My sanctuary

I’m sitting under the heat-lamps in the glassed room outside my cousin’s house. It’s getting dark, but the sky is still blue so you can just make out the line of trees behind the lake. There are mosquitos buzzing around me, so I have to stop the writing to wave them off from time to time. I am slightly allergic to the bites, you see, so one on my wrist can make the whole itchy for a week.
The whole family is gathered around me, laughing and playing UNO, all while eating the cake I threw together because I had some raspberry-frosting over from the cupcakes I made yesterday.
There is a sense of calm in the chaos. While the youngest of us, my cousin and brother, are taking UNO very seriously, my mom and aunt are mostly laughing and enjoying themselves. The older cousin, feeling very adult at the age of seventeen, is sitting with his two friends at the end of the table, they too munching away on the cake. It’s calm. And loud.
I haven’t been back here for a while, out in the forest with my family. School came in the way, as it has been doing for everything the last year or so. Coming here always makes me feel at home, though I have never spent more than a few weeks here a year. It is so very nice and calm here. We are, in my opinion, in the middle of nowhere. The closest city, which is not a city I have been told, but a community, can be walked through in nothing more than a song or two and everything is surrounded by trees and more trees.
I was just interrupted by my brother proudly exclaiming that he has been cheating for some time now. Oh, what a little mongrel. Back to the story.
Since I live in the big city, coming here is always such a change. We went to the cinema last week and we had to drive for 45 minutes. It barely takes 45 minutes door to door back home. It is very nice to be so isolated though. I have internet, which keeps me sane, and I have my books, which keep me happy. It is, in my mind, the perfect holiday after a year of crying over IB and then two months of hard work. It is, in fact, exactly what I need.
The game goes on. The cousin and his friends have joined, blending into the group as everybody seems to be doing in such close-knit communities on the country. They’re laughing and teasing each other almost to the limit (the girl did storm out in an outrage concerning her snoring at one point) but the warmth remains, and it’s not all from the lamps.
As I sit here with my computer in front of me, typing away, I feel like I am nothing but an observer, like I am not apart of the group. Of course, I could jump right with with just a few words or a smile, but I feel more comfortable this way. Outside. On my own. Observing people in their right element. I think that might be both the writer and the photographer in me: Always wanting to see, without getting involved. It can also come from years of being to afraid to leave the background, and of not really being allowed.
I do like it here though. Behind the shield of my computer. It is a very nice, and safe, place to be.
Just like with this place in the forest. It’s outside the real world, outside reality. It is a safe place in a world where you are expected to achieve every single second of the day. Where there are plans and commitments. I miss the big city at times, just as I miss being involved with reality at times, but it is very nice sitting here. Outside the group, outside the world, and just breathe.
Just breathe.