Said I don’t believe in magic.

Like I don’t believe in love.

You romantic, oh so tragic!

To say I know what you’re made of.

You were smiling at the beginning.

Now, not so much, we don’t agree.

When Charlie Sheen said, he was winning.

When only losing could set him free.

It took some time for that to sink in.

All the truth down that hard road.

To watch the magic of so much thinking.

Now 6 years sober. That love showed.

Have I gone too far? Maybe, not far enough. Am I too critical of the human condition? Should I remove all restrictions and say how I really feel?

Severely critical? Are you seriously considering such a definition in this age of sensitivity?

Questions deserve answers until they don’t.

Is it sometimes better to just keep things to yourself? Rarely.

Definitely.

I used to believe in love. However, that was long ago in the far away land of my youth…

Long before the urban education reared me to reality and the plights of the Savage Selfish.

Is this what my mother tried to protect me from? The true nature of humanity? Don’t worry, Mom. I’m glad I know.

We never really know why we love who we think we love. We just do. I do know it made me crazy for a while. I’m so happy that is finally done. Some have said the greatest pain is to love someone who doesn’t love you OR worse still; they say to love someone who is in love with someone else.

I don’t know about such sorrow. I just know the bliss of solitude and the Savage Selfish.

The tribes have all gathered.

At the license handout store.

We were in for written testing.

Failed bribes screamed at the door.

Stacey had passed reception.

Xi Lee was feeling blessed.

I had found what I came to get.

My final AZ written test.

I see them on the roadways.

Makes me want to go back home.

Or at least get off the freeways.

Where never more to dare to roam.

Was early morning at the laundry.

Like to get there before 8.

Got to go to wash and fold.

Like meditation, contemplate.

He was slumped up in a stupor.

Dead asleep tween wash and dry.

The attendant tried to wake in vain.

I was silent, but I did spy.

If you think your day might be rough.

It’s probably not as rough as his.

To be young and drunk and stupid.

You see, that used to be my biz!

I thought I would make a difference.

Ah! The follies of youth and ideology.

Now I see my irrelevance.

Powerless perpetuity.

I don’t fight this urge to matter anymore.

I have a new urge.

To experience life with total awareness and zero need to influence anyone.

I will just watch and write.

It has come to this.

When you are a child in need, there’s so much confusion, and you understand so little. You are just forced into accepting what falls your way.

I never understood adults or what motivated them. What I perceived to be somewhere between cruelty and not caring.

Now I get it.

Now I see it.

Now I understand. Everybody has their part to play.

When you do everything for someone. Sacrifice your life, time, and resources for them; and then they look at you with that look of disdain like your very presence is offensive. It is hard to take.

Many must just say “fuck it! I don’t give a fuck or a care.”

Maybe this is why I’m sober. Mix this shit with alcohol and all you have left is the intergenerational transmission of family disfunction.

Do all families have secrets? Is it the glue that binds them together? Or the horror to drive us apart?

I used to think that I had all the answers. However, the truth is I have more questions than answers…

I have dealt with the intergenerational transmission of family disfunction from my past, and now we are part of a world that seems confused about their biology…

What I remember most about my wretched childhood was the lack of choice. Eat what you are given or don’t eat. Do what we say you do or go to your room. Accept what is offered or get nothing.

In the current time period, the questions seem to be… “What do you want?”

“You don’t want to be a boy? Then be a girl.”

Have we passed the point where parents can just tell their children what’s on offer? Take it or leave it?

I can’t believe that what I loathed so much is what I now see as the best possible solution.