Tonight I was thinking of material things that were stolen from me when I was young - small things like a sweatshirt, a backpack and a pencil case full of sketching pencils. Yet because I had so little money these small things were huge. That sweatshirt was the nicest I ever owned - a quality they don't make anymore, with the logo from my university embroidered onto it. Years later I tried to find another like it but couldn't.


I don't know why it bothers me that these things were stolen from me. Perhaps because I found several expensive items and returned them all. But of course the world is neither fair nor just.


Maybe these small things became a metaphor for other things that were taken from me at a young age. My innocence. My confidence. My self-worth.