Germination (Feast of Weeds Book 1): A Novella

How to Prepare

Posted August 10th at 7:46PM on Do More Than Survive: How to THRIVE as a Runaway

Practice running away before you actually run away. Pretend you're going to sleep over at a friend's house for a day or two and then go sleep out in the woods, eat out of some dumpsters, use only public restrooms to wash up.

Also, put good karma out into the world and leave a note to whoever you left behind—whether or not you think they care about you. I called my mom after I left. She said she was worried about me out here, but not enough to leave my stepfather. But I called, and I was even nice about it, plus, then you won't get reported as a kidnapping. Let the police spend time and money on finding kids who want to go home. Remember, no one likes a jerk.

Figure out what you're going to do with all the extra time once you run away. Other kids your age are going to be in school. Unless you get involved in drugs, or alcohol, or prostitution—not recommended unless you ran away because you secretly want to kill yourself, which was what I wanted at first—you are going to have a lot of free time on your hands.

This is important because at some point you're gonna rest your head on your pillow and know that you are sleeping on concrete and you're gonna start crying. Don't let anybody see it cause it'll make you a target. But it will happen. You'll get so upset about your life and realize that you maybe wished you'd finished the school year or gone to the school swim party at least once, just to know what it would have been like.

This is when your goal or dream or wish becomes really important to your survival because otherwise there's no point getting up the next day except for the alcohol and drugs.

Every street kid has one. What's yours going to be? Maybe right now, it's only to get out, to get some adventure, to get free of whatever beatings your stepdad did every night.

Okay, but now you're out, so now what?

Me and my friends, we have a plan. We're going to save up enough money to buy some land, we're thinking maybe in Arizona where it's cheap and warm. Or maybe in the State of Jefferson, in the woods with other people who understand that society has it all wrong. It's going to be our own place. We'll grow a garden and brew our own beer and live together and no one can kick us off it just for breathing because we'll own it.