In the beginning… I saw glimpses of what you might call normal in the living rooms and kitchen tables of schoolyard friends. Those friendships never lasted for me, and in time, they ceased to exist even in memory…

My behavior? I guess it was odd. Angry and loud. Sullen and sad or boisterous and much too much. The invitations dried up and faded fast. “He is strange.” I often heard.

I was tolerated as a boy. Feared in larger shoes. I moved a lot. Shifting. Fading. Reappear like mist in smoke. Spent some time in the shadows there… with  others going nowhere… and found out I didn’t fit there either.

“You are strange.” I was told.

“What is this strange you speak of? I have nothing to compare with, really. I do not know this comparative myth of normalcy.”

In time, I grew quiet and introspective and listened to wise counsel who told me the source of my strange. I was childish, emotionally sensitive, and idealistic… and oh, so angry.

I looked into this; faced my fears, and asked for spiritual help.

Things are so much better, and I am far from normal. Being a bastard has shaped me. I couldn’t be with normal friends. Normal girls wouldn’t date me. They all let me know by rejection that I wasn’t worthy. This is what not having a father creates…

When I was a kid in the 1960s, the farmers could be heard lamenting about a changing world that they feared.

Beautiful stone cobbled streets of small towns were replaced with “The Shopping Mall Generation!” AND cities grew. “Who would grow the food?” The farmers asked.

But did anyone see this coming down the pike? A generation so smart that they make money while they sleep?

A generation who became so important that not having children became for them, the best option. Which is probably the best thing since we can no longer determine genders…

I am not afraid. I am not in control. I am embarrassed… or am I entertained?

You hear often: Sometimes, a tearful exclamation! Other times, it’s an instructive statement…

“Life is not fair.”

Those of you who grew wise in homes with  quiet fluffed pillows are probably most shocked by this truth.

I hear the strained voices and see the upturned hands with the WTF expressions on the faces of those whose idea of an inconvenience is waiting for someone to serve them their food and complain when this doesn’t happen in a timely manner.

It’s not that I wish you mofu’s suffering…  I just wish you a dose of life that’s

” Not Fucking Fair!”

Walked in silence on the snows hard crust. My mind it roamed from wrong to the just. I watched an eagle swing from the sky… The silence was broken with his mighty cry.

He looked so proud. He looked so tough. His freedom, his kingdom. His only musts.

Then, a mighty thrust that shook the air. In seemingly gloom and much despair. His blood fell on his rocks from our of the air… And the silence was broken beyond repair.

No doubt nine times out of 10; Suicide is killing yourself in spite of yourself.

A large gaping mouth set upon this gigantic head… Held up by a tiny neck, unable to swallow those desires…

The horror! The horror!!

Now I have the visual of the narcissistic view. They fear they don’t exist…

It is drama in the kitchen.

Exaggeration on the phone.

Silence in the bedroom.

Until we are all alone.

It is drama all this bitchin.

Humiliation… no atone.

Beauty is just skin deep.

And Ugly goes to the bone.

They were meandering in the walkways.

We were all at City Hall.

All were there for different reasons.

Some, really, for no reasons at all.

I was resigned to fate or fortune.

Masquerades as fail/success.

I had bagged all paper signatures.

I prayed and said, “God bless!”

There’s this memory of Fredrick.

Where he wrote that God is dead.

And all the demons there danced with joy.

Mistaking what he said.

I’ve been watching praying listening.

All these decades turned to years.

And I don’t think he’s dead at all.

The plot is in arrears.

I was told early…

“Not everyone will accept your attempts at Amendment.”

I have had great success in this arena. I can count on the fingers of my hand and have didgets left over to those who have not forgiven me.

I will not dwell here.

I can not. They have the right.

I have decided to live and let live.

Your wounds are deep.

I am truly sorry for harms done.

To not forgive is a burden I don’t wish to carry and wish on none.

An old friend.

Wouldn’t come to the door.

We are strangers now.

It doesn’t matter how I feel.

I feel something more than nothing.

I can survive this rejection.

I am built for less.

We are strangers now.

I am less than forgiveness.

I will move towards the light.

I will not hide.

Until the darkness.

Not all doors are open.

I have to let that go.

I pray for sweet reunion.

For we are strangers now.

I try to write the truth about personal experience and have been shown at times my own delusions, which are an exceptional experience on their own when I come to terms with my own humanity and all the flaws that lie in this…

Our own experiences are all we really know, and I have been blessed with survival and dare I say sanity? Yes, I dare.

The frothy highs and lows have leveled into something more manageable, and the dramas are never really out of reach. There have been educational moments, and teachers come and go: their words resonate.

I am writing a second novel, which is a fictional work based on truths and experiences, and I no longer ponder outcomes. This is a great gift and a new experience. I am ready.