Days have passed, we found more clothes, not much food though. The only water we've had for the past few days was the rain water,but who knows if it was contaminated or not. It's not like we care anymore though, it's been almost a year and still no promised land. I try to keep the children calm, I just keep saying we are almost there. I think they stopped believing me, they were the only hope left, the only people who kept believing. Not anymore, I’m close to giving up, I’m close to breaking.

3 more, 3 more of our group have died. Erica, Cara, and Grant that brings the total to 13 loses. Erica was 14, my age, the raiders got her. Cara died peacefully, 63, many were glad, they said she was just slowing us down. I liked her though, she reminded me of my mom. Grant wasn’t even a year old. His mom died, contamination, that was when Grant was only 3 months. I was there when she died, she told me Grant would make it, that he had to make it. I could only nod when she said that, of course I didn’t believe it. I don’t understand why she would want Grant to grow up in this world, there's no way any of us will survive anyway.

We need a new map. Ours was stolen by raiders, 6 in our group were left behind.

We found a new girl, my age. She was cuddled up next to her mom, she was dead. At least we assume that she was her mom, she hasn't said anything since we found her. She’s “lucky”, the raiders were right behind us, I wonder if we should have let her die, let the raiders end her misery. Although a death by raiders is worse than living in this world.

A week has passed, we learned the new girl’s name, Eve. She’s actually cool, a little quiet, but that could come in handy. She’s a scout, just like me, we go ahead of the group and see if it’s safe to move on. I wanted this, I want to be the first to see the promised land, or the first to die. I don’t want to watch everyone else die. Maybe I should just drink some contaminated water, end it quickly.

We are happy, we saw a flower, it might not be much but that means the sun is here. We set up camp to see it, nothing yet. The children's spirits are lifted though, it makes everyone happy. It's funny how things we used to never pay attention to are now uplifting. Our motivation has returned.

Today Cal was born, he’s my mom’s best friends son. Sadly his mom didn’t make it, at least he won't be sad, at least he didn’t watch her die. Since he has no relatives I’m his caregiver. I used to take care of my little brother, I'll just keep hope that he survives. I will walk 1000 more miles if it means Cal could survive.

I think I need to leave the group. We are making no progress, I swear we are going in circles. At this rate we will never find the promised land. I bet if I took Cal we could run away from the group and find the promised land ourselves. I have to do this, for Cal’s future. I will grab supplies tonight, maybe Eve will come with us.

It worked, we are all out. Of course Eve joined us, she said that she had nothing to lose anyway. I know we will find the promised land now. We are for once hopeful, that has not happened in so long, It feels good. Maybe we will survive after all.

Cal had his first smile today, I think it was because we saw a sunset. It was still dark but the light shined through, that must be a good sign.

We found grass today. At first we thought it was contaminated, but then we remembered that grass was green. It’s weird to forget the once normal things in our lives. At night, Eve told me who she was before the disaster, apparently she had 6 other siblings, I could barely deal with one.

Cal woke up in the middle of the night. Eve and I shushed him, we don’t want to alert anyone especially the raiders. Cal is 2 months now.

It’s been 3 months, Cal is crawling now. Eve woke me up one morning and said Cal was gone. We saw the shelter door open, Cal was outside. He was playing in the Grass, we ran over to him and scolded him for leaving. We later said we were proud of him for crawling. We’ve set up camp in the same place for a month, maybe the raiders don’t know where we are. Though it can’t be long.

We moved, Cal did not like that. I think we are getting closer to the promised land.

We found it, we made it to the promised land. I was skeptical and thought this was just a trick by the raiders, then I realized the raiders are too dumb for this.

Another month, the buildings here are huge, they remind me of home before the disaster. The people in the promised land gave us an apartment. It’s small but it will do, for some reason they want to read my logs.

I think we will be fine, there are many children here. The people wanted to take Cal to relieve me of him since I’m still young. I told them that if they tried then I would personally bring the raiders here myself. They did not find that funny, but at least Cal will be staying with me.

It’s been 3 years, Cal is almost 4. None of the others have come to the promised land, I think they are still lost. I still miss them, I hope the raiders didn’t get to them. Cal is very wild, he gets along with the other kids. Leaving the group was the best decision I've ever made. I just have to keep telling myself it was for Cal, so he could survive. I wish my mom could see how much I've grown. I will not make another log, my life is normal now, my main focus is on raising Cal. Maybe we will find the others one day, I still think of them as family. I know that Cal will too, when he is older I will tell him stories of the disaster.I will tell him how we survived, and I will tell him about the nights that I was huddled with in the rain.