I have a goal to make this fear we all have into a turnaround.

We seem so afraid of facing our own souls.

What good could come from that avoidance?

I enjoy this life and want to spend more time here. Please don’t get me wrong. I just don’t want the dread that comes with what can’t be avoided.

Oh to be blessed with that kind of courage!

Dennis Mantin

I was awake when she said it. “I think you are off the hook.

I felt like I was floating, and so my time was all it took.

And some money and my pain, but I make that everyday.

Today they let me off the hook; at least that’s what they say.

I’m still a little frazzled, my nerves are raw and worn.

I’m not saying I won’t recover but I’m battered bruised and torn.

I’d like to thank the jokers and that Lady in my dreams.

I was dying there of laughter, almost bursting at the seams.

I was wakened with the alarm.Which is rare.

I was deep somewhere else. There were at least 3 others…

2 men that I can’t remember whom, and a beautiful Asian woman in a blue dress.

She had a sister too or a friend…Ah to dream. Got my kid back to school!

Now I know I dream in color.

She is having trouble sleeping.

I know that feeling of frustration .

Lying wide awake pretending

Wishing it was otherwise.

And then finally it happens…

Quiet fading darkness.

She will be tired and difficult to wake.

We all live in this ever changing visible world.

Each of us is burdened with a not so visible individual inner struggle.

This is the abstract.

This expression is art.

This is not a rehearsal.

This is where we have the chance to do something that might be remembered.

This is the stage of the human comedy.

All or nothing.

Never and always.

These are the red flags!

I was in that familiar state where nothing works and I just want to fucking scream! Everything is a mess.

No job.

No woman.

The fucking weather winter cold.

My seemingky endless stuffed up sinuses. This is what really gets me… with every breath.

Every forced stuffed up cold air breath.

Maybe a warmer climate with some palm trees?

The fever left my brainwaves.

On a Sunday in the cold.

The remedy was time and rest.

The group was often told.

I felt so light and fluffy.

Like a time of heaven sent.

Like a spiritual cleansing.

Of the sins I could repent.

The committees had all gathered.

Fear and loathing took the Chair.

I had a dream and walked the beam.

There were Angels in the air.

The sun shone bright in quarantine.

It is Friday throughout the land.

I got these dreams that are buried deep.

Will be no more hand in hand.

I’m still dealing with this memory.

Of the way things used to be.

When I was young and you were here.

And all the good I couldn’t see.

The snow it fell with a vengeance… It was the winter of 22.

With the frozen and the huddled; somehow your thoughts got through.

I tested positive for the Covid, just when work said to return.

Made some plans, to hear God laugh and to feel the fever burn.

They locked me down in Quarantine. The mail it got through.

Said that more bad news is on the way, in the winter of 22.

I fed my kid, I fed myself, I sat down and had a tea.

She is playing mine craft there; and I am writing furiously.

It begins in March 2020 when I lose my job for 5 months. I know I will be months off, so I decide to write a novel. I finish that in September, at the same time I go back to work. Perfect.

Not quite perfect… I get a call telling me that my daughter is being abused by her mother on September 1st and thus begins a process that takes 17 months and all my financial resources and time and energy to get sole custody of my daughter.

At the completion of this noble task I am informed I have tested positive for the virus that began all of this and I am beyond fortunate because it is a little like having a mild cold.

However all being said… I had this conversation with my daughter tonight and explained to her, all that I have written here with the caveat that I would like to take this 5 day quarantine to at least begin my 2nd novel. I do know what I want to write.

CAVENDISH