"When I was 12, I went to sea."

I looked up blankly. "Went to see what?"

"No. The sea. Big blue wet thing. You may know it as an ocean."

"No need for sarcasm." I muttered. "Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why did you go to sea? Especially at 12. Other people go to the zoo. Or to the pictures. Or they go and visit the sea, they do not - unless that's what you mean? I'm going to start telling people I went to sea at 7. I'm sure I did. Probably got sunburnt or almost drowned or got eaten by a jellyfish or set upon by a paticularly vicious group of seagulls - "

He was giving me one of those looks again. That look a lot of people ended up giving me. That 'there is clearly something wrong in your head but I have no idea what it is' look. Well, screw you, this is just how I think, in long...rambling...sentences.

"I was running away. Running away to sea. It was the done thing in those days. Before all of the children ran away to the circus."

"I'd pick the circus. You need sea-legs for the sea. No such thing as circus-legs." I was about to continue on this tangent, but I could see the beginnings of the look again, so I stopped. For now.

"You'd fit in quite well in the circus."

That was probably meant to be some sort of hilarious joke, the kind of joke parents always made, stupid, awful jokes. Ones that could hurt, actually, though if you mentioned that then they wouldn't believe you and you were too sensitive and oh there we were down that 'there is something wrong with you' path again.

Blah blah blah nobody understands me. (Except that they actually don't, and sometimes it keeps me up at night)

"I would take care of the tigers." I announced, turning and leaving the room, wondering where our nearest circus was.