All For More (Or Less)

Ah, the teenage version.

The sun came up like it always does. I realized where I was and thought back to recall what happened the night before.
I woke to the typical concerns after nights like the one before.
“Do I have something to worry about?”
Did I start something or say something to the wrong person?
“Why was my nose bleeding last night?”
Or at minimum,  did I play the fool or act like a lunatic?
Chances are that something happened.
Then again, something is always “happening.”
Right?

Was this just another night of teenage angst, and drinking too much, smoking too much, too much weed, and of course, too many doses of mescaline, which I could feel chemical reaction that was lingering because the aftermath was still in me.

I listen to parents talk about their kids and how they’re afraid of what they face.
We faced a much different life when I was younger. At least we had real music.
I say this often but these damned kids don’t know what real music is these days.
But this is for another entry.

I woke up in a friend’s house, on his floor in the living room. The party which happened the night before was just another night of a week’s long party.
It was summertime and this was another string of events that took place because my friend’s Mother and Stepfather were on vacation.
They were away, somewhere. And yes, we raided the fridge. We ate everything in sight. We ordered pizza. There were beer cans everywhere and in fairness to any assumptions, yes, many brain cells were killed to honor this festive chaos.

The morning was early and sleep and I did not agree with each other.
Then again, sleep and I have had our share of love/hate relationships. Then again, and depending upon the chemicals, some substances kept me awake for days. Some drugs came with an aftermath that caused me to sleep until 4:00 the next day.

I had a black wristband on my left wrist. I recall this very well in my mind’s eye.

I was wearing a black concert t-shirt which was a sign of loyalty to the band, which had a dominant role in the throes of my teenage rebellion. Otherwise, I had on my loose jeans, which probably needed to be nailed to my ass because I was so thin and my belts could wrap around my waist twice.
I was young, defiant, yet smart in ways that I never knew.
I was always thinking. I always wanted more.
I wanted to feel. I want to enjoy.
I wanted to be wild. And I wanted to enjoy myself, or dance, if I could.
I wanted to feel the beat of something in my heart.
However, being free was not an easy thing for me.
And being cool was hard as well.

I had buckteeth. I was told that I was cute, but being cute only got me so far.
I wanted to be the one that girls wanted or liked and desired.
But no. I was cute.
My brother, on the other hand, was the one that girls always mentioned to me.
“Why don’t you look more like your brother?”
“How come you’re not big or strong like him?”
But again, this part of my defense is for another day in court.

I rolled over and realized that the night was done. The house was the kind of dim that happens just at sunrise when the sky changes and soft versions of light move into the household through the curtains that were off-center after a mid-summer party.

I rolled and searched for my pack of Marlboro Reds and my lighter. 
By the way, I worked hard to perfect this posture.  I worked hard to learn my poses as if to be this rebel, or this so-called abandoned outlaw. I wanted to be a bad ass, mysterious and lost or wild and havoc driven to the core.

Everyone else was sleeping. Everyone seemed comfortable to me.
Everyone else had their own crosses to bear too. Or so I assume. 
I often think about how we used to act or pretend like we knew what we were doing 
But no.
None of us had any idea what would become of us. We had no idea that some of us would become suburban tragedies. Some would face jail time.
We didn’t know . . .
Some would end up on the methadone line. Some would escape. Some would turn their life around. And no, we never assumed that a day would come and we would all show up at the park in Prospect, and this would be the last time that all of us would be in the same place at the same time.
No one does when you’re young
Until they do . . .

I wasn’t around more parties after this one. No, my energy skipped a beat and my direction took an early but unfortunate turn quicker than the others.

What a party this was.
I wished I remembered more of it though.

I walked outside of the house and chose to smoke and watch the sky at sunrise. 
It’s amazing.
Moments like this.
It’s amazing when the soul can feel something coming, like a change in the mix.
This was foreshadowing before I knew what the word foreshadowing meant.

Have you ever found yourself aware, at a pivotal moment, which is a crossroad but also a Deja-vu moment?
You know something is on the rise.
Your mind is open to an alternate sense of awareness.
Or, maybe it was the drugs still in my system.
Maybe this was just a cathartic moment for a kid with a cigarette in his mouth and a small pipe for a morning toke of weed . . .
Maybe.
Ever have a time (minus the drugs or not) when the world sort of pauses in a weird way?
I knew that something was going to come. I knew that friendships change.
Loyalties change. I wished I was away from this.
I wished I could find “Somebody.”
I wished I wasn’t so afraid to be beautiful or to reach for beauty and have her hold my hand, so I could smile.
This was another one of my teenage prison cells. . . .
Understand?

I was about to change and so was my town. So was the energy and the feelings between me and the rest of the world. I was on the verge of losing my sanity as well as my friendships.
I knew this was coming.
I knew I was about to fall but nothing could stop me.
Nothing could prepare me either.
Sometimes, life’s a roller coaster and after the pinnacle at the top of the incline comes the fall and the destruction after the decline.

I looked at the wristband on my left wrist, which I assumed people saw as something worn to look cool, Maybe I thought that I could pull this off, like a rocker, or some kind of bad ass.

But no.
The wristband was to hide the drunken damage of an intentional wound that marked the artery in my wrist. I wore the band to disguise a superficial cut that was inching closer to emulate the weight of my teenage despair. 

“What the hell was I thinking?”
I smoked from my pipe to ease the angst and the tension.

I realized the meaning behind the slash on my wrist.
I could’ve driven the dagger home and closed the lights.
But no.
As much as I wanted to die, I have to admit this – I really wanted to live…
I just didn’t know how. 
And yes, I have spoken with many people over the decades who can relate and the one sentiment that is most relatable is that it’s not that I wanted to die as much as I wanted things to stop — so I could catch my breath or just breathe.

I was asked questions about my childhood.

Was I abused?

Was I hit?

Was I beaten?

Was I loved and was I supported?

I think people naturally assume that trauma stems from some kind of parental flaw. However, and while my answer to this is no, my parents were not perfect.
My Father was strict and hardheaded at times. He was older than most Dads with kids my age. He had his own history and share of grief. He had his own emotional struggles and insecurities as well. This did not make him a bad father by any means. Instead, this meant that life was happening to me and no one (especially me) knew how to deal with it.
And Mom?
Mom was the prime enabler.
Of course she was. At the same time, I had a good home and a nice bedroom.
My home was warm in the winter and cool in the summer. We had food to eat. I had clothes to wear.
Whether my parents had financial worries or burdens were unknown to me because this was not my business, or so my Father “The Old Man” told me.

As for my position in the family tree, I was the odd one, the lost one, and the challenged one. I was previously the mascot but that lost its value when I started to move into my teenage life.
More than anything else, I was physically different and smaller and much younger looking than other kids my age.

I was socially uncomfortable. I was never cool or seen as someone to notice.
Or so I thought.
I swore that I was no one. I swore that I would never be “someone,” at least not until I chose to wear the uniform of my so-called rebellion.
I grew my hair long. I got high. I cut class and essentially, I was one of the classroom statistics.
I was the kid that wasn’t allowed in anyone’s house.
I was the kid who failed himself and believed that everyone else had failed me first.

And somehow, I knew this was all wrong.

These were my thoughts that morning after the party.

I never asked for this position. I never wanted to be the outcast or to be the black sheep. I never wanted to be at war with the world nor did I want to train myself to have to accept pain or personal mutilation.

I sat outside of my friend’s house and looked up at the morning sky. I listened to the eerie quietness that comes with the wholesome feelings of Sunday morning and the early Church-going civilization.
I never wanted this. But this was what I had.

Ah, my smokes.
My cigarettes.
My crutches, as they were.

The feel of that inhale drag when the smoke fills your lungs.
Do you know? If you don’t know, then I guess you can’t know.
I saw this as another act of rebellion.
Everything was a look to me. Everything was an image and me?
I saw this as the only thing that could fit me.
I wanted to have that James Dean approach.
I wanted to be like the character Dallas Winston from The Outsiders.
I was more like Ponyboy, the dreamer and the poet.
But I wanted to be more than some meek looking kid.

I was never good at school, so I could never be a brain.
I was too small, too thin, too weak and way too slow to be an athlete.
I was fine to be where I was and be crazy because this carried a mild level of status.
And my friends? Well, they were somewhat fine too.
Everyone had something to hide. Everyone was trying to cover or hide something. Maybe they didn’t have to wear a wristband to hide their truths, but real scars and invisible scars are both painful and equally real.

I suppose this was the first time I thought to myself, “I could just walk away.”
“I could walk away and change my crowd.”
Would any of them miss me?
Would anyone notice that I was gone?
Would it hurt to realize that no one cared and nothing changed, and the world didn’t skip a beat because I left.
And there were more questions, like:
“If I wasn’t “selling,” would people just buy from someone else?”
No one talks about this part when it comes to dealing.
It’s not just about money.
There’s a statement that’s made.
People call you.
People want you to hang around.
You can be seen as important because people want what you have, and, in fact, they’re willing to pay you for it!
It’s a whole ritual of events when it comes to drug dealing.
From big time to small time, “chippie” habits.
It’s not just about money.
It’s a lifestyle.

I remember thinking:
I could be good too, you know?
Maybe I could buckle down or learn how to read better.
I could study. I could do better in math or join the mathletes or something like that.
Maybe I could be true to my dreams and I could write and be out loud about this instead of being some 14-year-old kid.
Maybe I could be a professional at something.
Maybe I could find out what it means to be comfortable.

“I don’t need this shit!”

I smoked my cigarette down to the filter.
I thought about walking away. Then again, I think this is not limited to teenage life.
Not by any means. Or like the saying goes: I’ve thought about running away more as an adult than I ever did as a kid . . .
Life happens. Life is not age sensitive.
Life doesn’t care if we are ready to deal with heartache or if we’re prepared to face the hard truths that life is not always fair.
Sure . . .
We think about leaving. We think about the world outside of the box we live in.
Some are brave and they take the risk. Some are like the underdog and win or lose, they show up either way.

Some rest better not knowing if the world is really waiting for them someplace else. Some are fine to say as they are, even if how they are is lacking or unsatisfied.
Some are too afraid and thus, they sink inward and they act or pretend or they find something that helps them to feel a more tolerable version of life as it is.
Some are just too afraid of the unknown.
So they sit and wait until death do they part.

I wanted more.
I wanted better.
I wanted to be happy.

But what do I do if I stand up and walk away, only to find out that what I walked towards was just another failure?
What if walking away only sets me up for another failure?
What if no one cares?
What if no one notices?
What f I look back and see that people are happier after I’ve left?
None of this is the life that I wanted.
But yes, this was the life that I had.
Is it better to dance with the devil you know?

Or what if there are angels in the outfield, waiting for us to step up to the plate and take a swing and the next pitch.
I can say life throws curveballs.
I can agree that you’ll never hit the ball if you never try and swing.
But enough with the baseball analogies.

Life is always moving and we are always changing.
There was a time when I assumed that this was all life could be.
But after years of assessing myself and decades of introspection, I realize that time is moving faster than I thought.
Life is happening and more often than not, there are no second chances.
I will never be able to go back and relive my younger years.
I will never be able to change what happened before.
But I want more (or less).
I refuse to settle ever again.

I have sat with people who entered into a brand new career after retirement. At the time,I recall thinking how this was crazy.
Why retire if you’re going to keep working?
But no.
I don’t see this as crazy anymore.
I think I get it now.
I see this as someone realizing that whether they are late to the game or not, they can choose, change their minds, stand up, sit down, or turn around and go back to where they began.
That’s why I chose to fight this case and face the judges.

My first dream was to become a writer.
And I still have this dream.
Am I a writer?
What is a writer anyway?
Does success determine art or does my expression determine whether I am an artist or not?

I suppose I’m a writer because I say “I’m a writer!”

Either way, bring on the critics.
Bring on the judges.
Let them come around to tear us apart.
Let them rip my art to shreds.
Who cares . . .
At least I dared.
At least I spoke up.
At least I didn’t fail myself
Or better, at least I was brave enough to love
Or try and take the risk.

Whether I go into a hole or die alone or find myself lucky in love, no one can take this away from me.
No one can say that I failed to do what my heart always begged for.
I opened up to you.
I gave you my “everything.”
Good and bad.
Faults and all.
I never judged you
and I never will.
I wore my heart on my sleeve and whether my success is true or false,
at least I can say that I dared to love the most beautiful girl in the world.

God, you are so sexy.
I dream of you. Did you know that?
Then again, I’ve always dreamt of you
even before I knew who you were, I still knew you.
Even when I was alone with that “morning after” cigarette the night after the party, and after I realized there was puke on my shirt, I always dreamed of the day when I would meet you.

Nothing is random.
Nothing is coincidental.
You are you for a reason.
And me?
I am yours for the same reason as well.

My first real poem will always belong to you:

“When I listen,
I can hear you in my thoughts
And when I look
I can see you in my dreams
And on the movie screens
behind the walls of my eyelids . . .

. . . but my only hope is
that someday soon
I will hold you in my arms

Forever~”

I love you.
I love the way you lay and how your hips curve and your skin feels.
I love that I can see your face and only want to see you more.
I want more, as if there is no such thing as being too excessive or wanting you too much.

I want this because I have seen excess and I have lived with doing “too much,” but if my heaven is ever to come true. then my hope is to be with you, uninterrupted, unlimited, unwavering and yes, always willing to walk the beach, come rain, or come shine.

I don’t care where you are now,
but one day
I know
you are going to marry me.

I promise!