due today in 10 hours

DeAnn Cross

Introduction to creative writing

Professor Harrell

04/11/2018

Writing Exercise #

The thought of getting lost in the forest may seem trivial now given the navigation technology that is in place. However, for a kid growing up in the 90s it was a very vivid reality. There were no smart phones with access to maps. There were no devices that could actively track the movement of an individual and help them find their way. There was no way to communicate with the outside world once a person lost their way in the forest. It was a lot scarier then than it is now. The event gave me the biggest scare of my life and I have been afraid of heading into forests ever since.

When my brother and I decided to veer off the track in the forest it was all in the spirit of adventure. We wanted to explore the unknown parts of the forest and see what was out there. Having never been there before we were very anxious and eager to go where no child had ever gone before. The prior warnings by our parents did not do any good either. They had warned us not to veer off the track or go too deep into the forest. This only made us want to veer off the track and go to the deepest precipices of the forest even more. It was truly a brave time for us and the notion of being rebellious was mainstream.

When it dawned on us that we were lost we started to panic. We were just kids and could not fathom the extent of the forest. As far as we were concerned the forest was infinite and we would spend an eternity there without ever making it to the outside world. To make matters worse we had absolutely no supplies. No water or snacks. I started contemplating living off the land and killing wild animals for food as I had seen in the movies. Alas I was weak and very unathletic making the notion of actively chasing animals an unrealistic one.

The biggest scare of the entire experience came when we encountered some loggers in the forest. We approached them thinking that they would help us find our way. Little did we know that they were illegal loggers and were basically on the run from the law. On approaching them they immediately grabbed us and started asking who we were and how we had made it to their location. When we told them we were simply lost they were having none of it. They insisted that we had been sent by law enforcement to spy on them. They started threatening to kill us as a means of protecting their location.

They locked us in a cabin. However, they did not take account of our body size relative to the bars on the window. My brother and I managed to squeeze through the bars. Once we were outside we ran like our lives depended on it, and indeed they did. Once the flight instinct kicked in nothing else mattered. I am not sure how long we were running but it seemed like three hours at the very minimum. As luck would have it we stumbled upon the familiar track and were able to make our way back home. We were torn about telling our parents about the experience knowing that we would get punished for disobeying them in the first place and almost dying in the process. They were an old school breed of parents who would console us whenever we disobeyed them and got hurt only to punish us later on. We had no choice and had to inform them of the experience. We were grounded for a month but it was all worth it since we made it from the forest safe and sound.