The forest, the ocean and the girl.

As a child my family lived abroad, but we would spend summers in Norway. Our cabin lay nestled between the black water of the Nordic Sea and the forest, far removed from the big city I was used to. Coming home was a strange experience. The place I knew so well felt familiar, yet strange. The feeling that something lurked behind the trees or under the surface of the ocean made me uneasy. I would lay awake for hours listening to the quiet and startle with every unexpected sound. Drifting in and out of sleep, hypnagogic images would play tricks on my mind. Dreams and reality seemed to blend until I was unsure of what was what. Stepping outside to go to the toilet was a quest not taken lightly. I would hold my breath and run. Feeling the branches catch my hair and bare skin before reaching the safety of the outhouse, where I sat until my breath was steady and my eyes adapted to the soft light of the Nordic night. As the days and nights went by, my confidence grew and I would venture out. The silence gave my imagination the food it needed to transform the forest into a place where reality and dreams converged.