person had to work from dusk to dawn. After they worked hard, they would live in a small house with no comforts. The worse fear was if the weather made their life unbearable. Still living at this time was exciting. There were so many new things. The locomotive made the world a smaller place. In the cities, new factories were sprouting up. It made me think about what life would be like in a century. Would it be less simple than it is now? Would it be a place where we could buy everything at a shop and not depend on help from neighbours? Would society be a more selfish society?

I admit that think too much. I always did and used this talent to write books. My stories usually were about the social inequality and hardships in life. These stories proved to be popular, as it seemed as if people liked to read about people in misfortune and hard times. If one of my stories were about a child living in poverty and being a victim of society, it would bring tears to their eyes and be thankful that their children lived a better life. Writing stories was an escape for me. It was also my statement to the world, that a civilized world would never allow child labour, a child in a workhouse or a child that never knew love. I enjoyed shocking people and making them think. Maybe my stories would wake some people up to make a change!

You can understand why people thought I was a pessimist. Maybe I was. I did not like being around other people. People went so much up in religion, Some people's religion was God, while others had money and status as a religion. I often had to sigh when I have seen how people treated each other. They would be best friends when they were together with someone. When that person was not there, he or she would be the victim of gossip or jealousy. The same people that could not treat others with an ounce of respect went to Church every Sunday to show how Christian they were. These same people never tried to make the world a better place. They would make an excuse that anything bad that happened was a punishment from God. Society was so hypocritical.

I loved life and the simplicity of it when I was by myself. I was never lonely as there was always something to do. My writing kept me busy. Otherwise, I would cook and do other daily chores. In my spare time, I would go fishing and enjoy the quietness of nature. I do realize that people would look at this lifestyle as being a hermit and a loner. Some people may even think that I was a strange man for having this lifestyle. They thought that I was not as good as them, because I never went to Church. The bottom line is that I disagreed with them. I never hurt a soul, I prayed when I was in nature. I was happy with my life. After all, is that what life is all about... finding happiness?

I was not all alone. There was a woman my age that lived close to me. Her name was Miss Sullivan, She was the only human being that lived close to me, otherwise, I lived in the middle of nowhere. Miss Sullivan would visit me once in a while. She thought it was her duty to make sure that I ate proper food once in a while. We would have lively discussions and she would tell me what she thought of my stories. In all honesty, I enjoyed her visits. She was a spinster and never talked about romance. This suited me fine, as I had no intentions of committing myself to marriage. Luckily Miss Sullivan also thought the same.

I just finished a book. Miss Sullivan gave me a lot of compliments and thought it was one of my best yet. It was a child that lived during the witch hunts in Salem, and the people thought that the child was a witch. It was a scary story and the fact that it was based on reality made it scarier. The book showed how humans hid behind superstitions and used superstition and religious fanaticism to have an excuse to make others suffer. I was relieved that Miss Sullivan liked it as the book was darker than the books that I usually wrote. We had a great discussion after which we used the book to analyse society and how sad it was at times. It reminded me that I was so lucky that I lived the life that I did, away from people that would be nice to me until I turned my back. Little did I know that my life would drastically change, whether I liked it or not!