Never Try to Never Die

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I could have been so many things; I could have written an epic or traveled through space. I could have been a painter or a poet, taught philosophy or graduated high school, first in my class. I could have been big and strong and held my head so high; walked the million roads that cross the earth and ran my fingers through the dust of all seven wonders with big blind eyes shining with thoughts of magic and mystery. I could have been a hero—a Superman without the wings; could’ve learned to laugh when I was sad, or trust in love when I was mad.

I could have been a lover and made a heart flutter like a bird trapped and afraid; it would have beaten and banged against its cage, and made her hands quiver and quake. I could have kissed away the pain or written my name is goose flesh across her skin; I could have learned her favorite verse or listened about her day. I could’ve held her hand or kissed her neck, rubbed her back while encouraging her to dream, I could have vanquished her demons and been her everything.

When I was young and my hopes and dreams turned from riches and fame to my next meal and staying out of the rain, I lost sight of the future. No more, did I need to write or read; no more, did I need love or happiness, just a two dollar sandwich and a place to sleep.  Eventually, I traded my self esteem for a coke straw and a habit that cost me an ounce and a half a week; I tic-tic-tic’d away with a razor at big white piles of self hatred on a little three dollar mirror, and every time I saw my eyes, as I leaned over to sniff away another day, they always whispered the truth from their red and manic graves. Until finally, the last of me was walked out of a courtroom and into a cage, where I was taught that what I could have been was what I’d never be. I graduated with honors from the state pen, and took my meals with murderers and thieves, with rapists and dope fiends; there was never a question if that’s where I belonged, those people were what I had become.

I could’ve, I would’ve, I should’ve, but here I sit, growing out instead of up and learning English from alphabet soup in a cup. I’ve said goodbye again and again; whether with razors or pills, or a little bathroom and a long conversation with a sympathetic charcoal grill, but I always opened my eyes. Isn’t it ironic that the very things that are killing me are the same things that have made me strong enough to never die?

 

I Am A Little Confused & A Lot Disappointed

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So, yesterday the state of NC voted to add an amendment to its constitution making marriage clearly defined as solely between a man and a woman. The last numbers I saw had the amendment passing by well over 60%, which, to me, is ridiculous; if it had barely passed I would feel a little better about the state of affairs here in what has become my home. It would seem that while much of the nation is struggling to embrace equality for everyone regardless of their race, sex, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, or any other means with which to discriminate against someone, here we are embracing bigotry and hate. What’s next North Carolina, an amendment trying to redefine the parameters of slavery, or maybe an end to suffrage?

The hate mongers that wrote, introduced, agreed with, and voted for this amendment all say things like, “protecting the sanctity of marriage”, which really confuses the hell out of me. For some reason I don’t see marriage as all that sacred anymore; I mean divorce, which is also prohibited in the bible, by the way, is over 50%, as a national average and climbs a little higher every year. But wait, I have an even bigger point to make here; what about the guy that marries his toaster, or the woman that marries a cat? We see that kind of weird crap all the time and not once has someone stood up and said, “Wait one gosh-dern minute, that thar is a deescrase to the sanctity of marriage.” Where are the morality police when their beloved sacred and holy union is so obviously being made a fool of?

The word “morality” is another thing I hear constantly as an argument for such an amendment to even exist. Again, I am confused, lobbyists buy and sell our congressmen and as though they were trading cards, and not one piece of legislature has passed to stop, or even prohibit, another run of IMMORAL business practices that led to the state of our current economic crisis. All the while we are being told what is right and wrong by these same people? Are not extramarital sex and gluttony also amoral acts according to the bible? What about lying, is that also immoral, Senator?

Why is it okay to ignore these basic moralities and not another, if you truly have a problem with the morality of love of another human being, where is the line that has been drawn in the bible that separates the things we are to follow and the others that are okay now? Just once I would like to find someone that can explain to me the difference.

My absolute favorite argument though, the one that transcends all the others, is the children; the idea being that somehow our children will become gay if they are allowed to believe that it is okay. This has suddenly become a “chicken or the egg” argument? That without homosexuality there would be no homosexuality; could it be, could there somewhere in history be evidence that homosexuality was introduced to the human race, and before that we were all attracted to the opposite sex? Did an alien race expose human children to gay pornography in an attempt to kill off the species? I got news for you Sleepy Head, there has always been homosexuality; it still isn’t widely accepted, but your kids may still be gay, they may still find themselves attracted to the same sex.

All you’re really teaching your children is that you think it is wrong; that they can’t be honest with you about their feelings. They have to hide it, or bury it so deep within themselves that they let it eat at them for years. You’re teaching your kids that it is okay to point and laugh at the effeminate boy in their class, that hate IS acceptable. These children that you love so much are jumping off bridges, and tying their belts around their neck to keep from facing the hatred of their family, or friends, that find it easier to hate them for being different than to accept that they are just that, different. They are dying, and you’re helping them to think it is the only way.

There is no right or wrong love, they are not sick; I can’t say for sure, but I bet if given the choice, at fifteen years old when they were discovering they were different, that they weren’t attracted to the opposite sex, I imagine there are lots of men and women that would chosen to be straight. If for no other reason than to please their family and friends, but there is no choice here, they are who they are, just as you are who you are, and the only real question we should be asking is doesn’t everyone deserve the right to be exactly who they are?

Everyone is entitled to the same rights as everyone else, and we have answered that question again and again. Why must every branch that you perceive in our species, or society, fight anew for rights that everyone else enjoys? The simple truth of it is this: Who you love or do not love only affects me when you start to tell me who I can and cannot love, until then it is only love.

March of the Epilogue

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I hear it even now, over the tik-tik-tak of the keys, as I mumble these words to you. The silky serenade of madness whispering in the walls; I hear my name as it beckons me, stroking my ego and fellating my paranoia. My mind is gently led to bed by the confidant hand of lunacy; tender kisses and soft urgings have wooed me into her arms.

The shower, a forgotten friend, stands dry in the corner as my five o’clock shadow turns to seven day stubble and creeps across my face. I scratch and I dig as my imagination scurries up and down my arms and legs, nibbling my flesh and chanting her name; always half a step faster than my fingernails, it tiptoes away as I pick-pick-pick at its ghost.

There are seven Sundays in every hour but the minutes zip by like black flies chasing the turd truck; days come and go like offended friends as the nicotine stains inch along my fingers. I close my eyes and watch my tiptoes tango across the edge of my desk as I slip a rope around my neck, and even as I shake my head and beg for mercy, I cannot turn away. I wait for the finish, the end of the tale; I watch with wide-eyed fascination as the dance moves closer to my demise, holding my breath so I can hear the snap.

I have settled into my tormented mind and begun to crave the soft kisses of madness, my secret hides behind every smile as I fight the tears that the loneliness craves. Paranoia and psychosis whisper my name in the dead of night, I allow them to hold me close and call me lover; I drift to sleep in the arms of mania and wait for the final act to play itself out. I will wait for the end with clenched teeth and bloodshot eyes, tattered fingernails, and desperate anticipation.

#Scintilla day 10 – Lost Lovers

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We will call her “H”, and I owe her an apology. I was twenty-two years old and on top of the world; I was invincible, had a chip on my shoulder the size of Mount Rushmore and welcomed any and all attempts to knock it loose. She was smart and beautiful, my friends—self proclaimed rednecks— called her a hippie, but she was just smarter than them. She had read a few books, gone to college; she would speak her mind and didn’t think twice about calling them on their back-woods bullshit. She was a couple years older than me and slung beer and liquor at my favorite watering hole a few nights a week.

I had known her for a couple years and we had always been friendly, but had never crossed the invisible line that separates all platonic friendships, and then, one night, as the bar was closing and a group of us were planning to go back to my mother’s house for the late night festivities, I asked her if she wanted to come along and have some drinks with us. Over the next few weeks she would become an ever present fixture at the house in the early morning weekend hours and eventually found her way to my bed, and my arms.

It was easy between us, we laughed a lot; because we had known each other for so long the conversation was already familiar. We had already been ourselves in each other’s company for so long that it almost felt natural to be with each other. Within a few months we had an apartment together and began the process of filling it piece by piece with “our” stuff. Everything may have been perfect, except there was another woman.

She was white and came in a little baggie; at the same time I was trying to build a life with H, I was flirting with that little white slut, and was falling for her as well. I never lied, or kept it a secret; it was just a little harmless flirting after all, a peck on the cheek here, a pat on the ass there, a wink and a smile, a late night taste, just for fun. The next year went just about like you would imagine—if you were trying to write a tragedy—my flirting turned into full fledged lust. I craved her, hungered for her scent, the little tickle she would always put in the back of my throat; there is an eventuality in every love triangle: somebody is always going to end up feeling left out, and in ours that someone was H, for good reason.

I eventually went from using, to selling and abusing; which, in my case, meant that hundreds of dollars a night sniffed into oblivion. H and I almost never went to bed together, our sex life turned into her being wakened by a wide eyed maniac with a stainless steel hard-on, there was but one thing on his mind, and love wasn’t invited, not even to watch.

Even though I was literally blowing almost two grand a week, I still made even more than that; week after week , month after month. The money became un-spendable; we moved into a nicer apartment, had all the toys and trinkets we could stand, ate out whenever we wanted, and I used the money as justification for what I was doing to myself, to us.

One year turned to two, and H asked me what I would say if she asked me to quit; I told her I would get a place of my own if she tried to force me. She never asked me again, but two weeks later she told me she was pregnant. Now it is very important that you pay attention to this next part, because I didn’t laugh and sweep her up into my arms swinging her about in elation, I didn’t smile, I didn’t even look at her. I just said, “What do you want to do?”

“Well, I don’t want it.”She said this with conviction, but there is that little voice in my ear that tells me I could have changed her mind; I could have promised, I could have done any of three million things and she would have folded, I could almost see the creases where she had practiced folding over and over until she was bent nearly in half.

“How much do you need?” That is what I did say. That may be the very worst thing I ever said to anybody, ever.

We talked it over, and a week later she took the day off and went to the doctor, she spent two days on the couch and in that time we didn’t really do a lot of talking. On the second day, I came home from work and she had cleaned the apartment, top to bottom; it was spotless, I took her out to our favorite restaurant and did my best to make her laugh, I even succeeded. We went home that night and I held her for the first time in weeks, we even shut the lights off and went to bed together at a decent hour.

The next day, a friend of mine brought the police to my house to get out of some trouble, I was caught with 167.5 grams of cocaine. Over the next two days I would be arrested twice, and eventually charged with seven felony counts of trafficking and a misdemeanor possession of paraphernalia. She was a trooper through it all, arranged for bail the first day; found me a lawyer on the second and got me released.

The next year was like an amusement park ride that squeaks a little too much and you’re always waiting for the car to plummet to the earth below. We had to move into my mother’s house and spent month after month barely scraping by, while we scrounged every penny we had to pay for my lawyer, it was all we could do to buy a six-pack on Friday and have a couple beers.  If convicted I was facing twenty-five years; my first plea offer was ten, I was 24. I was moody and mean; I could feel the rest of my slipping through my fingers and lashed out at everyone. There were good times too, but I was capable of turning a wonderful night into a nightmare in an instant. H cried more in that year than I had ever seen her cry before, and it was usually from things I had said.

Right before my sentencing—we knew I was going in there to get three years—I told her I didn’t want her to wait, that she should forget about me. She refused, told me that it would be over before we knew it, that she would be there for me as often and as much as she could be, and that when it was over we would go back to our life together, but I had to promise her that I was done with the powder, completely. That I would do everything I could to stay out of trouble so I got out as early as I could and we would be us again. So I promised, and it was settled.

It didn’t take long looking at the world from behind that razor wire to know what I had left behind, there was a hundred and five pound hole in my life and nothing filled it. I started working out every day, quit caffeine and cigarettes, read as much of anything I could find like a hungry bear rifling through a garbage bin. I was going to use my time to work on everything, mind, body, and soul. I wrote her letters that made her ask me who wrote it, or if I copied it from a book. I was going to come out a new man, and make her see that she hadn’t wasted her time on me, but I was too late.

There were visits where I could smell the alcohol seeping from her pores from her drinking the night before. She stopped coming every week, stopped answering the phone when she had always been there before; she started lying about sending me money. Until one morning she answered the phone early and I asked her if she was coming to see me that day and she started crying. I knew right away that there was someone there with her and she wasn’t going to come; she had made it just under sixteen months.

Those were dark days, and I thought a lot about climbing fences in those days, but I never did, I stayed where I was and let the Devil give me what’s mine. I didn’t give up on my dream though; nineteen months later I walked out that gate a chiseled reading machine that was going to go find his woman and show her what he had done, and convince her what he would do next.

I ran into her not long after on my way to work, and asked her if she would talk to me; she agreed and we decided to meet for a drink that afternoon. I spent the whole day planning what I would say; went over it again and again, there was no doubt that she was going to see the new me and forget everything I had ever done to her.

I got to the bar before she did and sat at a table waiting patiently while I nursed a beer; she showed up twenty minutes later with two friends in tow. I didn’t let it slow me down any though and I did my best to tell her everything I had practiced in my mind all day, but they laughed at my words. Her and her friends talked about me as though I wasn’t even there, “He reminds me of So-N-So,” or, “Is he serious?”

She had only come to ask me not to come to her house, to not sneak over there and steal what had been our cat from her. She was finished with me and I could see it in her eyes when they would light up at each new joke at my expense. I eventually got drunk, and stormed out of that bar; I never saw her again, but it didn’t matter because I had my other girl waiting for me. If I no longer had to keep my promises to her not to ever see that little white slut again, I would see her all I wanted. It wasn’t long before I would have her in my arms again; at least she still loved me.

#Scintilla Day 9 – The list of Wonder

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I thought about writing a list of things I hate, but honestly, I don’t think I could come up with 23 examples, so I decided to talk about favorite books instead.

#23) The Walking Dead,  Robert Kirkman—I feel a little silly starting this list with what is essentially a comic book, but I have to say that it has to be the best example of zombie apocalypse fiction I have ever read. If you have never bothered to look at these books, and are a fan of the zombie genre, it is definitely worth the time.

#22) Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser—This is really nothing more than a sociological study of fast food—primarily McDonald’s, because let’s face it they are the king of the fast food world—and its effects on our society. When I first started this book I had to stop and get myself a highlighter to mark the things that I found to be utterly unbelievable, there were more than I could count when I was finished and I ended up using a whole highlighter and had to get a new one to finish the book.

#21) The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins—I found the first book in the series to be completely engrossing. The other two weren’t as good in my opinion but were still good enough to mention, but wouldn’t make my list if they weren’t tied to the first one.

#20) Blaze, Richard Bachman(A.K.A-Stephen King)—This book is about two, or one, depending on how your take of this novel, criminals that kidnap a baby for ransom. They protagonist is a dim-witted orphan who goes by the name Blaze, and as I got to know Blaze and his story, I found myself reliving moments from my childhood. Let me just say that Blaze and I could have been brothers, were he not fictional.

#19) Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett—I was given this book by a cousin of mine late one night, and to be perfectly honest I had little hope I would like it. Hell, I was almost certain I wouldn’t even read it, but I did, and I loved it.

#18) 20th Century Ghosts, Joe Hill—This book is a collection of short fiction, and inside of it is a story named Pop Art, which is my favorite piece of short fiction I have ever read. It is quirky and weird, touching and well told. It is excellent in so many ways. The rest of the stories are pretty good as well, but to not mention Pop Art here would be a mistake.

#17) Morality, Stephen King—This too is a piece of short fiction—I must say his short stories is just one small reason I have always been a huge fan of King. No other author has ever successfully marketed his short stories the way he has, and for good reason. This story is about a couple that is struggling with money and is presented with a way to make some quick cash, but in order to do so they must cross a line that not everyone would.

#16) Ishmael, Daniel Quinn—A talking gorilla teaches a man the finer points of living in harmony with the world, and he does it in a way that everyone can understand it. There are a few flaws in his philosophy, but all in all this book will make you think.

#15) Notes of a Dirty Old Man, Charles Bukowski—Famous for his poetry, this is a collection of stories from the admitted dirty old man himself. Bukowski tells many stories that are so horrifying and I-can’t-turn-away-from-this-nightmare in nature, and you may never know if they are true or simply semi-autobiographical, but there is bare knuckle honesty in his words and for that it makes this list.

#14) Cat’s Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut—Almost anything by this man is worth reading, this is my favorite of the one’s I have read but I could list several here that wouldn’t be out of place on this list.

#13) Naked, David Sedaris—This is the first and only novel I have read by Sedaris, but I found it funny and more than a little frightening in its honesty. I plan to read more of him in the near future.

#12) Villa Incognito, Tom Robbins—Robbins is one of my favorite authors and his name will appear on this list again, but this book captures his satirical humor and around-your-ass-to-get-to-your-elbow way of telling a story. I find him to be hilarious and a master of a metaphor.

#11) To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee—I know that this book will make many of your lists as well so I won’t go into much detail about it, but I have to thank 9th grade English for making me read this book.

#10) On Writing, Stephen King—I have read only two different books about the craft and this one was by far the best. It is a memoir, and reads more like a novel and less like a textbook than you might imagine. I would recommend it to anyone that dreams of writing in one fashion or another.

#9) Mine, Robert R. McCammon—I read this book as a teenager and have read later novels by the same author in recent months and found them less than appealing, I have plans to go back and reread this book to see if I still find it as engrossing as I did years ago, but it lives in my memory as a true thriller in every sense of the word. It is about a psychopathic woman that steals an infant from the hospital and the ensuing man hunt to get it back, an edge of your seat page turner.

#8) The Dark Tower, Stephen King—This is just one title from the seven book series by King, and honestly I can’t say it is my favorite of the series, but I can’t pick a favorite. They are all wonderful so in order to keep from listing them all separately, or trying to pick just one, I list them all under the title of the series itself. If you have not read them, and are a fan of Sci-fi-fantasy, they will not disappoint.

#7) Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates, Tom Robbins—The protagonist in this novel—he goes by the name Switters—is probably my favorite literary character of all time. He is funny and flawed, hell bent on sex with his sixteen year old step-sister, and spends 4/5ths of the book in a wheel chair, even though he can walk, because a witch doctor tells him that his feet can never touch the ground again. A great read.

#6) Aztec, Gary Jennings—Historical fiction can be a hard sell for me, if there isn’t enough actual history involved then I lose interest quickly, who wants to read a textbook on history after all? This book is a well told and interesting look at the whole of Central and South American Indian tribes. Their beliefs, their rituals, their true nature, they were not the blood thirsty heathens many people think they were—way more so than the Spaniards that eventually conquer them—I would say.

#5) 11/22/63, Stephen King—Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Read it today, seriously.

#4) Danny, The Champion of the World, Roald Dahl—I fell in love with Dahl in fourth grade and read everything I could find by him like it was my life’s goal. This was my favorite of the group, and I will never forget the days spent in his worlds.

#3) Gerald’s Game, Stephen King—There are many moments in this novel where the words “Holy Shit!” are apt and warranted.  A woman, alone and naked, handcuffed to a bed and her desperate attempts to free herself.

#2) The Bachman Books, Richard Bachman(A.K.A-Stephen King)—A collection of short novels that changed my life. I was in sixth grade when I was introduced to this book by a teacher; I was given the book for Christmas that year and have never looked back. Each of them holds fond memories and many a night spent reading with a flashlight until I could hold my eyes open no longer.

#1) IT, Stephen King—I have read this book three times and it never disappoints. It always scares me, makes me laugh, and reminds me that there are few things that are as powerful as true friendship and love. I will read it again soon, and will not skip a word when I do so.

There are probably some books that I am forgetting here, and the order of the list is as close as I could come to giving them a true number value, but the idea is still the same. I love them all and hope that you might find something here that you haven’t read and will love as much as I do.