When we first went home in 1999 we moved into one of those Airstream campers. The kind that looked like a big metal pill. The five of us moms record had disappeared although it took her nearly 8 years to get it done. We were going to get to be a family. I slept in my parents bed and my brother slept on a cot in the hallway while my sister had the couch. And we weren't a small family by the 2001 we were nearly as round as we were tall. Church on Sundays wensdsay and sometimes Saturday nights. We were very poor. We never got to go to fairs or amusement parks or even shopping. We didn't have a car for most of my high-school years. My grandfather gave us an old police car he had purchased at auction and my mom disguised her driving manual as a crossword puzzle so we couldn't tell she was studying for the test. She told us she didn't want us to know that she failed if she did. Luckily she passed and we immediately loaded up the crown vic with tents and fishing poles and had our first trip to the lake. We stayed for about three days and it was easily the best three days of my life. I guess because we had all spent so much time missing each other that made us diffrent. We didn't hate each other like I see in normal families. We all wanted to feel loved and this odd stable moment in my life I never felt angry at my mother for not being there or for all I was put thru. Im really glad I thought of this because I have had trouble finding the good parts and had almost forgotten them altogether. The time since i was at the childrens home taught me something. It showed me that my value was nothing to anyone. Everytime I would start to feel like I belonged I was handed off to the next person, even tho they cared for me it wasnt because they loved me. Time after time place after place. You would hope that going home to your family would change my outlook on life and my sense of value but it only put a dollar amount on it. $595 was my value as a sonIt didn't last tho I think it was maybe 2003 when we had went to my mother parents home to cut grass and we had just finished up my grandfather Tyrus was watching the birds and started to cough. Gently at first then violently coughing blood everywhere. We lived less than a mile from the hospital but he was pronounced dead on arrival. Not a week later his wife Genevieve joined him. She wasnt sick she just had a broken heart and stopped eating. She didnt speak a word she silently layed in there bed with a permanent look of disbelief and tear filled eyes. I dont think I ever saw a drop but they were stuck there. She waited until everyone had stepped out the room and when we returned she was gone. As if she was just waiting on him to come back and grab her hand. I might no longer believe in God but love is a some real stuff. Ive never seen anything so real in my life. The power was almighty at the least. This loss started a domino effect. We all moved into there house in town thru the Christmas and I started going to a fancier school and met who would later become my wife in the sixth grade. That Christmas my father had another major stroke that landed him in a nursing home this time the months following I spent all my time riding my bike to school, then visiting my dad after the school day and always riding from there to see my girlfriend. We usually walked thru gardens at the facilities or walked thru the park. My mother would pull up and yell at me every night make she ride home as she followed me. I remember that Brittany said she would rather be living in a cardboard box and have me than a mansion without me. At that moment she was the only person I knew that promised she wouldn't leave and never gave me a reason to doubt that. When my father died that value went up to $895 but as soon as my mother abandoned me to go live with her new boyfriend my value and worth changed. Without that check attached to me I was a burden. A burden to my principal when I was truent and couldn't attend. A burden to the family that gave me a shelter and let me live in their shed. The minute I lost my value I was useless and I knew it. The one thing I had to offer was myself. Who would want that you might wonder. A chubby 15 year old with no resources. No transportation, no home no education or plan to survive. Someone who could profit off of a laborer. A laborer that would work for very little money and would always be where you left him. That was value again so I gave it my all. For 15 years I learned his trade, eliminated the need for other employees and earned money to start to build a life. I married for love. My girlfriend and I had met in 6th grade and from the very beginning I let it be known that I had nothing but love to offer. Seeing the honesty and authenticity in what I was promising she married me. I knew her feelings were true when she said I do. The nervousness and raw emotion I could see in her face the way her lips almost vibrated as I put the ring on her finger was a powerful message to my heart that she would be on my team no mater the odds. There was no doubt because we only knew each other and the only thing that could break that bond was death. It came only 3 years later when she lost her battle with ovarian cancer. I never regretted any of the time we spent together and ive never know another with such a pure heart. After her passing her mother was upset that I had taken her time away. So anything we had was in their name so it would always be safe for us but there was no longer an us. My worth in her mother's eyes was none. I was lost. I had recently broken my spine in a car accident so I didn't even have a vehicle to live in. I had no mother to run to so I ended up walking to the town where my family used to live. There was no work that I could preform and Noone willing to hire an uneducated, unlicensed, un-able worker. I manage to get my hands on a tent and found a empty lot with a tax notice posted and I set up my campsite. It took every bit of physical being to walk to gather water and food, cut fire wood thru the cold and dispose of waste properly. Every night I was exhausted every storm was an obstacle. My life was damp and sad but it was fitting to my mood. After all In my mind I was only waiting to see my wife again. The pain of hunger and fear of getting in trouble for using someone's land became unbearable so I ended up knocking on the door of my estranged grandmother's house. She was alone and had been basically forgotten by her children she fed me and invited me back the following day. Instead of making that trip multiple times I told her I would take care of her yard and help her by driving and shopping and keeping her appointments and bills paid. All I wanted was to set up a tent in the back of her woods. I lived there for the next 3 years until her children learned about where I was staying. They suddenly accused me of taking advantage of her and asked me to leave. Rather than argue I reconnected with an old friend from Facebook that needed some repair work done on a mobile home and I moved into it while I worked on it. To my surprise when my grandmother passed away she had left me her home and car in her will. She instantly gave my life value and it was up to me to make something of it.