how did you stay alive?

The baby was swaddled and meant to be a source of joy, but to look at it was to know how profoundly different this child would be. Can you even call it a child? It's not that it looked reptilian exactly, it mostly looked like a baby— it was a baby, but this baby was different, more different than anything anyone has ever known. When I looked into its eyes I fell into its world, its reality. Waterfalling, cascadia, timespace distortion, frequency shift. This place isn't ours any longer. I know that. Many of us have known for a long time, but we didn't know how it would play out. Even as it happens, I don't know how to describe it properly. Totally silent, and utterly knowing. The first of these children will have a difficult time. It's going to take a lot of care and compassion to make sure they survive. They're not here for us, they don't really need us. They need each other. They need to be together.

People were still pretending it was a regular baby, wanted a gender reveal party and presents to celebrate the miracle of life. It's not going to go how they want. I can't even tell anyone that. No one would listen. They don’t make eye contact, they're not here to perform to expectations. The new children are for the new age, the new earth. We're the ones dying out, they're the evolution. How can we support them? My first concern is that they are protected and cared for, given what they need to grow instead of being burned alive or left on mountaintops to die. Humans can be selfish and ignorant and not respond well to new information and changing circumstances. Violent, screaming meat sacks throwing shit, rattling the cage.

I can't save all the kids, but I got an idea when I heard someone complaining about how alien they seemed. These aren't the first beings here to be called aliens and freaks, a lot of us have walked that path already and without the abilities they're coming in with. I ran down the hallway past lots of emptied rooms to find one of the kids who'd grown up a weirdo freak like I did. It's not that I ever passed for normal exactly, but I did manage to pass for quiet and unobtrusive, easily ignored and dismissed. Really had them thinking I was inconsequential. That's how I moved through the world. How did you do it? How did you stay alive? What gifts can we share to help these children survive the cruelty and violence of this place? I'm never going to advise anyone to stay small and silent. I did it and I wouldn't wish that on anyone. The joy of being truly seen and heard, witnessed in our full expression nourishes the heart, the soul– what's best in us. How was it for you, freak? How did you survive? Let me know in the comments.