My New Best Friend

Somehow this is just typical.  I manage to create my own personalised best friend and he has a horrible personality and spends most of his time thinking up nasty practical jokes to spring on me.  Even Nemo just to mostly just ignore me!  I know I was lonely, I know I said that I was desperate for anybody to talk to but, why, why!? Edwin is every insecurity I have made ‘real’. 

He could have been sweet.  He could have been kind.  He could have been my robotic soul mate.  Instead I swear he goes to bed at night and dreams of new ways to torment me.  He’s a monster!

It’s not that he doesn’t like me, although with us being so very different I’m not sure how long that will last, but being my friend doesn’t seem to mean anything much.  He still takes great delight in making my life pure misery. 

I do my best to stay friendly with him.  Playing games is always a fun way to pass the time and certainly nothing that Nemo was ever interested in.  I may possibly admit as well that keeping Edwin occupied with something means he has less time to sneak up on me and scare the living daylights out of me.

I have also tried my best to interest him in gardening, both as being useful to have another pair of hands to keep the growing plants in good order and also as an exercise in turning whatever passes for his mind to a more gentle pursuit.  Hoping that the simple pleasure of tending the earth and watching it bring forth a bountiful harvest would have a beneficial effect on him.

This was about as effective as giving a goldfish a bicycle.

So, here I am, yet again sitting alone at my camp-fire wondering if, once more, I should have taken greater care in what I asked for.

But here things took a rather surprising turn.  Although I should qualify this as many would consider a walking, talking robot turning up pretty surprising.  I certainly did.

Less surprising than that!

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

I remember reading Frankenstein as a young child.  Frankenstein’s creator, full of hubris, tries to make that most marvellous of all things – Life. 

I wasn’t.  I was really just trying to divert myself or perhaps make a magical flying machine to take me away from here.  But somehow, I managed to make….

This.

I’m not even sure how it happened.  Suddenly a random collection of nuts and bolts started to walk and talk. 

Gave me a heck of a shock, I’m telling you!

I think I’ll just try to not think about it too much.  This island is a special place; maybe something felt my loneliness and took pity on me. 

Whatever the reason I now have a friend.

The Cold of Winter Comes from More than the Weather

True Winter has come to the island again. I know from experience that it will be brief but I'm still glad of my fire.

The garden goes dormant in Winter which saves me a great deal of time in having to maintain it.

I've also disposed of two of the beehives. I really don't know how much honey Nemo thought he needed but I don't want to spend the time looking after them.

I don't dwell on it but I know my loneliness is starting to prey on my mind. The other day I built a snowman, making him as lifelike as I was able to and then I stared at my creation and I realised I was willing it to come to life. Frosty the Snowman perhaps?

The island is just as beautiful in Winter as it is in all the other seasons but its pristine snowy whiteness somehow seems to emphasise how alone I am. I don't see many other living things during this time and even the song of the birds seems to die away. 

The 'inventing room' is my preferred hideaway during this time. Not only am I protected from the

elements but the banging and clanging creates an artificial sort of noise which means the silence isn't so loud.

I'm not quite sure what I am looking for when I invent but I'm fairly sure that this swinging ball contraption isn't it. Oh well, it's kinda neat I guess.

Spring comes and washes away the snow. Life will return to the island thank goodness. I'm a bit tired of feeling like I'm the only living thing here.

Nemo used to love jumping in puddles. I've never really tried it but I felt the urge to do what he did. It's quite fun but somehow I think there is something missing. Maybe he did it a different way? Are there different ways of jumping in puddles?

I always wanted a pet when I was at the orphanage and I was never allowed one. Now I'm by myself I can have any pet I like. I remember how much I didn't like being around people and how much I wanted to be alone. Well, now I am and I can have a pet fish here if I want to!

Or maybe not.

Perhaps a pet cockroach would be harder to kill. Lots of people like to collect bugs and things and find them super interesting and fun to talk to and interact with.

Or perhaps a pet dog?  I obviously can't have a real one but a little metal dog has lots of advantages; it doesn't pee in the house, it doesn't need washing or feeding or looking after.  I can still play with it and I don't have all of the hassle of being responsible for its well-being.   

Oh, who am I trying to fool?! I'M SO LONELY!

I wake up lonely, I spend all day trying to not think about how lonely I am and then I go to bed lonely dreading the next day when I have to go through it all again.  I'd give anything to hear a friendly voice.  Or even a not so friendly voice.  Nemo telling me that I smell, an annoying brat from the orphanage, my old school teachers yelling at me for not paying attention during lessons.  ANYBODY!

I can't believe I ever used to wish to be able to live my life completely separate from other people.  They say to be careful what you wish for.  

I'm so, so lonely...

Alone at Last

Peepo is now my only companion on the island and although I still enjoy playing with him he is no longer a sympathetic ear when I need someone to talk to. He is just a stuffed toy.

The chores of camp keep me busy and don't leave me a lot of time for dwelling on my loneliness. The bee hives need tending.

The garden needs looking after.

And I have also returned to the junkyard up at the mine and am trying to make some useful items from what I find there.

With debatable success.

Thank goodness for those handy 'Showers in a Can' else I would have been a charred corpse long since.

I can't really say that anything I am currently making has much practical value although I do occasionally find some real finds in the junk piles as I sort through them.

All of this work leaves me little thought for anything but my bed. Which is still out in the tent; now that I am able to move inside the shack I find that I am reluctant to do so. Perhaps I have the thought that Nemo's ghost still lingers but I think that I just prefer to be out of doors and closer to nature.

Life's Changes

It is nice to have the occasional chat by the fireside as we roast our fish. Nemo still doesn't talk much but I have picked up a few things from him. For instance he told me that we are in some strange part of the sea 'where things go missing' and apparently, he thinks that we have now gone missing. He doesn't seem that concerned, never mentions family or friends, and sometimes I wonder if he came here deliberately to this, triangle of some sort I think he said, to try to get lost.

Well, if that was his aim, then he has succeeded.

In the here and now though Nemo continues looking after his bee hives, getting the occasional sting :-) He still doesn't share the honey with me though and still secrets his excess produce away in some hidey hole I've yet to find.

Nemo also perseveres in trying to get a garden established.

It's certainly growing a little larger but I don't think anything in it's edible.

But he seems to enjoy it and has a sense of accomplishment I think in finally working out how to get some of these weird plants to grow even if they aren't providing any variation to our largely fish diet.

I'm no gardener but I feel a similar pride in my fishing ability. There wouldn't be a fish on the island I couldn't catch now. And long hours spent fishing are a great way to pass the time.

The trip home through the beautiful forest is always a great end to the day. Even when it's raining.

You would think with all my swimming and getting soaked by the rain that it would help with keeping down the smell a bit. Unfortunately, as Nemo rather unkindly reminds me, it's best to not stand downwind of me. Or even stand too close. 

Yes. I stink.

I guess things couldn't stay the same forever but you never expect change. It always comes as a shock.

This change came so quickly. One moment here.

The next. Gone.

We haven't exactly been close Nemo and I but he must have meant more to me than I realised and I was so distressed at his passing that I thought I saw some boney dark cowled figure appear and escort him into the next world.

Either that or the heat was getting to me.

I buried Nemo in a patch of undergrowth a little way along the beach and now I am truly alone; will the isolation drive me mad?

My Teenage Years

My teenage years do not bring all that many changes. I am still responsible for the fishing; although now I feel more confident about staying out late at night. In the years that I have been here I have never seen another living person and I no longer feel the need to run back to the 'safety' of Nemo's shack when it gets late.

Another small change is that I am now using my tent. I came back from a late night fishing trip and found this...

If Nemo had decided to use my sleeping bag then I was going to use my tent. 

In the morning Nemo didn't say anything about the 'new' tent. Not a single question! So all my damp nights worrying about it were a complete waste of time!

The biggest change is really that Nemo occasionally interacts with me now. True it's usually by sneaking up behind me and soaking me with water but it's more than he's ever done before.

 

Anyway I don't mind water. If I'm not catching our dinner in it, I'm usually having a splash around myself to try to cool off. I feel like I should be trying to be more productive and spend a lot more time up at the mine seeing what I can make out of the scrap there but, well, it's nicer down here and the days just keep drifting past. Tomorrow. I'll start working on it tomorrow.