A Lady on the Bus
So this is not a work of fiction. It's the true life story of a person I met and the experience I had with her. I'm sharing this so that you can keep this lady in your prayers, as she is struggling. She is a beautiful, amazing soul. But she needs the protection of whatever divinity is out there.
So I was on the bus today, going home from school. As I got on the bus, I noticed a lady who looked like she was sleeping on her seat. No big deal, people get cozy on the bus sometimes, they even close their eyes sometimes, it doesn't necessarily mean they're actually asleep. So I just stand near the back which is where people go if all the seats are occupied.
But eventually the bus stops at a bus stop and I notice a police car stopped in front of us. The driver gets out of the bus and talks to the police. Then a police officer comes and he starts talking to the lady who was resting. Now, I have been the victim of police brutality before. I know wha it's like. This woman is visibly BIPOC, and she looks to be either Latina or Indigenous. She looks poor. She could be having a mental health crisis. I know what police do to people like her. I'm not about to let her get murdered or beaten up or something. So I start filming. I don't say anything, I just take out my phone and start filming.
I know we're on a bus and beside a busy road, so if there is any maltreatment, people will see. But I also know that there are many cases where people got killed on or by a busy road. I've watched a video of a mentally ill man getting gunned down by the police even though he was just standing with his hands up, and this happened right by a busy road full of cars. If anything happens, having video evidence of it will back up and lend credibility to eyewitness accounts. If anything happens, having video evidence of it will make more people believe the truth.
So I film, from a few meters away. The police officer asks her if she has a ticket for the bus. She says no. He demands that she get out of the bus. She refuses at first. But he threatens to take her out by force. Now I will mention that she looks extremely tired and groggy and she doesn't seem to be thinking rationally. The police officer threatens to arrest her, so she gets off the bus. The cop follows her, and I follow the cop, still filming. Outside, the cop threatens to arrest the girl, and asks for her information. He notices me filming and asks if he can help me. I say no, and that I'm just making sure.
The lady seems completely delirious. She can only answer yes or no, and her voice sounds incredibly distressed and emotional. The police officer eventually gets into his car and drives away. And I stop filming but I stay with the lady. She's sitting on a bench and I sit beside her. I ask her if she has any friends or family she can go to. She can't answer my questions in full sentences and just says no in a very panicked voice. I ask her if she wants to go to a homeless shelter, and she says no. I have to talk to her and repeat the same question four or five times to get an answer. The police officer had previously had to ask the same question many times to get an answer as well.
I know I can't leave her like this. She's completely out of it and if she's outside by herself by the time night rolls around, then she might get kidnapped. I've seen too many missing posters around my city, and read too many articles about the MMIGW2S crisis. Not to mention, she doesn't have any warm clothes, she only has a cotton t shirt and slacks, and the nights are very cold where I live. She could straight up die of pneumonia or something if she doesn't find shelter before the night. So I decide to call a homeless shelter anyways and explain my situation. They tell me to call a number and there will be a crisis response team who will come.
So the crisis response team is not part of the police. They don't have weapons. They're social workers who use deescalation tactics and stuff.
So I call the number for the crisis response team. And at this point she's lying down on the bench at the bus stand and I'm sitting on the ground next to her. Which is okay, since she's really tired and I'm not. I get put on hold on the phone, and I stay put on hold for like half an hour. So I'm just sitting here, keeping an eye on the lady, waiting to be connected on the phone to someone I can talk to. And it's pretty tense, but thank the gods the weather is good.
Eventually the call does get through. The lady on the other side of the phone line asks what happened and where I am. So I explain my situation to her. She says she'll send a crisis response team, but they'll take at least half an hour to get there. So that's okay I guess. So I stay with the distressed lady. I don't try to talk to her. I just let her rest. The gods know that she needs her rest. I just want to make sure she doesn't end up kidnapped or the victim of police brutality or a suicide victim or something. I want her to rest in a soft, clean bed inside instead of having to sleep on a hard metal bench outside. But for the time being I just let her rest.
So eventually the crisis support team gets here. They have a car, and they are two ladies. They're really nice. They ask her questions, and she is finally able to talk in full sentences, instead of only saying yes or no. This is a good thing. But the answers she gives still don't make sense. When the crisis response ladies ask her if she's staying with anyone, she says that she's staying with family. But when they ask if she knows the phone numbers of any family members, she replies that she doesn't have any family. When they ask her how she got to where she is now, she replies that she walked. Which I know is not true since I was on the bus with her and I got off said bus with her.
She keeps insisting that she needs to go back to where she was staying, she wants them to take her to where she was staying. She keeps begging to have help so she can go back. But when the ladies ask her what address she needs to go back to, she says she doesn't know. When they ask her if she has anyone's phone number that she could call, she responds that she doesn't know any phone numbers. She sounds incredibly distressed this whole time.
Eventually she says that she was trying to get to a bank, and so they ask her if she might be able to lead them to where she's staying if they start from the bank she was trying to get to. She says that maybe she can. She gets in the car with them and the three ladies drive off. So after this, I stay at the bus stop and I take the next bus home.
So I have no idea what happened to her beyond that. But I do trust the lady at the homeless shelter call line who told me to call the crisis response team. And I do trust the crisis response team because they're not cops, and they're very gentle and kind.
I sincerely hope that she gets the help that she needs and that she enters into a better mental state. I hope she gets back to her home and that she can be safe and comfortable. I hope she receives healthcare and mental healthcare because she clearly needs both. This is coming from someone who clearly needed both at one point too. I was extremely undernourished and suicidal once and going to the hospital kept me from dying. I hope that she gets the help that she needs. I hope that so much with all of my heart.
I am keeping her in my prayers, and I would really appreciate it if you guys could pray for her as well. I hope she can have the blessings of all the gods. I believe in the power of prayer and I believe in the power of love. I believe in the power of kindness, compassion, humility, empathy, and dignity. If you could all pray for her, it would mean an immense amount to me and I would be very grateful.
Surfeit sans sic-squalid spoiled sundered smorgasbord squandered serenity
Let me preface this synopsis of self with a poetic epistle (hopefully such reasonably nonrhyming license acceptable videre licet, this non-friction category) before delving into the heart of this bipedal hominid, the apotheosis sans earth, wind and fire depleting air supply and whip lashing the apathy annihilating will to live, thus forever suspending me as still thirteen and thirsting to taste and touch a youth untouched by fiery passion – so:
Despite three score
plus five birthdays elapsed
since exiting the birth canal
uber cataclysmic neurological
eruption would parlay
with forces of destruction
pell mell to rent asunder
psyche, an internal maelstrom
wrenched self worthiness -
pitting mine mien as blunder
bulldozing with razorblades
former childhood's end
wondrous glee raising suicide
quiet riotous ambition, a painfully slow
(self starvation) mine inexorable ride,
which chronological frieze kept hog-tied
and hide bound this one grown male
dredging haunting spectre – where
to be gratefully dead – within Elysian dale
youngest of me two female progeny
segued emotionally troublesome
twenty plus five year old
today April twenty fifth
two thousand twenty four,
cuz these lovely bones
triggered flashback to wretched tears
sans insidious roiling
jagged stone shredding/
thwarting desire to lyft motive to be alive
shockwaves extant to this day -
no matter long since
recovered from nose-dive
dog gone emotional, psychological
and social repercussions
hound me present mental state
indelible permanent scars
(per anxiety, herky jerky,
hokey pokey, panicky,
quirky tic) seem never to abate
try as I might to shake free
from the riptide affects
that drowned this boy to grow
he experiences an especially
perilous remembrance
of things past regarding
abysmal infernal woe
when thee second punim
o thine two lovely offspring
passed that milestone age
with nary a hint how her papa felt
life locked up within
his abysmal agonizing stage
impossible to forgive permanent harm
inflicted not only on self but searing pain
my late mother and
then living octogenarian father
whose angst this dada insight re: did gain
from bringing forth progeny,
which years eclipsed
at break neck speed,
whereby each special daughter
evincing greater sturdiness
akin to hardy weed
bound to surpass their dear ole dad
permanently branded with ghost
of Christmases past for never knowing
thee potential that burned black toast
and hunger pains even to this day frequently
blithely ignored as if still callous
tempted, lured and baited by hand of death
this grown man wished inxs to kiss.
Social anxiety (incorporating the alphabet soup of physiological symptoms i.e. clammy palms, heart palpitation, nausea, vertigo, et cetera) erupted to rent my psyche asunder and forcefully endearing themselves to my being (like dasher, dancer, Prancer, vixen, comet, cupid, dinner and Blitzen) with most every visit to college cafeterias, (an unpleasant effect explaining termination from the umpteen universities i matriculated), especially when hungry hordes (like madding crowds swelling the sea of Muslims practically stampeding their way en route the Hajj) clamored to be fed sustenance or spiritual succor respectively.
Never did this liberal minded scrivener get trampled underfoot, but he experienced physical manifestations entailing great discomfort probably on par with any devout pilgrimage to the holy shrine of Mecca.
Within the labyrinth of this mortal being i.e. christened matthew scott harris, hid unseen live, googly-eyed, earth-linked, mailer daemons that resounded with a quiet riot chorus of their unheard yahoo kindling the trip wire of damned perspiration, laceration (stinging tips of metallic whips and chains) induced hallucination prodding sphincter muscle to go into overdrive vis a vis via defecation, (irritable bowel ran rampant) creating one wreck of a human abomination kept in check from any unsuspecting observer.
This general figurative broad-brush stroke pertaining to the collective soul wrenching episodes does an injustice to panic attacks.
Best for me to winnow thru the quagmire of countless instances to evoke emotional explosion in an effort to engender comprehension, fixation, interrogation (pardon the hyperbolic exaggeration fueling this assay wantonly craving super) layman preservation, than zeroing in on a singular instance.
Little effort required for me to dial back mental chronology and pluck one generic panic attach festooned with the usual attendant coterie of kindling internal microscopic killing machinations swaggering like hotmail fresh off the field of a winning team.
Meal times at college (particularly with the madding crowd of voraciously famished coed undergraduates), the most frequent settings outbursts generated feverishly essentially annihilating any ambition to enjoy a normal peaceful repast (to satiate hunger), the most common environment envision a generic college cafeteria.
About twenty years ago (two decades spanning mine some total of fifty six birthdays plodding through the pernicious plots per me world wide web) represents the most recent non-voluntary foray into the field of dreaded descent into the domain of all out internal combustion, whereby attrition into no mans land of wretched undulating spasms quaking ole matthew knocked immunization generally enjoyed clinging assiduously to hibernation, meditation, self actualization as self sedation.
Eyelids now temporarily closed to re-envision the nada so salient salad days whence the feeding time instantaneously transformed into frantic frenzy at Kutztown university. While most all other student feasted on the ordinary industrial chow, i felt the grippe ketchup and override excruciating hunger. Adrenaline coursed thru this measly dry mouthed body (starving to savor the institutional haute cuisine.
No sooner did this then rather bony gluteus maximus became situated at the table (often whereby a quick exit could be made in the predictable panic stricken outcome that pierced and hammered me with gut wrenching agony), the medley of organic constriction of throat re: named near asphyxiation, furious pounding of ma poor heart churning out hormonal secretion sans flight or fight, strong sensation sans regurgitation (despite the likelihood my bowels recently purged per diarrhea courtesy of irritable gastrointestinal stress), disallowed even one morsel to appease thine palette.
Much as waste not want not the coda, ethos, general integrity keeping afloat my dogma, that credo went out the window (with or without the baby and bathwater – plugged pulled so no infant drowned, nor any other animal harmed in the making of this mindful video), the tray of uneaten food left for an employee to discard.
Complete discombobulating disorientation (in tandem with the tried and true trademark tell tale signs of tumultuous ferocious fracas re: Tony the tiger witnessed personal pandemonium, which violent trigger, nonetheless did offer a scant few minutes to gather peanut butter and jelly sandwiched haphazardly slap dashed together, whereby to escape this jam.
Cumulative episodes whence tumultuous shell shocked warring faction repeatedly played itself and affecting escape from this perilous perdition.
The shoals of home (which appeared sweeter than ever) specifically sighted when sitting with pangs of stomach churning aches to eat instead delivered a sentence whereby this anguished author felt himself severely lashed and slavishly held within thine fragile self witnessed withdrawal from campus life (for the umpteenth time) and hence avoidance became the coping mechanism.
Fast forward to the present. Now a cornucopia of pharmaceutical medications keep in check (akin to a mate) and put a lid on susceptibility toward chaotic sensation run amok.
This collective soul (whose esprit de corps rose from thine Heiress house of the rising sun) in fits and starts finally seems closer to psychological nirvana.
Now, now longer does a led zeppelin manacle this Renaissance man from the culture club. He scales the Ashbury heights of ecstasy via pharmacological panacea. He feels indomitable emotional strength to haul in the oats of a misspent youth.
Accidental infringement on other’s sensitivities
I acknowledge gratitude at your acceptance that an artist's creation loses punch if forced to modify his/her creation, whether that constitutes a poem, piece of music, painting, et cetera unless the literary, lyrical, brush stroke, et cetera endeavor violates infringement on other's sensitivities.
Gratitude at communiqué enlightening me how I unintentionally, unquestionably, and unwittingly impacted your steadfast ideological bedrock geology courtesy mine igneous poetic posting(s).
impossible mission to gauge whenever your sensitivities ruffled, cuz blatant, crass, damnable, execrable... meanness absent within me when attempting to express emotions, ideas, opinions, et cetera, and share with others sense and sensibility without pride nor prejudice my perception, which admission invites the notion regarding accidentally, inadvertently, unknowingly, et cetera trespassing and violating the virtual boundaries of another minus of course blatant hate speech, which yours truly (me) abhors.
puzzlement thus arises when written endeavors (mine) finds a reader (especially the administrator/facilitator of website) who gets cross and tetchy when their sacred tenets, precepts, beliefs, et cetera infringed upon prompting me to contemplate how does one exercise freedom of communication cultivating mutual (of omaha - ha) understanding.
one or many people no doubt take objection when perusing stances on various matters I espouse, particularly propensity against or in favor of controversial issue such as politics. rules and regulations rather ambiguous linkedin to verboten matters. rather than modify the heft of some self satisfactory scribbled specimen, I opt to find a more receptive party.
As a former country bumpkin (boot yours truly - me ain't no city slicker), I awkwardly, ineptly, and submissively fumbled thru life..., whereat purposefulness rarely gained traction as das scribe sets forth when orbitz around Earth just a fraction of three score plus five years.
Fatherhood (half my life time ago) bolstered reasonable rhyme manifesting itself before these myopic bespectacled eyes.
Infancy, babyhood, and childhood evidenced, noticed, and witnessed adequate basic provisions, and no shortage of food engendered dynamic cohesion allowed, enabled, and provided "mama's boy" imbued, and attempted to compensate being socially withdrawn posting and answering personal classified advertisements, (while marital vows long since pledged), now in hindsight such risqué communiqués juvenile and lewd sense and sensibility of healthy emotional, mental and physical natural maturation social withdrawal did occlude invariably classmates found lack of responsiveness rude.
Additionally, yours truly never field tested self reliance skill sets, but rather overstayed his welcome livingsocial with parents at 324 Level Road, whose patience he sorely tested ofttimes giving rise since hashtagged as dad's infamous midnight lectures heavily referencing laced expletives, which vituperative ultimatums extemporaneously delivered courtesy paternal linkedin progenitor of mine when the doomsday clock struck twelve allowing, enabling, providing standing room only promising colorful denunciatory epithets assaulting, cannonading, firing... exploding character assassination verbal thermonuclear bombs squarely lobbed at unemployed sole son, his/him offspring afflicted then (three plus decades ago and now) with debilitating anxiety/ social panic, palmar hyperhidrosis, body dysmorphia, and irritable bowel for starters.
I (a rather meek as a mouse individual) stood still as a statue silently weathering such blistering, calumniating, excoriating, fulminating, haranguing, infuriating, et cetera brickbats upon a rather docile doodler with words, who essentially internalized torturous barrage vacuous warnings to shape up or ship out, which mother and father dearest doled out their version of abusive traumatic boot camp survival mode qualified as invisible contusions, fractures, infarctions, lesions, obstructions and ruinations upon psyche.
Less so these days than during mine half life ago throbbing sentimental pangs triggered nostalgic memories of yesteryear (amusing, kibitizing, playfully ribbing older and younger sister), before mine emotionally, mentally, socially, et cetera fraught days of yore spilt presentiment witnessed tinged blood weathering sucker punched blows that wrought battle fatigued figurative war weary civilian.
He (yours truly) doth presently ramble, scrabble, and trundle across gutted landscape strewn with psychological potsherds.
Oppressive alienation hashtags me as outcast, where new born babes technical abilities surpassed scant infantile savviness (mine) spurring notion, whereby yours truly lived ages ago, when pedestrian pace of life (again mine) sedate compared and contrasted with present.
Impossible mission to side step cratered pock marked cerebral terrain punctuating terra incognita courtesy disequilibrium severely disrupting ability to function, especially distractions issued out radio waves regarding same Christmas songs playing every hour during holidays.
I can't shake loose being metaphorically entangled cumulative detritus analogous geologic,
chronologic, and audiologic tracks laid down since conception wrought indelible grooves within noggin.
Risk averse demeanor kept me hermetically sealed against positive growth experiences and (bully me) not sequestered nor singled out as token scapegoat, whereby (wherein) psyche
relentlessly, quintessentially, and painfully assaulted.
I too unwittingly, guiltily, approvingly and willingly allowed, enabled, and provided unrepentant thugs to unleash rocketing brickbats sticks and stones (also Daily family hurled heavy objects at Georgie, a Boxer/Dalmatian mix breed), when our family Audubon, Pennsylvania.
Nevertheless, despite experiencing horrendous childhood grievances, I revere boyhood good times a painfully shy, (albeit rather socially withdrawn) kid with a severe nasal twang courtesy submucous cleft palate, nevertheless oblivious to danger fields safely and securely affixed to mother's apron strings.
Yepper, yours truly a bonafide mama's boy severing figurative umbilical cord I could not deploy even now as an aging baby boomer, viz yule eyes long hair pencil necked geek,
I still experience social anxiety, when feigning hobnobbing amidst hoi polloi.
Now at an advanced crotchety age namely lxv Earth orbitz rome'n around the nearest star, yours truly revisits poignant episodes foisting, launching, snapchatting one after another crisis sidelining ability to cope pursuing life, liberty and pursuit of happiness whiz hard by at light speed.
Though just a snot nosed kid during third industrial revolution, I remember feeling lost in space (age) and agog at being on the cusp, when infrastructure (regarding blueprint describing information superhighway, technological/computer transformation would when soon after graduating Methacton high school (mine alma mater) quickly usher The Fourth Industrial Revolution a way of describing the blurring of boundaries between the physical, digital, and biological worlds, a fusion of advances in artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, the Internet of Things (IoT), 3D printing, genetic engineering, quantum computing, and other technologies constituting Meta sphere.
The Red Carpet
Central Park smells better in the fall. That doesn't say too much, but if you've ever had the displeasure of taking a walk through in the heat of summer, you'd know what I mean. It smells like dirt, rot, and earth. I feel uncomfortable watching her undress bit by bit. I have trouble not being unnerved by the leaves I step on as I trample her youth and virility bit by bit. Soon she'll die.
A glance around the park shows the birds, the people, the animals, and insects that enjoy what she offers. The shade, the fields, the flowers, the walkways, and the water-features. Sometimes I wonder if Shel Silverstein walked the same path I do. Did he try to pick around the yellow and orange leaves plastered to the asphalt?
Too often, I hear people speak about phases of life like the changing of the seasons. If this is it, I don't want it. She buds every spring like a little baby. She opens her eyes and learns and grows. She sprouts into a full woman. Fertile with life of every species, she offers everything to them. We don't even thank her.
We marvel at the colors in the fall. They are the last markers of her beauty. Some travel a hundred miles to catch the foliage. But she's dying. We all sigh and simply wait for the birth of a new year, a new season. Will next year bless us more? We don't even thank her. Have we ever thanked her? Rather, we toss silver cans in her bushes and cigarette butts on her trails.
When the leaves drop and turn brown, we wait and wait and wait for spring. What about the old crone that waits, gnarled and bare? Some admire her pretty white hair on the tree branches and bushes, but we simply wait for her to die, so we may enjoy her daughter's benefits.
She gives, and gives, and gives. We take, and take, and take. When there is nothing left, we sit back and wait until she's dead. Then, we may enjoy ourselves once more. For what is fall but the reminder that she's dying and with patience, we may help ourselves to her fruits.
Central Park is abuzz with activity. People take photos of the leaves. The birds perch in the branches. The path is covered and I have no choice but to walk the red carpet that fall has laid out.
Grandpa
The truth is often said in jest. That little slice of wisdom come from HG Welles at the end of War of The Worlds!
I recall the night I was telling my visiting grandparents a story from my Boy Scout trip. It was a campfire tell and how much of it is fact I don't know. Anyways, each time I tried to tell it my grandpa would interupt wanting more details: what was his skin color, did he have a gold tooth, things like that.
He was of course doing this to mess with me. But now that I weave a tale now and then I understand how those little details my grandpa demanded to know make the difference.
He Ain’t Heavy He’s My Brother
by Wilkinson Riling
There is a quote from French dramatist Jean Baptiste Legouve, "A brother is a friend given by nature." I can say from experience, nature went out of her way to provide to me the best friend, the best brother, a person can have. It would be years later when cruel fate would override that process of natural selection with the indifference of a random accident.
We were two years apart, my brother Richard and I, but I can tell you we had a deep connection I've heard only exists among twins. Physically, for all the similarities, there were significant differences. Richard was taller, I was leaner. Richard was muscular, where I was slight. Richard was left handed, I was right. Richard was outgoing and personable, I leaned towards being introverted. The one trait we both possessed was we could look at each other and know in that instant what the other was thinking. With just a glance we could detect in one another our thoughts, mood, veracity, anxiety, needs and most of all humor. That was the one super power he had over me. He could make me laugh anytime he wanted, and often did.
When we were kids we had a basement my Dad had refurbished with a tile floor, drop ceiling and wood paneling. Pop even put a TV in the back wall when the first remote controls came out. The basement was a man cave long before they were ever known as man caves. Speaking of caves, when you closed the main door and covered up the basement window, it was black as pitch in the cellar.
The neighborhood kids would come over to play a game of "Tag in the Dark." The person who was "It" would step out of the room and count while everyone scurried for hiding places. That person, after reaching "ten Mississippi," would turn off the light, enter and have to search in the darkness to find the next person to be "It."
My brother never bothered searching for anyone else, he just would start calling out my name in a funny voice and wait to hear my stifling giggles. I tried so hard not to laugh one time, I wet my pants. So, when he tagged me and the lights came up, I was not only "It," I was pissed, because he made me the focal point of much childhood derision. But I knew then as I know now, all's far in a game of "Tag in the Dark."
My brother had a softer side to him as well. When we were kids we shared a room and a bed. Around Christmas time we both liked having a back scratch. When we gave each other a back scratch there was always an argument who went first. Because if you were the first scratcher, then you, as the scratchee, could fall asleep after. Without a clock we had to figure out how to time the length of the back scratch. So, we used the Christmas standard, "Silent Night." The back scratch would last only as long as the first two stanzas of the carol. Richard always got to give me a back scratch first, leaving me half asleep to finish up. I still remember my seven-year-old voice cracking on the high notes of the lyrics encouraging one to sleep in heavenly peace and finishing with my brother asleep in what could only be described as such.
I smoked my first cigarette with my brother. I was around ten. We would go behind our garage along with my brother's friend Scotty. We took turns puffing and try not to cough on a Winston cigarette Scott stole from his mother. Our garage was backed up against a small hill that divided our block from the street behind us. This hill gave us easy access to the garage roof where we would practice our delinquency. On this particular day, we were racing to climb up to the garage roof. Scott and I took the well travelled back route.
My brother had a better idea. My father had left a ladder out, unbeknownst to us, Richard set it up in front of the garage and started to climb. Scott and I arrived on back of the roof just as Richard's arms came over the opposite end of the garage followed by his grinning face. He had that smile on his face thinking he surprised us with his ingenuity. It took less than a second for that smile to be replaced by a look of fear and regret. The ladder slipped out from under him and he disappeared from view. I don't remember hearing him scream, I do remember the sound of crashing glass.
Scott and I ran up to the edge of the roof and looked down. The image is burned into my brain like a color daguerreotype. The edges may be faded, but all the consequential parts clear and visible. Richard lay splayed on his stomach perpendicular to the fallen ladder and surrounded by shards of glass from a broken window. He was wearing short pants. His left leg was cut open at the calf with a four inch wide vertical tear that ran from just below the knee to just above the ankle. There was a pool of blood around the area of his leg. I could see the white of his bone protruding out from the canal of blood held in his place by a levee of skin.
I don't ever recall being more clear of thought. I remembered our neighbor had been working in his garage. I jumped off the back of the garage and ran through the neighbor's hedges, I told my neighbor that Richard needed help. The neighbor ran over with rags to use as a tourniquet. I didn't follow. Instead, I ran down the driveway and up the street. This happened on a Saturday afternoon. I recalled that another neighbor up the street always had her father over for a late afternoon spaghetti dinner on Saturday. Moreover, I remembered her father was a doctor. I got the old man away from his Italian dinner and to bring his medical bag. I pushed him down the street imploring him to hurry and to save my brother.
The doctor had clean bandages and gave my brother a shot of something just as the emergency vehicle showed up. In the end, Richard required over seventy stitches and had to work to rebuild muscle in his leg. It only served to make me aware of how accident prone my brother could be. I've heard it suggested because he's left handed as the reason, but I believe it's because he was fearless. He remained so even after taking that fall.
My brother went on to become of all things, a roofer. Talk about tempting the fates. He started his own roofing company which became locally very successful and well respected. I pursued a career that took me to the West coast. Whenever I'd come back to visit over the years we'd rib each other about our childhood exploits, whether wetting pants or falling off ladders, to any weight gain that we managed to accumulate over the years. Even though we both put on the pounds, Richard would always smile and say, "Bill, you ain't heavy, you're my brother." The line was taken directly from the 1969 hit from the Hollies, "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother." It would become our theme song.
In 1989 I was at work at my desk in California. The phone rang. It was my father. He told me Richard had an accident. "Please don't tell me he's gone, Dad." He wasn't, but it didn't look good. I flew home that evening. My brother had fallen after a chicken ladder snapped in half causing him to slide off a three story roof. He struck a car and then hit the pavement head first. A chicken ladder is a homemade wooden support that allows a roofer to walk perpendicular to a slanted roof. This gave out causing Richard's fall.
The first day I arrived at the hospital and saw him, Richard's head looked swollen to the size a beach ball, tubes and wires stuck in and on him like tentacles draping from an electronic squid. I got to hold his hand and let him know I was there but I have no idea if he heard me. I spent the day bedside and whispered to him stories from our childhood.
On the second day, I am left with another color daguerreotype in my brain. My father and I were visiting Richard. We were talking in low tones at the base of his bed. Without warning, Richard bolted straight up in bed, eyes wide open, staring directly at us, his left hand reaching out to us as if he wanted us to grab his hand and stop him from falling. It was and is, the scariest thing I ever saw in my life. Because I had no idea what to do. Nor did my father, because we banged into each other trying to move out of the room and call for a doctor. Richard was pulling at tubes and cables and stretching all the wires clipped to him. The doctor and nurses scrambled and settled him down, but I can never forget the fear I saw in my brother's eyes and the helplessness I felt. The doctor said Richard might have been reliving the fall in his mind. Add to that, what my father must have been going through and it was all beyond my emotional imagination.
The third day remains the most incredible for me, because it contains elements of life's mysteries causing me to question my very sanity and issues of life after death. I can play back bits and pieces in my head like a tick tok video, so let me time stamp it for you.
It was March, 13th, 1989. 7:30 a.m. an early Spring morning. The sun had risen above neighborhood rooftops. I'm sitting in Richard's hospital room with his wife. We're letting Richard know we're there. I'm speaking in low tones because I don't want to excite him and repeat the previous day. His wife is gently stroking his forehead. A nurse barrels into the room like Mary Tyler Moore on prozac and loudly proclaims, "Good morning, Richard, it's a beautiful day!" She opens the blinds to let in more sunlight. "Spring is in the air! The tulips are in bloom and your family is here and they love you very much!"
I asked the nurse how he slept through the night. She smiled saying he had such a good quiet evening, no seizures. She again reminded us it was a beautiful day and left. I turned to my brother's wife and smiled. "I think he's going to be okay. I'm going to call Dad." I went to a nearby pay phone, fished out a quarter from my pocket. My Dad picked up in one ring. "Dad, Billy. Richard slept through the night, no seizures. He even looks better. Dad, I think he's going to be okay." Those words no sooner left my lips when I heard the intercom. "Code Blue, Code Blue, Code Blue."
"Dad, get down here, now!" I had a sinking feeling I hope I never feel again.
I ran back to my brother's room, it was already crowded with an emergency staff. My brother's wife was against the opposite wall in the hallway looking in, but it was hard to see anything except the backs of the doctors and nurses working on Richard. The patient room right next to my brother's room was empty, so I stepped up to the doorway to get an angled view of them working on my brother. They were doing CPR and all the other emergency procedures we see on TV hospital dramas but this drama was real. Or was it?
There was a radio playing music in the empty room as they worked on my brother. The radio was playing a song. It was a song by the Hollies. "He Ain't Heavy He's my Brother" was playing as my brother was dying. I started to think I was in a bad dream, not quite a nightmare. This can't be happening. But it was. For four minutes and nineteen seconds I listened to that heart breaking song watching as my brother's life ebbed away. To add to the mystery of the moment, the next song that the radio played was Chicago's "If You Leave Me Now." His wife later told me that was their song. Was that Richard saying goodbye to us? Was it just an amazing coincidence? Was my brain seeking connections to help me deal with the trauma of the moment? I don't know. It haunts me to this day.
As the song says... the road is long with many a winding turn that leads us to who knows where? But if I'm strong, strong enough to carry him, he ain't heavy, he's my brother.
I carry my brother in my heart.
The Most Magical Place on Earth
The day before our trip to Disneyland, I woke up with blood in my underwear. I should have been surprised, but I wasn’t. I’d known this was coming, sooner or later, the same way it was always looming for prepubescent girls, but I’ll admit, the timing wasn’t stellar. Still, I wasn’t surprised. Life had always had a way of taking good things away from me. Why should I have hoped to be a child at the most magical place on earth, if even only for a day? I shook my mother awake in the darkness of Grandma’s guest bedroom. “I started my period,” I stated bluntly.
“Oh honey,” Mom moved to cup my face, to give sympathy, but I pulled out of her touch and tucked twitching hands behind my back.
“It’s not a big deal. I just need…stuff.”
Mom sighed, resigned, and threw off her blankets. She shouldn’t be surprised this was how I’d chosen to handle the situation. First blood or not, I’d been an adult for years. It didn’t matter that I was only twelve. I’d stopped being a child the first time I’d offered myself up for a beating to spare my little brother. Dad didn’t particularly care who he hit, so long as he hit someone. I’d been six then and already well on my way to understanding some things about the world I really shouldn’t have. With the first smack of Dad’s beating stick on my back, the last dregs of innocence had left my small body. I should probably feel something about that, too, but I didn’t. It’s just the way things were.
My mother shuffled past, beckoning me to follow her into the bathroom across the hall. She held up a bulky panty liner, “Here. This is all Grams has. We’ll stop and get you something better on the way. Let me show you how to use it.”
I nodded, and let her show me, though I already knew. My best friend had gotten her period six months ago. Sara wasn’t one to leave out any detail and had shared the ins and outs of bleeding and tampons and pads with brutal efficiency to anyone who would listen in our little friend group. Yes, I already knew, but I let Mom show me. It was more important for her to feel needed than it was for me to be comfortable. And so, I shuffled out of the bathroom and packed up my bag, adding a fistful of the low-quality incontinence liners to my purse.
We drove for twelve hours that day. I shifted uncomfortably in the back seat of my grandparent’s minivan, but I wouldn’t dare complain. They were footing the bill for this trip to Disney. God knew my mom, who was in the throes of raising six kids solo, couldn’t afford it. Mom bought me tampons at a truck stop. Every hotel we’d be staying at during our week-long trip would have a pool, and I loved to swim. Mom tried to convince me that I wouldn’t even bleed much, but I knew she was wrong. My body had been hovering on the precipice of this thing for too long. I was more developed than any of the other girls I knew, with heavy breasts and curving hips and standing at 5’8” already. Men had been screaming vulgar things out the windows of their trucks at me for two years as I made my trek to school in the mornings. I couldn’t really blame them for mistaking me for a woman or something close to one. I looked like it. I relished the vile words the men spewed out their windows at me. I knew I shouldn’t, but my father had told me I was an ugly thing for so long, it was nice to know that someone, anyone, thought differently. I pondered all of these things during the twelve-hour drive, and arrived at the conclusion that while the whole period thing was miserable, it wasn’t a bad thing. It was just another step toward becoming the adult I so desperately wanted to be. When I was an adult, I could be free. I wanted so badly to be free. I wanted so badly to be wanted.
By the time we arrived at the theme park the next night, I was an old hat at the whole tampons and pads thing. I had fully leaned into the idea that no matter what anyone tried to tell me, I was a woman now. I’d demand the respect of one. And I did. Grams and Mom were the first to notice the shift. They just met my gaze with a knowing glint and subtle nods. I’d not be treated like a child anymore. Mercifully, they didn’t try to. They stopped giving me orders and started deferring to me for opinions and on the fourth evening of the trip, Grandma handed me a tattered copy of her favorite romance novel and informed me, “You’re old enough to read this now.”
During our breaks from the sticky, sweaty excitement of the park, I devoured the book. It confirmed some things that’d been pondered over pillows at many a slumber party. The book gave vital information on how to fully wield the power that’d been bequeathed upon me in the form of generous hips and cat eyes. On the last night of the trip, my bleeding had stopped and I clutched a towel around my breasts and left the hotel room with a mumbled, “I’m going to the pool.”
Surprisingly, no one challenged me. They let me slip from the room, twelve years old, clad in nothing but an orange bikini and a towel.
I smiled with wicked delight as I made my way to the pool yard. I’d been watching, these days past, hoping for an opportunity to test my hypothesis, but in order to do that, I needed to get away from my family… and they’d just… let me leave. My heart pounded as I exited the building. The thick, warm night air of a Los Angeles summer blasted me, and I gulped down lungfuls and told myself to be brave. I stepped into the poolyard and let my towel drop. It pooled around my feet, and when I looked up, six pairs of eyes were running up and down the length of me. I met a pair of glittering blue and grinned. I let a little bit of that heat I’d been kindling flare in my eyes, too, “Can I join you?” I purred in a voice foreign to my ears. The minor league baseball player across from me smiled lazily and trailed his fingers through the steaming water next to him.
“Sure,” he said, taking another sweeping look down to my toes and then slowly back up before he met my eyes again. Something stirred in his gaze and I bit my lip before climbing into the hot tub beside him.
I’d been watching the baseball team for a few days. They had rooms down the hall from ours. I’d overheard them talking about their spur-of-the-moment decision to stay a few nights and explore the theme park before continuing on their way. All of them were young, in their early twenties, and all of them were outrageously good-looking in the way only aspiring male athletes can be. They were all also, mercifully, on good behavior. I took for granted the danger I was putting myself in, not having learned the other truths about the way men might behave when confronted with an almost-naked young woman. And that’s what they thought I was: a young woman. My body, my face, the way I held myself told them. They didn’t ask, and I didn’t bother to correct them. I spent hours in the pool that night, riding on their shoulders, swimming beside them, running my hands all over them, their hands all over me. I reveled in it. I laughed and they echoed, and when the one with striking blue eyes invited me up to his room, I thought for a long minute about going, but this man was a gentleman and he saw the hesitation in my eyes and tipped his head.
“I get it,” he said, “you’ve got other attachments.”
I smirked and nodded, allowing him to believe whatever conclusion he’d come to.
“Either way, this was,” he smiled, “...fun. Thanks.”
I twined my fingers in his and looked up under my lashes, “Sorry.”
He ran a tentative hand down my cheek. “There’s nothing to apologize for. Let me know if you change your mind. You can find me in room 402.”
I nodded again and gave him the sultry smile I’d spent an hour cultivating in the mirror earlier. He grinned and turned away, exiting the pool yard with his friends elbowing and gently ribbing along the way.
When they were gone, I sank back into the hot tub and laughed. Though they didn’t know it, those men had just given me the keys to the kingdom. My hypothesis was confirmed. There was power in this woman’s body. I’d just had no less than ten men dancing for me like puppets on strings. I palmed my round breast and grinned at the sky. Yes, there was power in this body, power in the truth I now beheld. And I would use it from that moment forward to get everything I ever wanted.
When we left the most magical place on Earth the next day, my metamorphosis was complete. I was a woman, and the world wasn’t ready for the terrors I was poised to unleash upon it.
Change
I used to walk the streets of New York City holding your hand. My memories were focused on the feel of your hand on mine, the jacket I stole from your closet sitting on my shoulders, and the sixteen minutes of conversation that existed between my front door and yours.
We were freshmen in college, unencumbered by the world. Everything was beautiful. We fell in love alongside the falling leaves, our lives changing alongside the seasons. But fall only lasted so long, and as winter approached, so too did the end of our relationship.
A year later, I walk alone. The streets of New York City are different now, the autumn colors and leaves mean different things. My memories are of the sidewalk crack at the corner, which almost looks like it could be a bird. They are of the park bench with the chipped green paint, where a couple sits every Saturday afternoon, falling in love like I used to. They are of my own hands, in a pair of gray woolen gloves, because while I still remember the feel of your hands, I think I know mine better now.
Some things have stayed the same. The seasons still change, the leaves still fall, and the wind still blows. But you and I walk separately, and the leaves no longer fall for us- but for you, and me, and change.
I have changed, and I think the leaves will celebrate that too.
The Led Zeppelin Shirt that Stopped a Heart
Everyone seems to have a first love story, some are comical, others romantic, most leave behind emotional pain the likes of which makes you want to rip your own still-beating heart out of your ribcage and smash it on the concrete with a ten pound sledge hammer just so that you can make the pain stop. What makes my first love story interesting is that I wasn't able to tell her how I felt when we inhabited the same space. Nope. It would take a 1 am phone call years later for the truth to come out. Every time I tried to confess my love for Sarah (not her real name, of course) it felt like someone shoved an entire bag of marshmallows in my mouth, rendering 16-year-old me completely mute while simultaneously allowing just a little bit of drool to escape the imperfect seal formed by the marshmallow's plastic bag and my paralyzed lips. Ultimately, I guess it took the last bit of dust of my adolescence to finally settle for me to come fully and completely clean to Sarah as an adult.
It was the first day of sophomore year and I sitting in my Algebra II class. Thanks to the teacher's mandatory alphabetical seating chart and possessing a last name starting with, "U" I was just where I wanted to be, at the back of the room in the far-right corner where I could sit unobserved. Sitting there waiting for class to start while breathing in the smell of pencil shavings, possible asbestos fibers, and teenage angst I was somewhat underwhelmed with sophomore year to that point.
Then she walked in the door wearing tight jeans, a Led Zeppelin t-shirt, and that mushroom cloud of bangs that girls drained an entire can of hairspray to create in the early nineties. She was everything I dreamed of in a girl at that point. I watched her approach the seating chart, and once her assigned seat was identified, SHE MADE HER WAY TOWARDS ME! Turns out, her last name started with a, "T" so she sat right in front of me. She didn't look familiar so she was either new or a freshman, either way, I was thrilled. So, Sarah sat down, turned to me and said, "How ya doin! Cool Megadeth shirt." After those six words I knew that I would happily swallow a sword wrapped in barbed wire and lubricated with sulfuric acid to see her smile and the light that danced in her brown eyes whenever she was happy.
"Wow." This girl is fucking perfect," I thought. I was right as the days passed, Sarah and I became friends, and pretty much ignored the teacher in Algebra II (I still got an A thank you very much). Sarah was a freshman, loved metal, and hated all the things I hated, which was pretty much every aspect of high school and our vapid, Vanilla Ice loving, and approaching maturation, middle-class maggot classmates. Later, I introduced her to my two closest friends, and she was absorbed immediately. Although Doug (not his real name) immediately put her in his sights for the next girl to test the tolerances of the springs in the backseat of his car, Doug picked up on my vibe and backed off like any good friend would.
Well, Sarah and I rarely had classes together after Algebra, but we talked on the phone, hung out with Doug and our other friend, Jared (once again not his real name) whenever we could, and went through the diarrhea cramp-like throes of high school together. Now, Doug and Jared were aware of my feelings for Sarah and regularly told me I should make a move. In here lies the problem. I was a buck-toothed, physically disabled, pimple faced, greasy haired loser who's single mom was content to live on the dole. I couldn't afford to take her anywhere, didn't have a car, and in terms of physical attractiveness I rated myself somewhere between the Elephant Man and Quasimodo. Fuck, at least Quasimodo had a cool bachelor pad of his own near Notre Dame's bell tower. As far as I was concerned, I had ZERO to offer the angel in blue jeans and Converse All-Stars.
By the time I was a senior, I had watched Sarah go through a couple of boyfriends, but still, I couldn't bring myself to say anything. Finally, Doug's girlfriend, Melanie (not her real name and who later became his wife from what I've heard) had grown tired of seeing my puppy dog eyes and hearing my unrequited love filled sighs. So, as a friend of Sarah and mine she was (DOM-DOM-DOM) going to tell Sarah how I felt. I begged her to remain silent and promised I'd try to tell her. I lucked out because Melanie foolishly didn't require a timeline and I was quick to write mental fine print that read, "I will tell Sarah how I feel...Someday." Besides, I really had tried a couple of times and on each attempt the cat not only got my tongue, but it managed to snag my brain as well because my feeling revealing attempts made me look like I was a post-operative lobotomy patient.
High school ended and I remained silent. I was moving to Florida for college (BIGGEST FUCKING MISTAKE EVER). Sarah had to finish high school and had a serious boyfriend by then. Well, neither of us could afford long distance phone charges, but stamps were cheap, so we regularly wrote letters. Sarah would finish high school and move to Oregon with her boyfriend. Still, I held the torch for her and would regularly wail along to Nazareth's, Love Hurts every time it was on the radio. God, I was pathetic!
Eventually, I moved back to California and Sarah broke up with her boyfriend, but stayed in Oregon. Then one night around 1:00 am I received a phone call. It was Sarah and she was hammered, three sheets to the wind, she'd tied one on, and got herself well and truly blitzed. Of course, I was happy to hear from her and realizing that she was inebriated, I wanted to make sure that she was okay. Up to that point the letters had continued, but hearing someone's voice after a couple of years is amazing. So, we talked for hours. Sarah was feeling nostalgic so a lot of the conversation centered on high school.
Now, I'm not sure how it happened, maybe it was the fact that I was exhausted and on the phone for 3 hours, but eventually during that call I told Sarah that I had been crazy about her for years and was too shy and full of self-hatred to say anything. I wasn't really sure if she'd heard me, but we got off the phone shortly after that.
A couple of w
of anxiety filled weeks would pass and I received a letter from Sarah. I actually threw up and couldn't open it for hours. Maybe she hadn't heard or it got lost in the tequila haze. I stared at that envelope wondering if she had heard my confession and if I had killed a friendship by telling her. When I finally gathered the courage to open the letter, Sarah simply asked why had I never said anything. She didn't admit one way or another how she felt, but I could tell that she was shocked. My response back was apologetic and I attempted to explain how unworthy I felt for anyone or anything. So, I never felt that admitting my feelings would lead to anything good. I asked that she forgive me for making things weird and that I knew that things were what they were.
Sarah wrote me back and we never mentioned my confession again. Eventually, I would fall into a very dark place and mental illness would take the reigns of my life, leading me towards the cliff of self-obliteration at full speed. Sarah would move again, this time to Iowa. Our letters would continue, not as frequently, but we still wrote. Sarah met a great guy who was a high school teacher and they married and had 2 kiddos. After a few years and a FUCK LOAD OF MEDICATION and THERAPY I would get better, meet a great girl, get married, and bring our three little demon-spawn (and fourth little imp via CPS and family court) into the world.
The letters have since stopped coming or going. Such is life. We get stuck in our own little orbits and stop looking outward. I think fondly of Sarah and I have to credit her for being my friend. She, Doug, Jared, and Melanie made me feel something strange. They made me feel like I mattered somehow to someone. I think that this carried me through the darkness and is a big a huge part of me still being here. To my friends, wherever they are, and whatever they're doing, let me just say for the record that, "Our other classmates probably still suck, Vanilla Ice has been replaced by Taylor Swift (an even blander flavor of vanilla), and I'm still FUCKING PISSED we couldn't get tickets to see Megadeth."
my first and worst love
This story is a tragedy. I’ve told it a million times. In fact, it’s most of my stories, but I’ve left out much of it. I’ll tell you more and more each time, I swear. Here’s the most I can give you today:
He was my first love. It all began when I was 18 and he was 17. We were almost to the end of our senior year of high school. March 24th was our first date. I had never been romanced before. I’d had crushes, been on dates, been kissed, been felt up in someone’s basement by a guy I hated. But, I’d never felt something like I had that night. I was wearing ripped jeans, a black tank top, a flannel shirt, my black converse, and my dad’s old jacket. I still have the last two items. The shoelaces are frayed and the jacket’s pockets are ripped, though. We had pizza and ice cream, and talked about our future plans - college, jobs, moving away from home.
I had already committed to school, but he was waiting on a letter from his top choice. He wanted to be a theater major. I only went to one school play - the children’s play he was in - because I hate plays (for the most part). He’d actually told me not to go to it, but I did anyway, and I think I still have the ticket stub and the playbill with a kiss mark over his name. I wore pink lipstick that day.
He got his degree in computer science but works in email marketing (I despise advertising of all kinds, but not because of him). But, before all that he moved back to Italy, and we were long distance for a year. It was awful, minus when he visited me at Christmas. I drove to the airport to see him. It was raining and I listened to “Friday I’m in Love” by The Cure on the way home. I got distracted and took the wrong exit. I ended up on the toll road.
Our second date was at the mall. I wore yoga pants and I may have been hungover again. I know I was tired. I don’t drink anymore which makes this story funnier to me. When we were walking, I started singing along to the music they played over the intercom and he said to me, “you know every song”, which isn’t true, but I know a lot of the hits from the past 50 years. We sat on a couch in the Macy’s furniture section for hours. Long enough for someone who worked there to come up to us and comment on it. He said he’d already sold the couch and didn’t mind that we’d been there for so long, he just thought it was interesting. He said, “When you two get married, come back here, so I can sell you some furniture”, and we used to reference that all the time. We didn’t get married, not even engaged.
On our third date, we went on a walk at a park near my neighborhood. We ended up back at my house (not in that way, that comes later). He met my mom for the first time, and we went upstairs to “watch TV” aka makeout. We made our relationship official that day. I was wearing my favorite overalls that I still get compliments on to this day. I bought them specifically to wear on that date.
Our fourth date was prom. My dress was $450, and it was the most beautiful I had ever felt. I was not popular in high school, but he was relatively popular. I ended up getting compliments from people who had never spoken to me. We went back to my friend’s house for the afterparty. He drove my car there. I got a little bit drunk on shots of Ciroc and we spent the whole party alone in my friend’s bedroom (not like that, that comes later).
That happened for the first time in late June, but I won’t tell the story. It was unremarkable to be honest. We had our first fight around that time. We were driving home from another park. I think I was driving because that was something that I used to do. I stopped the argument by cranking up the music. We were listening to “Jack and Diane” by John Mellencamp, and I was singing along to it. He used to like my singing and my taste in music back then. I took him back to my house and my mom convinced him to stay for dinner. We were fighting about something stupid and she was the one who ended it, albeit unknowingly.
The worst fight we ever had was when I was 21 or 22. Flash forward from senior year of high school to senior year of college. He was an anti-vaxxer and I made fun of him for it. I can’t remember what I said, but it wasn’t that offensive. He started screaming at me. He screamed at me until I sobbed on the floor of my bedroom. I stopped trusting him that night. I remember my friend was in the other room, and he texted me asking if I was okay, and I said “yes”. The next day, when my boyfriend had gone home, my friend asked me about the fight again and I told him that I started it, which is kind of true, but he said, and I’ll never forget it, “I can’t imagine what [his girlfriend’s name] would have to do for me to yell at her like that”. They live together now and are a very happy couple, I’m still friends with them both.
The reason for the breakup was not all the fighting. In the end, he cheated on me. He admitted to it in August. I was 23 and he was 22. He told me it had happened while he was away in Italy while we were 18/19 and that he had just kissed a few girls, so I forgave him. I told him not to do it again and he promised he wouldn’t. I visited him in mid-September and was there until October 30th. He called me on the 31st to tell me he’d cheated on me twice while I was there.
I told him he was a coward for not telling me before. The thing that made me the most angry was that he chose to confess over the phone. I didn’t even get closure because he didn’t want to see me cry in person, he couldn’t do it when we were together because he couldn’t bear to see my face. He didn’t cry when he told me. That made me angry too.
He started dating someone else, but we called each other and fell asleep on the phone together many nights for the next few months. He started going to see a therapist and he got better to some extent, he started letting me talk and had more empathy towards me. He apologized and told me he’d repented (he’s a devout Catholic). I told him that meant he was forgiven by God, but not by me. (I love the song “God Will” by Lyle Lovett, and I think it’s fitting).
Regardless, we saw each other in person in January, and we went on a weekend getaway to Savannah to try to patch things up. It ended in him yelling at me in the airport when I had a panic attack. We haven’t seen each other in person since then. I wish I could say I had a better last memory with him, but I don’t.
We continued to try to patch things up for months, multiple times. We broke it off once and I started dating this girl that I really liked (she broke my heart too, but she was nicer about it). The ex-boyfriend and I almost got back together in June, but we fought over the phone about sexual assault statistics. He said men get falsely accused all the time and I disagreed. I asked him if he really believed me when I told him what had happened when I was 16 and he promised he’d never hurt me like that. He said yes, and I asked him if he’d believe that I’ve had so many friends who have similar stories and he said he wouldn’t necessarily believe them. I hung up and told him I couldn’t do it anymore.
I think back to all the times I took Klonopin before having sex, so “it’d be easier for me to get through it”, and I think it makes that argument make more sense.
Last Thanksgiving, 5 months post-breakup, we went around the table and talked about what we were most thankful for, and I said that I was most thankful that he wasn’t in my life anymore. The whole table - my whole family - clapped for me.