BEGINS BOOK ONE:

March 14th We are six people who have managed to stay alive through whatever it is that has happened to our planet. My husband Bob and I were fortunate enough to be protected by our spirits and brought through all of this. I am Janet Dove, my husband is full blooded Blackoot and a very proud man. A very good man as well. And not just to me. He treats all people well. My mother was Cherokee and my father was French. I don’t mean French transplanted to this country. My mother met him in France. We are looking forward to whatever the spirits purpose is in this. We have many young people with us. Michael Collins. He’s mixed race. Like many of us. He probably doesn’t realize it but he is in fact our leader. He’s in his early twenties. I guess the mixed race stuff doesn’t matter anymore, but I lived with it for so long that it’s hard for me to let it go. Bob has suffered worse with those prejudices. Many other people besides me. Maybe the world is at that place where all of that stuff can be let go now? I hope so. Candace Loi is a beautiful young woman. Her father is Asian, her mother African American. She has her mothers dark beauty blended with her fathers features. Striking. I enjoy her company. She reminds me of my daughter. I don’t know how she faired in all of this. I suppose we’re all wondering similar things. Tom. Thomas Evans. And, Lydia, Marcia George fill out our party. We are planning to leave here in a few months and head south, or west. The direction isn’t decided only the realization that we need to go. Our thinking is that we should head south. Somewhere warmer. After all, there is no electricity here. And we are living in a cave. It’s not a bad cave, and we’re lucky to have it. Allmost the entire city has been destroyed. The buildings are unsafe to live in. When we leave, we’ll leave all of that behind us. This is who we are. We will, most likely continue to the south. We are currently looking for a Short Wave radio set to tryn to get in touch with others around the world. You, whoever you may be, may be able to reach us where ever we have gone to now. Bob believes in the Nation. That the people will once again live on the earth the way they used to. Bob believes it, and so I believe it. I’ll continue to keep this book up while we’re here and include any useful information we can pass on to you before we go… March 18th Today has certainly been a better day for all of us. Mike, Candace, Tom and some of the others went looking for vehicles today hoping they would find that the ones with electronic brains would be working. Electronic something. Brains I guess. I have no real idea. Give me a database and I could tell you something, but I don’t understand anything at all about engines, except they’re working again. The rest of us stayed back and worked here for the day. We made a few trips around the area. Nell and Lilly went to the Market on State Street and came back with ears of corn that were still good. Bobby and I and Sandy went a little ways down this road to where an old outside restaurant Bob knew about was. They cooked, or grilled food outside in the summer. In the winter I guess they cooked inside. We took all the outside grill pieces to build a grill outside the cave. A big one too. It took a lot of work, several trips back and forth. We found some wheeled carts, probably used to move stuff around inside the restaurant, and wheeled the stuff down to the cave with them. We got everything back and Bobby set it up. Sandy and I collected loose rock from the cliffs and river banks to build the back and the sides to hold the racks. The smoking racks were easier to build the large roof we used was hung over the whole outside grill back at the restaurant. There were long, thin, metal rods to hold it up. Sandy and I worked on that as Bob worked on the sides and back of the grill. We found extra long, metal rods and used those to hang the meat on. Here we were dragging all that stuff around, and Bob talking about going hunting so we could have something to cook on the grill besides corn, when down the road we hear some light tap-click tap-click and the deer showed up just as if the Gods had sent them to us. They saw us about the same time we saw them, and Bobby and Sandy opened up. I don’t think people hunted Deer much in the old days with hand guns, but it was what they had, well, to hand. They each got one. About then the others came back with six new trucks as our old ones dropped into the river during the storms. We spent several hours talking and eating, just enjoying each others company, and then almost everyone turned in. Sandy and I watched the drying racks. I took the first watch anyway, so Sandy’s catching a little sleep as I write this. We are, several of us, planning to leave once the spring is here, and go on our way. We haven’t yet gotten around to talking about how we’ll do that, or where we will go, only that we will go. Bobby and I are very enthusiastic about Sandy. She is all for going back to the Earth, building the people up again. Where there are three of us, there has to be more. I guess that’s the same, nearly, as, where there’s a will, there’s a way. Our people have always had the will. Now we have them way. I truly believe we’ll collect more people as we go. The sky is starry bright. The world seems to be settling down. I’m sorry that all of this had to happen, but I’m happy about where my life is now. March 19th We are going. We have all decided to go. Bob announced our plans for a new Nation of people. They are not all for that… Yet. But I know some will be. We all agreed on April first. Thirteen days. I hope that is not unlucky. We have three more with us from a horrible incident that happened today out at the mall on Arsenal street. A woman was killed and Bob had to kill someone. That is the main reason we are going. Tom even changed his mind about going. He has changed a lot in the last few days. He’s very different than he was when we first met him. We will leave these journals behind us for others to find, I guess. We didn’t really discuss that part of things. We are all nervous about today. There are two more people out there still on the loose that may want to hurt us and they may know where we’re at.. Tom and Mike have posted a double guard until we leave. … APRIL FIRST! March 24th I spent the entire day in fear. Non stop. It almost would’ve been better to have been in the fight yesterday. Instead I was on the sidelines always wondering what was going on. I volunteered to go up top tonight and watch. I spent four hours and saw nothing. Heard nothing. Well, almost nothing. I guess it depends on what your view of nothing is. I saw nothing to do with the men who have attacked us. But, there are packs of wild dogs, or dogs that have gone wild. I don’t guess that would be the same thing. It was dark too. I could hear them but I couldn’t see them well. I suppose they even could’ve been wolves. They came for the bodies. They fought over them It was horrible. I wasn’t sure I could take It., but of course I did. I hadn’t even known there were bodies up there. I mean we would take care of our bodies, why wouldn’t they? But there were bodies. I could see some of them just laying in the moonlight. There were some in the burned out cars and trucks too. I didn’t know those dogs would come for them like that. And I didn’t know you could smell blood like that… When there is so much… I’m no drama queen, I write what I feel. I dealt with it. What else could I do? I find myself dealing with a lot of things lately, and I don’t know how I do it. Even with the Dogs, or wolves… The bodies… I wasn’t as scared as I was today… Down below… Safe (ha ha). It’s not funny except I only meant relatively safe, there is no such thing as really safe. I was more afraid earlier than I was up top because of not knowing. Not seeing… I was with the kids. The little ones. Reassuring them. Still I would’ve rather been in it. I would’ve rather known. This place has gone so bad, and it seems the more we plan the worse it turns out. Maybe we should just leave. But, no one is going to listen to me. I’m not strong willed. I don’t argue my points., I don’t really stick up for myself or my ideas. When I was a girl my uncle Delbert and my aunt Edna would sometimes come over. He was fine except when he drank, and he drank all of the time. Maybe you could say he was fine form those first few hours between smashed and gone. He would run my aunt Edna down. Call her names. In front of everyone, even us children. Sometimes my father would say, “Delbert, you can’t truly mean that,” and he would answer that he did. He did truly mean that; that she was a silly bitch, and, when he was really drunk, a silly cunt. That was what she was and there was nothing else to say about it as far as he was concerned. She had no back bone. Neither do I. And, I have no self confidence either. Bob treats me well, but I wonder, does Bob ever think that way about me? I ask because, I do. Sometimes I pity myself the same way I did Aunt Edna, and I think I’m just a silly bitch. Maybe even the other word… Sometimes. I’m upset. I shouldn’t write when I’m upset. I hope I’m not stuck inside and afraid when anything goes on… It’s probably only a few hours before dawn, I’ll try to sleep… I don’t want to be a silly bitch, but I don’t want to be afraid either… I don’t know if I can sleep. I guess I’ll try… March 25th Finally, we’ve begun. Myself, Robert, Sandy and a new young woman named Susan. We also have the two little ones, Janelle and Brian. I’ve taken care of them. Taken them in. They will go with us when we go, I expect. Sandy had some sort of falling out with Nell. She won’t talk about it, but she’s been upset all of today, and she was upset most of yesterday. She did seem better tonight though, laughing and talking with Susan. I have an idea. Relationships on their own can be difficult, especially now. But, I could be wrong. Maybe it’s only the stress we’re all dealing with. Maybe it’ll be easier now. I am trying hard to keep myself in check too. People seem to expect a lot from me, I know that. I see that. I do everything that I can do. But I never know what is right or what is not. We’re sleeping in a field. Better than a cave? Some think so. Soon a longhouse?

BEGINS BOOK TWO