Michael Rossi's Blog, page 2

Rock and Roll, Time Travel, and the Bright Side of Statutory Rape

On December 31, 1979, I was six years old and living in New York with my sister, father, and his girlfriend. It had been barely a week since the most joyous Christmas of my life, and I felt like Richie Rich, thanks to all of the presents I received that year. This had not always been the case for us because we were quite poor, so I was the six-year-old version of grateful. My mother had left us a year before, but the girlfriend was doing a good job as a substitute, so I was also the six-year-old version of happy.

My almost-family was all gathered around the television that night to watch Dick Clark rock-in a brand new decade. Children don’t drink on New Year’s Eve, but parents do, so many of the sober daily rules went out the window. Bedtimes were ignored, snacks were not limited, and there was absolutely no concern that we celebrated the year’s passing by vigorously banging pots and pans together in our tiny little apartment, which was surrounded on three sides by other tenants that might not enjoy such midnight clamor.

Dick’s big guest that year was Blondie, and although Disco’s death-warrant had already been signed, she was at the apex of her career. She performed Heart of Glass in her perfect, sultry-sweet voice, wearing a short, light-colored, sleeveless dress; I fell hard, and was in love for the very first time. I had gleefully sung along with Blondie’s songs on the radio, but there were no videos back then, and only four television channels in my house, so I had never actually seen her. This was my first crush, but your first crush is an anomaly, so you don’t recognize it as the inevitable birth of desire it represents; you are just suddenly obsessed for reasons you cannot possibly imagine.

I peppered my family relentlessly with questions about the young singer that night. I did not yet fully understand basic mathematics, so I was certain that there was some way in which my age might catch up to hers and we could be together forever. My father was a sweet man and told me that there was always a chance. I was off to bed early that morning with visions of Mr. and Mrs. Mike and Blondie; Hollywood power-couple with matching blond mops.

By the end of the following year, I had turned seven, my father was dead, and my sister and I had begun a childhood experience of being passed from family member to family member, until we were old enough to fend for ourselves. For me, that would be the ripe old age of fifteen.

The summer of my sixteenth birthday found me legally emancipated, and living in Collinsville; a small suburb of Saint Louis on the Illinois side of the Mississippi River. I was renting an apartment with a friend of mine named Greg, adjacent to a house owned by his Uncle John. Greg’s Aunt Shelly and two nephews also lived in the attached single-story home, and a small laundry room and interior door separated our domiciles.

Greg was twenty at the time, and all of his friends slowly became my friends. We had parties nearly every single weekend and always had a keg of cheap beer chilling in a blue, plastic barrel we kept in the back yard. Being emancipated and having older friends meant I never experienced the typical teenage anxiety over locating alcohol. If none of our older friends were around, Uncle John was always willing to procure whatever beverages we requested. John also liked to party with us, and was adept at making our young female guests uncomfortable by his mid-thirties drunken advances. He had a removable front tooth that he would reveal, along with a description of the empty space’s use when pleasing the ladies.

That summer, our group of friends planned a trip to the river in Southern Missouri where John had grown up. I rode down with Greg and his uncle in John’s old, white pick-up truck, with our iced-down keg in the bed; its tap pulled through the rear, middle window. Greg and I would take turns crawling out of the passenger side into the bed to pump the tapper. We never stopped speeding down the highway for these turns, and I don’t remember ever being concerned that the two possible outcomes each shot at pumping were success or death.

It was a Labor Day weekend, so most of the group was staying until Monday, but I had to return to my job as a waiter in a pie restaurant on Sunday morning.

Late that Saturday night, I awoke to hear John and Shelly screaming at each other in the front lawn of John’s mother’s house, where we were staying. He had come home late and Shelly was rightfully convinced that he had been cheating on her with an old girlfriend that still lived in the area. He was, and we all knew it. John was not a good man, and most of us knew that too.

An hour later, after the rest of the group had fallen back to sleep, I heard Shelly continue to cry as she packed up her car. The boys would stay one more day with their father, but she was going home. I rose and walked outside to help her stuff the car. I liked Shelly; she let me live in her house for very little rent and would often save some leftover dinner for me. Homemade dinners are a rare treat for teenagers fending for themselves.

As I helped her, Shelly did her best to stop the tears while questioning any knowledge I might have as to the nature of John’s infidelity. I played dumb, of course; an easy task for all sixteen-year-old boys. When your greatest aspiration is to someday fly the Millennium Falcon while drinking a beer and rocking out to AC/DC, playing a fool comes somewhat naturally.

The next morning, I too left a day early to make my shift at the pie restaurant. The Pantry was over-staffed for a holiday Sunday, so I was sent home almost as soon as I arrived. Shelly’s Buick was in the drive when I pulled up to the house and music was coming through the doorway between her home and our little apartment.

I changed clothes and sat down to relax on the couch in our tiny living room (which doubled as my bedroom), when there was a knock at the door. With almost no hesitation, the door swung open, and there was Shelly.

Shelly was not particularly tall, kept her hair shoulder length, and wore no makeup. She was in her mid-thirties, and life had given her some premature wrinkles around bright blue eyes, but she was still beautiful. Her features were small and doll-like, and the walls of her home displayed pictures of her in her glory days. Shelly had always been gorgeous in the simple way most men of her era preferred.

“Do you want to come over and smoke with me?” She asked; leaning against the jam in short jean-shorts and a thin, faded flannel shirt that had been washed a thousand times, unbuttoned to the clasp of her bra. Until that moment, I had been sitting on the couch contemplating the demise of my boss, as well as the entire pie industry, for having me drive all the way from my river trip, just to be sent home early. My boss was suddenly forgiven.

Minutes later, I was sitting on the firm couch in the main living room with my land-lady/Uncle John’s wife, smoking a tight-rolled joint. It was a dark brown hide-a-bed couch from the eighties with drink holders built into the arms and padding created by hundreds of buttons pushed deep into the fabric. I have always liked firm couches; they are easy to jump from if you have to.

The ranch home’s living room actually had two full couches and several chairs. The place did a lot of entertaining and the small boxy television on one side of the room was eclipsed by the giant stereo along the other. On the record player, Shelly was spinning a Charlie Daniels album. I listened to mostly pop music then, but I knew Charlie Daniels well because it had been my father’s favorite band.

“I used to date him.” Shelly said, her head bobbing.

“Charlie Daniels?” I inquired excitedly.

“No”, she replied, “Taz… He plays keyboards, but he also plays bass sometimes”.

Shelly went on to describe her short career as a much-too-young rock and roll groupie, prior to motherhood. She detailed her adventures, while swirling the ice in her glass and waiving it around in dramatic gestures. As she did, a slow smile began to cross her face and she time-traveled to a time when she was more desirable; a time when a man would never dare cheat on her.

I watched her crawl into the distant memories of herself, as we worked our way through her record collection. Lynyrd Skynyrd, Cream, and James Taylor were all on the afternoon’s menu, as one by one, Shelly would pull records from the stack. Each playing came with a small tale of better days and debauchery, and every story was better than the last. My lesson in rock-groupie lifestyle reached its zenith when she retrieved Blondie’s 1978 album, Parallel Lines. Placing the needle in the correct spot, Shelly began to describe a teenage, drug-fueled orgy that she had attended with band members from Blondie, including Debby Harry herself, while Heart of Glass pounded from the speakers.

Now, before we get any further, it should be noted that “groupies” are the Holy Grail to teenage boys. The idea that you can achieve something so special that a handful of beautiful women will do anything for you, on that basis alone, regardless of how ridiculously stupid you can be, has certainly fueled some of the greatest advancements in human history.

Shelly and I danced around the living room to the remainder of the album and by the time it was done the memories had melted away twenty years, right along with any inhibitions. We kissed for hours on that couch like the teenager only one of us was, but the other was channeling.

Later that night, Shelly and I drove to a park situated alongside a large lake, fed by the Mississippi river. We had sex there, on the hood of my Mustang, while Pink Floyd’s The Wall blasted from my stereo. I recall the incident as being just like a Whitesnake video, but it probably looked as uncomfortable as a Woody Allen movie. I had moved in with my girlfriend when I was fifteen, so I was more experienced than you might think- but Shelly was an ex-groupie sexual dynamo for Christ’s sake; one with first hand carnal knowledge of Debby Harry! She kept asking me to slow down, but warnings like that are hard to heed, so in a flash it was over.

By the next morning, all of our friends, as well as Shelly’s family, had returned from the river trip. John and Shelly continued to fight, but memories of youth and hope had turned the tables on the argument, so John’s excuses held no power. She stood her ground and detailed his many abuses before finally demanding a separation. In almost no time at all, she was gone.

The parties at the house became even more frequent after John’s wife and children moved out. Several other friends optioned the open rooms and the home became a frat house, minus the education. I got my own room by cleaning out a large interior closet space with no windows. Sleep was even harder for me back then and absolute darkness afforded me the occasional extra hour.

A short time after Shelly moved out, I found myself sitting around a small bonfire in our back yard with a drunk and sad Uncle John. He was lamenting the loss of his family, as drunk people tend to do while paying the price for infidelity; with tears and stories. John began to describe all of the things that made his wife special. He told me that I would probably never know a love like that, and I quickly agreed.

I didn’t stay at that house for long following the incident and never slept with Shelly again. I was scared of John, and constantly imagined what he might do to me if he found out that I’d had sex with his wife. Within a year, I hopped on a bus for Seattle on an adventure to experience the new rock coming from the Pacific Northwest, and I don’t know if John ever discovered our transgression.

My day and night with Shelly taught me a lot about women and the way they need to feel desired. I don’t know what happened to her after the divorce, but I have always hoped she found what she deserved.

I would go on to live a life filled with many regrets, but Shelly isn’t one of them. I will always feel grateful for my forbidden day of rock and roll, time-travel, and statutory rape.

I Love The Dog… Just Not That Much.

I love my dog… Just not that much. Well, I guess I can’t really call her my dog. I love the dog; there, that’s better. Five years ago, I first discussed getting a dog with my roommate and when a friend of his mentioned she had a puppy to give away, we were placed with a collie mix that we named Georgia. We were actually given a choice between two dogs, and my daughter helped choose Georgia. There is no feeling quite like watching your young daughter pick a dog.

Thanks to my allergies, I’ve never really been that big of an animal fan. When I was young, I loved them as all children do, but petting a cat or a long-haired dog meant waking the next morning with my eyes and nose sealed shut. This love/hate relationship with animals gradually turned me into a mean, little torturer. Incidents involving the testing of the nine lives theory, as well as several innings of frog-baseball, litter my youth. I guess I am sort-of fortunate that I am not a serial killer. Well, not yet anyway.

Luckily, over time, a de-facto peace came to exist between me and cat kingdom. I try not to touch them, drop them from tall staircases, or set their tails on fire, and they agree to let me breath. It is a precarious cease-fire, danced on a hot tin roof and held together by fears of mutually assured destruction.

Dogs, on the other hand, don’t cause me much trouble anymore, and aren’t nearly as organized as cats, so no peace is required. I mess with dogs the way I mess with people. I poke and prod and play; I really like to rough-house. The downside of this play is that some dogs don’t like rough-housing at all. Dogs like Georgia.

When we first got Georgia, I could not yet see her anxious nature, and playfully tortured her. I would chase her around the house with an overturned basket, scaring her into a trap. As I write this I am struck by how oddly similar I treat puppies and dates. I probably need to discuss that with a professional.

As you might guess, messing with Georgia, as an already nervous puppy, led to her becoming one of the most skittish dogs I have ever known. Very soon, and for several years, Georgia wanted absolutely nothing to do with me, no matter how many bones I gave her. She would hide under my roommate’s bed for days if he was out of town, and getting her out from under could sometimes take hours. She was probably waiting for Liam Nesson to come and save her from the malevolent blond human living in the next room.

In the last few months, I have been spending much more time at home. In that time, I have gone out of way to be sweet to Georgia, in an effort to mend long busted fences. Special treats and lots of love are always on the menu these days, and my efforts have yielded fantastic results. I am greeted often, at the door even, with a wagging tail and begs for attention. Last week, when I was terribly sick, I was shocked when Georgia laid next me on the couch for hours, making my misery that much more bearable.

On Wednesday, I found myself alone in the house. It was around noon, and I had just finished doing some writing when I decided a little “me-time” was in order. Jumping back into bed, I quickly picked out some porn, hit the lotion, and got to work, with my right hand holding my phone, and the left gripping my man-tackle. I was just getting started when my bedroom door burst open. It was Georgia.

Before I could do anything, she jumped onto the bed and immediately lay down along my back, right up against me. At first, I tried to move over, but she quickly shuffled with me to remain directly against my backside. I was stuck. What should I do? I wondered. If I scare her off, it could set our new-found relationship back months. If I do nothing, I will in fact, have committed a dubious act while lying next to a dog. I was also reminded of the time my grandmother walked in on me feeding the animal. I told her I was praying, but she still confiscated all of the catalogs that included advertisements for female underwear.

In the end, I did nothing. Our new peace had to be maintained, so I just let the damned needy, nosy dog lay there next to me. Now, I know what you are wondering, and the answer is yes, I still finished. It wasn’t easy, but I am a trooper when it comes to these things. With some determination I was able to reach satisfaction, while simultaneously retaining the love of my long lost friend, and fighting back my most terribly embarrassing childhood memory.

Happily, this problem has an easy fix, so a new locked-door-animal-feeding policy now exists, regardless of how many humans are home. Like I said; I love the dog… Just not that much.

Post Script: Georgia trying to heal my cold.

A Windy Night In America

In honor of tonight’s first Democratic debate, I thought it might be fun to write about politics today. Maybe you have seen CNN’s promos for the debate; they look exactly like an HBO promo for a championship fight. This debate is slated to begin right after the Cardinals beat the Cubs in Chicago, so I expect I will be in a good mood when it starts. Between the gale coming off of Lake Michigan, and the hot air blowing up from Vegas, it is sure to be a windy night in America.

Typically, I would spend my time on posts like this pointing out hypocrisy and obvious pandering among the candidates. I find it unlikely that this election season will be any different for me than seasons past, so I expect there will be plenty of face-palming and head-shaking for the next thirteen months. Unfortunately, I have been sick for the last week, and I don’t think my fragile mind can take the depression that comes with discussing current presidential hopefuls, so I have decided to write about great politicians of the past instead.

Why my second favorite politician, you ask? That’s easy; my favorite will always be Thomas Jefferson, but what more can be said about an agnostic hemp farmer (not the good kind of hemp), that drank wine like a cougar, screwed anything that moved, and still found time to help establish the world’s first modern democracy. Dos Equis beer wasn’t around in his day, but if it had, I am certain that Thomas Jefferson would have been the most interesting man in the world.

Note: I am aware that Jefferson owned slaves. Nobody is perfect.

My second favorite politician is actually still alive, at age ninety-seven, and his name is also Tom; Tom Moore Jr., from Waco Texas. You have likely never heard of Moore, because he was just a state senator and only that for six years (1967-1973). Most of us cannot name a single, current state senator, even one from our own state, so it is a little strange that I like this guy so much.

On April 1st, 1971, Representative Moore introduced legislation that would award commendation to a man named Albert De Salvo, for his, “unconventional techniques involving population control and applied psychology”. The Texas House of Representatives unanimously voted to approve the commendation.

Two time-honored traditions in law-making that disgusted Mr. Moore were; the passing of laws that did nothing to help citizens, like naming a post office or commending a person, and the writing of legislation by lobbyists. Moreover; Mr. Moore knew that legislators rarely even read the laws on which they were voting, at all. These traditions continue to this day, and of the 142 total laws passed by our 113th Congress (2013-2014), 34 were strictly ceremonial.

After the unanimous vote to commemorate De Salvo, but before the act could become law, Tom Moore Jr. withdrew the legislation, and the State of Texas has one less law, all thanks to Mr. Moore.

Post Script: Albert De Salvo is better known as the Boston Strangler. His efforts in “population control” are the thirteen women he is believed to have murdered between 1962 and 1964. Tom Moore Jr. managed to a make fool out of every single elected official with whom he worked, on the very day that every American knows to be weary of tricks; April Fool’s Day. Well played Tom.

Do You Like Oxycontin?

“Do you like Oxy?”

This question was posed to me recently by a friend, completely out of the blue, and it caught me a little by surprise. I had never taken Oxycontin, therefore; I had no opinion on whether or not I liked it. Regardless, I told him that I was a fan of the pain-killer, and gladly accepted the gift.

Sometime later, I started thinking about the pill I now possessed, as well as the interaction that led to me having it. My friend with the tablet could just as easily have asked, “Hey, I have an extra dose of the most dangerous drug in America… Do you want it?”

In the name of writing, I said yes. However; it should be noted here that me using my blogging as an excuse to do whatever I want, so that I might accurately pen the experience, has become a concern for some friends. I did recently suggest that because I write about race from time to time that I had a responsibility to my future readers to have at least one relationship with an African American woman, for no other reason than she is an African American.

My friends may be right.

I also pride myself on being an adventurer, so I was a little excited when the night to conduct my experiment had finally arrived. My test was not very scientific; it was just me and the dog, so I decided that she would have to be my control group. I explained the role thoroughly to her, but I am not sure she understood me. She may be adorable, but she is not a very smart dog. I popped the pill into my mouth and washed it down with a long sip of water. I made a refreshed sigh while cracking my knuckles, and then settled in my chair to start writing this post, as I awaited the effects.

Here are the numbers, while I can still understand numbers. In 2013, 22,767 people died from prescription drug overdoses. In that same year, 14,775 people died from overdosing on all other illicit drugs combined, including heroin, meth and all forms of cocaine.

Marijuana did not kill anybody in 2013.

If I wanted to put the butcher’s bill for prescription drugs in perspective, I could say that it is the equivalent of 9/11 happening over and over, every forty-eight days. If you didn’t already know this, and care enough to find the total upsetting, you will likely be disgusted when you discover that the number isn’t really all that accurate.

Many of the deaths on heroin’s rap sheet partially belong on the pharmaceutical corporation’s tally as well. Whether it starts from prescription or recreation, people become addicted to pills, and then as their life starts to collapse under the weight of that addiction (inevitable job loss coupled with the cost of the drugs themselves), they become heroin addicts, because heroin is the cheapest version of that high.

I spent over three years of my life as the executive vice president of a logistics company that delivered pharmaceuticals, including literally tons of narcotics, so I’ll go ahead and call myself an expert on their legal transportation. If the fact that processed latex from a plant growing in some of the most dangerous places in the world, can make it half-way across the planet to America, but still be cheaper than a pill made in America, doesn’t prove to you that something fishy may be going on, you are not paying attention.

You might think of heroin as an inner-city problem, and it is, but not always. Just north-east of Saint Louis is a county called Madison. This is one of the more affluent suburbs of Saint Louis, and certainly the most prosperous on the Illinois side of the river. In 2014, twenty-six people died of confirmed heroin overdoses in Madison County (the county’s total population is around 270,000). Thankfully, this number does not include many children, but that is nothing to celebrate.

Many of the addictions that end in young adult heroin deaths begin when those addicts are children. The addiction initiates when a kid grabs a few pills from their parent’s stash, or one of their peers makes the swipe and shares what he or she has stolen. As this behavior continues, an addiction to the high develops right along with a profitable market for the pills themselves. Like adults, the young people eventually switch to heroin because children cannot typically afford fancy pharmaceuticals, even if they do have a job at McDonald’s.

This scenario is happening every day in communities all over this country, but it is more than a little confusing when you consider the socioeconomic status enjoyed by many in Madison County. The schools in that county are some of the best in the Midwest, and many of the parents are wealthy and affluent, so why does that area have such a heroin problem?

I can find part of the answer by looking at my own life. If you looked at my list of possessions, you would likely consider me poor (you and I probably have vastly different definitions of the word “poor”, but that is a separate discussion). One of the side effects of my financial poverty is my lack of health insurance. Because I have no insurance, my access to doctors is limited. Should I find myself in a hospital, and in pain, any request for pain medication is met with cynicism. The doctor doesn’t know me and therefore chooses a pain management regimen that is the least likely to get me high.

However; if you are a normal member of society, with insurance and other adult stuff, you probably know your doctor well. People with money, too much time, and only made-up problems; tend to believe that they are not healthy if their bodies do not always feel as if those bodies are operating optimally. These fears have been cultivated to extremes over the last two decades, thanks to television advertising. It should be noted here that allowing pharmaceutical companies to market to consumers directly, is so dangerous that only two countries in the entire world allow it (New Zealand and the United States).

If you have insurance, the doctor you have been seeing for years will be much more likely to give you the medication you request, including the good pain-killers. Is this is why heroin addiction is running rampant in upscale communities? Is there simply more access to legally prescribed drugs, thanks to resources?

Regardless of my thoughts on addiction, I still insisted on taking my Oxy. My primary goal for life is to be well-rounded, and have a deep understanding of this world before I leave it. I cannot do that unless I experience as much of it for myself, and Oxycontin just got scratched off of the bucket list. I have never tried heroin or crack, but just to be on the safe side, I am waiting until retirement before I test them.

If you think this is irresponsible of me, you should know that I feel exactly the opposite. If everything you have learned about drugs originated from a Dare commercial, or your preacher; I have absolutely no use for your opinion. Furthermore; if you like to rail against drugs, while downing your Lexapro with a night-cap, you are even worse; a hypocrite. I, along with the rest of America, listened to Rush Limbaugh condemn all illegal drugs for years, while he simultaneously struggled with an addiction to legal ones.

I can certainly understand how Rush became addicted; opiates make you feel pretty amazing. The effects of my Oxy seemed to crawl in through an itch on my foot, and then slowly cover my entire body in a warm blanket. Thanks to my bipolar disorder, I have terrible anxiety most of the time. Twenty minutes after consuming my Oxy, I suddenly feared nothing. You could have shown me images of mangled toddlers and puppies that night, and it would not have bothered me. I truly can’t remember ever feeling that good before, and that is extremely dangerous.

I think I understand why doctors consider opiate addictions the most difficult to recover from. My personal experience with opiate addicts, as well as the opiates themselves, reminds me of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers movies. It doesn’t take very long for the person you knew to be replaced by an alien with no use for social conventions. And, like movie aliens, the new pretend-human will consume resources until there are none left. Parents of addicts know exactly what I am talking about.

I just don’t understand why we cannot control the prescription drug problem a little better. Addiction and the drug war are both forms of slavery, and we need to begin seeing them that way. It may seem counter-intuitive, but I think it is time to surrender, while we can still make demands. Politicians want only victories, so if our leaders need to feign triumph to make this happen, so be it. Great job guys!

Many Americans believe that all drugs should remain illegal because being high serves no purpose, and they may be right. It is difficult to argue against that point, but when you consider the fact that drugs have been a part of our civilization for thousands of years (at least 3000 before Jesus Christ was even born), the argument itself seems pointless. There are some aspects of the human condition you are just going to have to accept, and move on.

The first and most obvious step toward fixing America’s drug problem should be to remove marijuana from the list of schedule one drugs, because it does not belong there. In addition to the many illegal drugs I have tried, I have also been given many legal pills by doctors attempting to battle my bipolar. If I were to put all mind altering substances I have tried, in order of danger to my health, marijuana would lie at the safest end, just after coffee, and just before cigarettes. Alcohol would be at the very far end of that spectrum.

Proof that marijuana is not only safe, but medically useful, is everywhere, so why is it still illegal? This is America after all, so in order to answer that question, we have to look at who benefits from the status quo. The most obvious group includes the current legal peddlers of mind altering substances, like alcohol and pharmaceutical manufacturers. These companies have been given the opportunity to legally corner the market on drug use, and have failed us; miserably.

I am not as concerned about Big Pharma as you might think. Although the U.S. government holds the patent on medical marijuana, pharmaceutical companies are already filing patents to cover different uses of cannabinoids, including THC. Money is the only ideology these corporations understand, so if something is profitable, they will figure out a way to make it legal.

The most dangerous foes to legalization are the many groups whose jobs are directly affected by the current marijuana rules, like police orders, lawyers, guard unions and the giant corporations that now operate many of our prisons. These groups are motivated to denounce marijuana, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, over fears of lost revenue, seizures, and wages. I get that. Capitalism, in a free society, insists that these voices be heard, but I will never believe that a non-violent marijuana farmer, rotting in prison, should be the cost of an up-tick in your stock price.

What is most odd about the police’s stance against marijuana is that it contradicts law enforcement’s commitment against violence. Non-violence is one of the oldest and most accepted side-effects of cannabis. If you are a police officer responding to a domestic call, would you prefer the people you encounter to be drunk or stoned, if those were your only two options? Stoned, of course; if I was a police officer I would want all of my criminals slow, easily distracted, peacefully paranoid, and extremely hungry.

One of my very favorite quotes of all time comes from author and philosopher, Edmund Burke. Over two hundred years ago he said, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

That quote makes me wonder what a good man looks like. Is the pharmaceutical sales-rep, with whom you play golf a couple of times per year, a good man? It’s possible that you don’t even like him, but you golf anyway, because you have business together. Are you a good man? Maybe, you are the pharmacist that owns his own store, and never misses church on Sunday, so he pays for the round. Are you a good man now?

Oxycontin was invented in Germany in 1916, but wasn’t manufactured in America until 1996, when a company called Purdue Pharmaceuticals decided to give it a try. In May of 2007 Purdue pled guilty to misleading the public about Oxycontin’s risk of addiction, and agreed to pay $600 million in one of the largest pharmaceutical settlements in U.S. history.

Oxycontin led the wave of opiate resurgence in America, and all of the deaths that came with it, but not one single person from Purdue did any jail-time for their crimes. They were given probation. In fact, Purdue Pharmaceuticals still exists. Do good men run Purdue Pharmaceuticals? If a man has enough money to own private shares of Purdue, is he a good man? As a waiter, I often serve at pharmaceutical sales dinners and gladly accept the generous tip I receive. Am I a good man?

Maybe a short history lesson will help us understand the definition of good men. On April 12th, 1945, General George Patton toured the newly liberated concentration camp called Buchenwald. Three days later Patton had American GIs walk two-thousand citizens from the town of Weimar, five miles away, at gun-point, to see what was happening inside the camp. Most claimed that they had no idea that such atrocities were occurring so close, but that sounds like horse-shit to me. I am also certain that at least a handful of those citizens earned a living supplying that camp, but never missed church or took drugs.

Note: I apologize for going Nazi in my argument. I also think it is kind of douche-like of me. You cannot compare hundreds of thousands of drug deaths, with millions of deaths in the name of genocide. Just pretend I am a politician, those guys see Hitler everywhere. Also, it should be noted that Adolph Hitler was given daily doses of drugs like cocaine, heroin, meth and opiates. I wonder what history would look like if he had been given marijuana instead… just saying.

I think it is safe to say that we are all good men doing nothing. That needs to change.

I can do something. I can publish this blog post. Nothing good can come from me boasting publicly that I smoke marijuana, or that I am willing to pop the occasional pill. My drugs of choice, in order of consumed quantities, are: nicotine, caffeine, alcohol, Zantac, marijuana, Xanax and ibuprofen. I have also taken cocaine, Seroquel, ecstasy, LSD, Celexa, mushrooms, and almost every type of pain-killer.

Thanks to my bipolar, I can only smoke marijuana when I am by myself due to its exacerbating effect on my anxiety. Marijuana has three very specific purposes in my life; as a sleep aid, going to the movies (without my kids), and to make my two hour bike-rides more interesting. Marijuana is distracting, so my Huffy is the heaviest equipment I operate stoned.

I have children, ex-wives, bosses and friends that might not be pleased by the above revelations. So, why do I admit these things? If a handful of readers are entertained by my idiotic confession and it allows even one of them to open their eyes to see the wasteful hypocrisy of the drug war, as it actually exists, haven’t I done something? Is it not only worth the risk, but imperative that I admit these things?

Well, that sums up my review of Oxycontin and the drug war. Oxy will make you feel absolutely nothing, which is fantastic, but I do not recommend you try it more than once. In order for society to operate properly, we need to all be on Oxycontin or none of us at all. As for the war on drugs, we should probably take a little advice from the pot smoking hippies and consider giving peace a chance.

Now, somebody please pass me the Advil. I have a headache.

Post Script: I am in no way suggesting that anyone start smoking pot, drop out of their lives, and start a religion based on The Dude, from The Big Lebowski. You can’t, somebody already has. It is called The Church of the Latter-Day Dude, and they have hundreds of ordained priests. They even let women be priests! Those people are crazy.

Teenagers, Taints and Sir Isaac Newton

There is a short trail on my regular bike route that passes quickly through about a half-mile of trees, on the edge of two subdivisions. The asphalt trail is six feet wide, with about three feet of grass on either side, before the tree line. The dense of foliage mostly blocks your view of the homes and creates a beautiful canopy. It is my favorite part of the ride. Here it is. Doesn’t it seem peaceful?

I take most of my rides on weekday mornings and afternoons, so the trail is typically empty. I try to go on these long bike rides at least every other day, so occasionally I have to ride on Saturday mornings, when the trails are littered with normal people.

Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about Sundays. God and the devil take care of Sundays. I am often accused of being anti-religion, with good cause, but religion, or the lack of it, can be very useful. Church and hangovers are effective means of keeping enough people occupied on Sundays, as to make them no more congested than Tuesday morning rides.

I try not to get too irritated by the Saturday traffic. There are also more soccer moms on Saturdays, balancing some of that irritation. Busy Saturdays make me appreciate the other days and feel indebted for one of the luckiest circumstances of my current existence. By working mostly nights, all of my life’s maintenance; things like working out, shopping, going to the DMV, or any number of other boring but necessary tasks, are not that inconvenient for me. Almost every errand is run during off-peak hours, so I hardly ever wait in line. Since the average person spends around two years of their life in line, I’ll call myself fortunate.

The down-side to my schedule, of course, is that I miss most of my friend’s gatherings. Those events are typically held on weekend nights, when I am at work. That is probably a good thing too; if I come to your party, you are just as likely to bid me farewell as find me nearly passed out in your bathtub the next morning, still holding your family dog, and smoking a cigarette in post coital bliss. It’s probably best that you not invite me at all; it is just not worth the risk.

Note: This is sarcasm. A little piece of your soul dies when you start writing and discover that so many more people than you ever thought possible don’t get sarcasm. If you are one of these people, and a hacker over at PETA, please understand that I, at no time, have had sex with an animal, or advocated bestiality, in any way.

Last Saturday, I climbed the small hill at the entrance to my trail to find four kids in their early teens walking abreast, occupying the entire path, about a hundred yards ahead of me. I watched as another biker approached from the opposite direction, and to my disgust, the teens did not even attempt to make room for that bicyclist. Had that biker not jerked his ride to the right, he would have plowed into the two teens indignantly occupying his half of the path.

My temper ignited well beyond reason, and I immediately pedaled as fast as I could toward the group of teenagers. I came to a screeching halt right behind them, jumped off of my bike, and then started screaming before I had even pulled the buds from my ears.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?” I shouted at all four kids.

The expressions on their pimpled faces, as I screamed, were very similar to that look you see on the faces of zoo-goers while watching an hysterical monkey. I know this look because I also have a teenage son that thinks he is more evolved than I. The look simultaneously evaluates me as old and useless.

Those kids’ silent communication sent my anger into the stratosphere. A small piece of my brain began to debate whether or not I was going to have a gang affiliation when I was sent to prison for what I was about to do.

I don’t really want to go to prison, so I resigned myself to just continue screaming. My questioning what was wrong with these particular kids had gotten no answers, so I decided my best course of action was to insult their entire generation.

“IS THAT WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE?” I screamed. “ARE WE RAISING A GENERATION FILLED WITH FUCKING RETARDS?”

The subdivisions on either side of the trail are filled with very nice houses, and likely decent parents, so it occurred to me as these kids stared back at me dumbly, that they have probably never been screamed at by a strange adult, in this manner. The thought did not calm me down, but it made me realize that there was nothing I could scream at these kids that was going to get my point across.

I turned and pedaled away, yelling one final thought into the air like a madman. Directed at the world itself, I hollered, “THIS IS OUR FUTURE LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, AND IT IS FILLED WITH FUCKING RETARDS!”

I was nearly two miles away from the conflict when it began to dawn on me that I might have been a bit too aggressive with the spoiled little miscreants. It also occurred to me that I was being hypocritical; an unforgivable sin in my eyes. I’ll certainly never win the Father of The Year Award, but I do love my little bastards; fiercely. Should I ever happen upon someone shouting at either of my children, the way I yelled at those kids, there will be shots fired long before any questions can be asked.

By the time I reached home, I was filled with regret for my outburst. My visceral reaction to the indignant children was way out of line, and it did absolutely nothing to help them understand manners, common sense or courtesy. I answered ignorance with violence, just like old men would have done to me, when I was a teenager. This cycle has been going on much longer than I have been alive.

In Mary Schmich’s famous speech, Wear Sunscreen, she says, “Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you’ll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.”

Am I officially old now? If I am old, why have I not already learned the lesson: Violence’s only job in this world is to combat other violence? There are no other uses for viciousness, and there are no exceptions to this rule.

I allowed the question to concern me for a moment, before realizing that I can’t officially be old if I am still learning lessons at all, and my body still lets me take long bike rides.

In closing, I guess I owe those four jack-ass kids an apology. I am almost sorry, and that is a big step for me.

Post Script: All teenagers know Newton’s three laws of motion from science class. Based on their knowledge of the first two laws, all of these kids are aware, that by jumping off of my bike, while braking, but not waiting until I came to a complete stop, I instantly made that bike 175lbs. lighter, and its shitty brakes that much more effective. I stayed in motion; the bike did not.

That’s right, just before I began screaming at these children, I jumped prematurely from the bike and instantly slammed my dick and balls into the very bottom part of the handlebars. And then, as if that wasn’t enough, I overcompensated by jerking back and downward, thereby slamming my taint into the crossbar. It still feels like I have a bruise there, but I am not going to straddle a mirror to check for a damaged taint.

Forgetting these simple laws out of anger is embarrassing because I respect mathematics and quantum mechanics so much. I see the evolution of physics as the closest thing to a religion that I can find believable. That being said; this entire story falls under one of the oldest scientific precepts: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This is Sir Isaac Newton’s third law of motion, but it is often called Karma.

Off The Reservation – Chapter 1, Part 1

This is the next post in my ongoing plan to share as much of my memoir; Off The Reservation: Stories I Almost Took To The Grave And Probably Should Have, as I can.

This published memoir starts with childhood, but the original version I wrote did not follow chronological order. I attempted to deviate from the standard sequential format of biography to create a cause and effect description of my life. I almost immediately discovered that the great friends who agreed to be guinea pigs for my first draft had a hard time following along, so I changed the format.

I realize now that I was not yet skilled enough to take my readers along the path I desired, but I still believe that my story’s chain of circumstances is the most important aspect that you won’t find written in the book. It is my hope that some of you see it anyway.

CHAPTER 1

CARS, CATS, AND OTHER LIVING THINGS

The three of us leaned forward in the seat and whispered in unison. “Sledgehammer,” we said softly but maniacally toward the car’s vents.

After letting the threat of violence sink in for a moment, my father’s girlfriend Heather slowly turned the key in the ignition for a second time. This struggle was commonplace for the old Ford—a perfect mixture of blue and rust, with a white vinyl top so severely cracked as to give it a marble appearance. I had no understanding of cars as status symbols and what this one said about our family. To me, it was a fantastic machine, a giant blue whale of steel and glass. It had great big white pleather bench seats and came complete with a hole in the floor on the passenger side, where rust had eaten all the way to open air. Through this hole, one might watch the asphalt whiz by or drop an errant French fry or piece of candy when nobody was looking. I laughed a villainous chuckle as each victim disappeared through my trap door.

The obstinate Ford failed to start for a second time, and the wind-up was slowing, threatening back at us a dying battery. My sister and I both sat on the bench front seat, our seatbelts completely ignored, listening intently to the cranking of the starter for any proof of life.

I was six, short and thin with a giant mop of unkempt curly blond hair and blue eyes. On my skin I wore my annual coat of poison ivy, covered in dull pink calamine lotion. I was every kid in a movie that takes place in California in the early seventies, but upstate New York was as far from California as you could be.

My sister Amy was ten, much taller, a giant really. Unlike me, Amy was embossed with all of the traits of our Sicilian father: dark hair, dark eyes, and olive skin. She was every girl you ever saw in a movie about New York; she fit in.

I was always jealous of my sister’s familial dark features. Blond-haired, blue-eyed children have a tendency of standing out awkwardly in Italian family photos. I am only half-Italian, as is my sister, but we couldn’t look more different. The sight of us with our father made you wonder if perhaps there was a Swede hiding in the woodpile.

Amy and I are only half-Italian, but we were both mostly raised by whole Italians of different degrees. How Italian you are can be easily determined by how many Italian words you pepper into your everyday speech. My grandparents spoke only Italian when they were alone. Their children knew the words but only spoke it to their parents, and I don’t speak the language at all. I do actually know a little. If you would like to be called lazy and stupid, and then in four different ways be told in no uncertain terms that it would be completely acceptable for you to go and fuck yourself, I’m your guy.

Although our first two attempts to start the car had failed, I was somewhat relieved. All I could think of was the inspection under the hood we always had to do when we visited Heather’s family farm. It was imperative that you examine the motor compartment before leaving, because one cat had already died after crawling into the engine of a parked car in that driveway. Despite all of the farm’s wonders, visits meant being haunted by the idea of an angry car engine turning a cat into burger.

I was traumatized by the thought. The image of a poor, defenseless, bloody cat wrapped around a fan blade preoccupied my thoughts every time a car started. If it took two or three tries to start the car, so much the better. Maybe a trapped feline might use those moments to escape and thus save itself.

“Junkyard… Scrap metal… Trash heap.”

We all knew that whispering threats to the cantankerous Ford was the only way to get it to start, everybody in the family did. The triple dose of intimidation worked like a charm, and as the vehicle sputtered to life, we pulled from the driveway with all the animals alive and well.

I really don’t know why I was so concerned about the cats. My allergies had already swelled my face, and I was sure to wake the next morning with my eyes sealed shut thanks to our visit to the upstate New York farm and its many creatures.

I am very allergic to cats—so allergic, in fact, that they could literally be weaponized against me. Many years later, I would marry a woman who hated me with such ferocity that I would arrive home from work one day to find she had gone to the pound and adopted a little brown one out of spite. She held it close to her face and smiled at me menacingly over the fur as I came walking through the door, but that is a different story.

The glorious New York farm we were leaving was home to Heather’s parents. They weren’t farmers at all but mechanics, and instead of fixing plows in the barn, they built the best racecars in New York, or so I was told. Heather’s father Bud was a renowned driver and mechanic—famous thanks to his legendary string of wins on the New York stock-car circuit when he was young. Bud was the perfect combination of simple, gruff, and satisfied that you never meet in a city. After he hung up his gloves but before his sons were old enough to race, Bud built fantastical machines in his garage for other drivers.

The men would stand around in the barn all night, every night after dinner, to work on the racecars and drink beer. They drank Miller High Life but often discussed their common grievances about not being able to drink Coors—well, not in New York anyway. Thanks to the movie Smokey and the Bandit, which started the rumor that the beer was illegal east of the Mississippi, as well as poor distribution policies by Coors, New York beer drinkers of the late seventies and early eighties would often create elaborate conspiracy theories as to why the libation was not readily available.

The farm was surrounded by apple orchards, overrun with cats, and home to a pet skunk. It even contained a real hen house. Whenever I spent the night there, I would try to wake up before the rooster and go as close to the coop as I would dare stand so I could hear his first call to rise. Just so you know, in case you have never experienced it, chickens are fucking vicious.

In the summer and fall I would eat green unripe apples from the orchard and blackberries off the stone wall that bordered it until my stomach was in knots and my skin covered in poison ivy. Small but delicious strawberries grew wild on the side of the road; it was a magical place.

This was the summer of my seventh birthday, and I didn’t know much, but I knew that cars had souls, and ours lived in fear of the many possible punishments we threatened it with. I also knew that cats, unripe fruit, and the three-leaved plants they both hid behind were bad for me no matter how much I loved them. I will spend the rest of my life learning that there are a great many so-called cats to be love/hated, and not all cars are fearful.

I lived with my sister Amy, my father Michael, and his girlfriend Heather in the sleepy town of Fairport, New York, a small village along the Erie Canal waterfront. It was kind of a dump when I lived there, but it has become a haven for hip, happy white people since then. As a child, the only thing I liked about Fairport was the lift bridge, which hardly lifted at all.

New York summers exist in such stark contrast to its bleak winters that survival needs to be built into the character of its buildings and people. Both are constructed to be strong enough to endure the cold and snow, but soft enough to enjoy warmth and fruit. Growing up in New York means you have a deep respect for spring and the promise it brings.

My mother, Debbie, had left us a couple of years earlier—or at least it felt like years. Debbie had been raised in the poorest suburbs of St. Louis, and gotten pregnant by my father shortly after they got together. Three years later, after moving to New York, my parents decided to get married because they had accidentally gotten pregnant again, with me. The Supreme Court had ruled abortion constitutional about six months before my mother became expectant with me, so I am sort of happy they decided not to be trailblazers in the matter.

To be continued…

Post Script: When new people I meet discover that I have written a memoir, one of two statements is made. The most common response is more of a narrowing of the eyes, than a statement. They are unaware that some of the best memoir writers in the world are regular people; not famous people. The other response comes from those persons that believe that they too have a book inside of them. Some memoir writers become irritated by this question; I have read so on their blogs. They feel as if the statement somehow diminishes what they have written, because somebody believes it easy enough to do themselves. This is horse-shit. If you think you can write a book about your life you should at least try. What’s the worst that could happen? Jenny McCarthy has written nine books, and she is an idiot.

The Blackbird

As I get older, and my taste in fun changes, there remain a few childhood loves that will likely never leave me. One of these is jets. Big, fast, loud jets; armed to the teeth. I am not a military weapons fanatic, don’t own a gun, and have never served, but I make exceptions for fighter-jets. Air shows are Viagra to the little boy I will always be.

My very favorite plane is the SR-71 Blackbird. This reconnaissance aircraft was built by the Skunk Works division of Lockheed in the 1960s. The challenges overcome to build this aircraft seemed impossible when the project began. The SR-71 has flown higher than 16 miles, and as the fastest air-breathing aircraft on the planet, can travel from New York to London in just under two hours. No Blackbird has ever been shot down.

The SR-71 remained a secret weapon until 1964, when President Lyndon Johnson revealed it at a press conference. The actual name of the plane was the RS-71, not SR, but in his speech, Johnson switched the letters around, or at least that is how the story goes. Instead of correcting the commander in chief, the Air Force just changed the name. That sounds damn respectful to me.

You won’t find a lot of data on the gaffe, because to the press at the time, this was a non-story. Can you imagine the kind of fire a modern president would be under, should he or she make a mistake like this? Thanks to the rise in social media and instant communication over the last sixteen years, sitting presidents have needed to be perfect. Human beings are defined by imperfection, so is the ultimate goal here to elect an alien?

So many of you hate Obama and Bush II, that you have made that hate, a part of your personality. As a fan of hate, I am not here to judge, but you should know that carrying around anger like that gets heavy. If visible light could illuminate my emotional shadow, it would look a bit like Santa Clause with a full sack.

My problem with all of this hate is the disrespect. Whomever the people choose as the next president, regardless of his or her political affiliation, deserves respect. During World War II, the press almost never mentioned that Roosevelt was paralyzed, out of respect, and many of us consider that to be our finest hour.

I state here and now, that I owe President Bush II an apology. Regardless of my opinion on his policies, he was an American President, and thus deserved more respect than I gave his office. I am sorry; I was much younger, angrier, and not yet aware that we are all in this together.

As for the sitting president; his term is almost up, and he will have survived your contempt. If I were Obama, on my last day as president, just as I was about climb the stairs to Marine One for the last time, I would turn and give every one of my haters what they deserve, and just let one fly!

Post Script:

Trump Should Thank God For Mexicans

Donald Trump is smart. It hurt more than you know to start this off by saying that, but absolute honesty requires kudos to those whom you find yourself diametrically opposed, from time to time. One of these many areas that Donald and I consider differently is immigration.

I read a poll this morning claiming that 92% of the American people also consider immigration a problem; so once again, I mostly fall into the minority. If I believe differently than over ninety-percent of my fellow citizens, does that make me mathematically wrong on that subject altogether? I also believe that Trump would be a disaster if elected president, but thankfully 73 percent of republicans currently agree with me.

The smartest thing Trump has done, was to open his campaign by claiming that Mexico was sending murderers, rapist and drug dealers into this country. Although, he did admit that some were decent people, when most are not out murdering, raping or dealing, they are taking your jobs. He also promised to build a wall. A fourteenth century Chinese solution to a twenty-first century American problem; yeah… that will probably work.

Note: I am actually all-for building the wall along the border, and it has nothing to do with the Mexicans. I believe that there is no such thing as a public works project that is bad for the economy. Egypt built pyramids. Rome built aqueducts. The Church built churches. We should be building roads, but I will take walls. We need a reason to build something… anything!

Opening with an attack on illegal Mexicans was very smart of Trump, and sort-of obvious in hind-sight. Undocumented workers can’t legally vote, and even if they cheated and got a vote in, there aren’t nearly enough of them to affect anything. In other words, they cannot fight back. My personal vocabulary is a source of pride for me, but I can’t seem to think of the word that represents when somebody with nearly unlimited resources smacks around somebody that has no chance of fighting back. I think it has something to do with a male cow? Not sure, let’s remember to circle back to that.

I have been told that too many numbers scare off readers, so I am just going to say what I have to say, without all of the data. Different versions of the facts are out there, at your fingertips. Maybe, you will consider not watching another cat video in order to research why you think I am wrong; I dare all 295 million of you to do so at this time.

Additionally, I will mostly avoid the crime aspect of the immigration debate. I am not afraid of discussing that facet; there just is not enough room here to even begin debating crime percentages within poverty stricken socioeconomic classes. There are probably a thousand books on the subject, dating back hundreds of years, but even the least intellectual of my readers knows that there is more crime within poverty stricken areas and races. This is common sense.

The following thoughts on immigration will focus primarily on the economic impact of illegal farm workers, but I will start with a story in which economics and crime come together.

Several days ago, while waiting in line at the bank, I overheard a conversation two women were having just ahead of me. A tall, white woman, in her mid-forties, was speaking to a shorter version of herself, about Kathryn Steinle; the woman who was murdered in California by an undocumented Latino. The tall woman was expressing empathy for the Kathryn’s father, while claiming that all illegal immigrants should be sent home. I wanted to walk up to her and scream in her face, “YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT A SOLVED CRIME… IN A BANK!”

The American banking system nearly collapsed our economy, and in the process destroyed millions of lives. I have great sympathy for Kathryn Steinle’s family, but her murderer has been caught, and will likely spend the rest of his miserable life in prison. He is garbage and should be disposed of. What concerns me about conversations like this occurring in a bank, is that the pain of the Steinle family is a grain of sand compared to the beach of heartache created due to the illegal actions of American bankers, and not one of those bankers went to jail. Standing in a bank, discussing a solved crime, is like standing in Jonestown discussing your distaste for Kool-Aid.

Most Americans fear illegal immigration because of its perceived effect on the economy. The problem with arguing that illegal immigrants are hurting the economy, is that it probably isn’t true. I say “probably”, because I like to leave room for the possibility I am wrong. I know it is unheard of for someone like me to entertain the idea that I may be wrong about something for which I have passionate feelings. Don’t worry; it is probably just a glitch in my broken thinker.

If you read conservative news reports about immigration, you typically come away feeling confident that undocumented workers are taking all the low paying jobs; ones that should be going to Americans. I have to admit that this is true, but Americans don’t want those jobs. I don’t want those jobs, and having personally owned a freight business that specialized in the transportation of fruits and vegetables, I can promise you that you don’t want those jobs either.

For the sake of a balanced discussion, I tried to find a path that proved conservatives are correct about aliens taking all of the jobs, and ruining the economy. Let’s assume, for a moment, that every single illegal immigrant was deported tomorrow. Southern farmers, most of them conservative, would immediately need to replace the labor pool they had lost. The work is literally back-breaking, so how much would they have to pay legal citizens to do the job? Those farmers would suddenly find themselves competing for the fast-food workforce (On the bright side, thanks to the above-mentioned bankers, the fast-food workforce has gotten much bigger). What would you rather do, pick onions all day, in the heat, or offer fries with that?

Fruit and vegetable pickers are paid by production. At less than 50 cents per bucket, a very experienced onion picker can earn around $150 for a twelve hour day.

Wait… What?

Does this mean that if we doubled the pay to the farm workers, and then passed all of that increase on to consumers, it would only mean paying a quarter more for a bag of onions? This seems like an easy answer. I have managed hotel food operations, owned a large restaurant, been vice president of a medium sized courier company, managed large construction projects, and even owned a freight business. I have struggled with staffing my whole life, and the jobs I was offering were mostly inside, not that hard and year-round. If you told me that I could double the advertised pay for even the worst job I had available; I would consider that job filled.

Unfortunately, the bad news is that we tried this already and it didn’t work. Georgia and Alabama enacted strict immigration laws in 2011, and predictably, many undocumented workers left the state, or even worse, did not travel to those states at harvest time. For the first two years after the law’s passing, conservative southern farmers lost hundreds of millions of dollars, as the food they grew rotted in the fields. The farmers reported that only a fraction of workers they needed showed up at harvest, and many of them quit after the first day, due to the difficulty of the work. In true Sothern-style, authorities brought in prisoners to do the work.

Now, four years later, many pieces of these laws have either been repealed or invalidated by state Supreme Courts. The parts that remain are hardly enforceable, and most of the undocumented workers have returned with the harvests. Authorities have been told to leave them alone.

I am not suggesting that you change your opinion on immigration, or Donald Trump. Parts of me agree with you, on both matters. I am personally irritated when a foreigner moves to this country, but refuses to learn the language we speak; that should be your first priority. As for Trump, his stance against our tired political machine is very refreshing. He speaks from the heart, so I give him points for that.

All I ask is that while you are watching tonight’s debate, you consider the onions, cherries, strawberries and tomatoes you love so much. Imagine yourself in a scorching, hot field for twelve hours picking that food for around minimum wage. Now, I don’t know about you, but anybody willing to work that hard, justto be in this country, sounds exactly like the kind of person that has a shot at making America great again.

Maybe we should reach out to Mexico and ask for more of these farm workers, instead of less? We could even offer to trade them some bankers and politicians.

TRUMP / TRUMP’S HAIR 2016!!!!!

Post Script: Several months ago, a young man from Turkey, in America on a short-term visa, was hired where I work. His name is Sam. I have to admit, I was immediately irritated that we had hired a person that barely spoke English, when he started. Training Sam was certainly difficult in the beginning, but he quickly caught on. Within weeks, Sam was not only well-trained, but the absolute best we had. We were only one of Sam’s jobs, but you would think we were a coveted internship, if you saw how hard he worked. Sam’s visa is about to expire, so he came into work yesterday, on his day off, to ensure he had the chance to say goodbye and get pictures with everyone. Additionally, he made an effort to let every single person know that they were always welcome in his family’s home in Turkey. We could all learn a lot from Sam.

Freedom Of Speech And The N Word

I came across a story this morning that is really bothering me. Apparently, a woman in Nashville was sitting in her car, at a red light, talking on her cell-phone, when a man pulled up alongside her and began screaming through his window. He called her a “nigger” several times for using her phone, and even threatened to strike her. The woman caught most of the incident on her phone’s camera. Below is the link to the news feed and video.

Road rage video: In just 6 seconds, man yells N-word twice, threatens ‘punch the f*ck’ out of woman

After posting the video to her Facebook page, many people sent messages of support to the woman. The consensus of opinion was that the woman’s next step should be to report the stranger to police. It goes on to mention that the interaction occurred at three in the afternoon, next to a school. The woman that took the video finishes her interview by saying that she wants, “his employers to see it, his friends to see it, his church, his family.” Is that man an asshole? Absolutely! In no way is it acceptable to say those things to another human being.

Most of you would agree with me when I call the man an asshole, but we all need to keep in mind that things can get pretty tricky when we start telling people what to say. Words mean a great deal to me. They sit just behind my children on my list of things worth fighting for. All other human rights are possible, so long as we can think and say whatever we want.

I have to be honest; I don’t really care if you have guns, get abortions, don’t believe in god or fear gay marriages. To me, those arguments are all noise, and important because we are allowed to have them at all. It is only the words that concern me, and I will fight to the death for my right to use any words I want, any time I want; without exception.

As a writer, I can’t wait until I am successful enough to have some consistent haters. I will embrace their stupidity with kindness, because I know how important they are. The pieces are being put into place to create actual world-wide, Wi-Fi internet access. I am pretty sure that we are going to need some boundary pushers then. I plan on being one of them.

English writer Beatrice Evelyn Hall’s most famous quote is, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” The quote is often credited to Voltaire, but he never said the line. It was supposed to summarize Voltaire’s thoughts about On The Mind, a book published in 1758 that had been banned and burned, because it questioned the Catholic faith. This quote is at the core of the idea behind freedom of speech, and it may be the most important line said on that matter, or any other.

So, most of us agree that this guy is a racist jerk, but do we really need to get police involved? If we did, shouldn’t both the man and the woman be cited? It is not illegal to talk on your phone while driving in Tennessee yet, but it is illegal to type while driving. If the woman hit the pad on her phone at all, she was breaking the law. Typing while driving and verbal threats are both illegal in Tennessee, but which is more dangerous?

If you are a parent to one of the kids in that nearby school, what would you think held greater danger for your child?

A. Someone talking on their phone while driving near the school at the time of day most likely have school children crossing the street.

B. You kids over-hearing someone using vulgarity and racial slurs in a very threatening manner.

We like to teach our children that sticks and stones can break bones, but words can never hurt them. As our kids get older, we start to give this rule caveats. Oh… wait… don’t say these words, they kind-of hurt. And this word, this word is grounds for having your life ruined. I know this goes against popular opinion, but I do not agree.

It is possible that I have been too heavily influenced by George Carlin; an unwitting soldier in the battle he fought against the fear of words.

Your opinion on race is most definitely influenced by where you live. I live fifteen miles from Ferguson, MO, and speakers from all over the country have come here to talk about racial equality, over the last year. The problem with the current conversation on race is that it is an argument instead of a discussion.

This argument stirs so many emotions because of slavery, and the many sins born from that institution. Slavery has been illegal in America for over one-hundred and fifty years, but unfortunately it is not the only atrocity Americans have committed upon one another. I find it a bit hypocritical when I hear someone bring up slavery, while standing on ground that a Native American likely died protecting, or was forced to walk away from. I am just grateful that I had no part to play in either of those events.

If I judged someone based on the color of their skin, I would be the hypocrite. The Human Genome Project has proved scientifically that every single person that has ever lived is a descendant of the same dark skinned tribe in Central Africa. My great, great, great… X1000… grandmother was a black woman. This fact reminds me of Dennis Hopper’s death speech to Christopher Walken in True Romance.

We all need to get some damn perspective. The discussion on race starts with a discussion on poverty, not skin color. While we are having that discussion, no opinions or words, regardless of how vile and stupid they appear, will be suppressed.

Additionally, I can also promise you this; if you start putting people in jail for the things that they say, you are going to have one hell of a fight on your hands. That is no threat. It is a promise.

Post Script: Tennessee has the highest percentage of cell phone related accidents in the U.S. In 2011, over ten-percent of all crashes were caused by someone using a hand-held device while driving. Not one single person in Tennessee died from an insult in 2011.

10,000 Hours of Hate

Hemingway once said, “We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master”.

Ugh… Did I just quote Hemingway? Let me get this straight; I am not really a fan of Ernest H., but I somehow find it totally acceptable to borrow his magic hat for a moment, to inspire my readers to understand how passionately I feel about writing? Hypocrite. Oh well; I am pretty sure Hemingway wouldn’t like my writing either.

While we are on the subject, shouldn’t the fact that Hemingway killed himself, sort-of call everything he has ever written into question anyway? I am not trying to hate on the old man; I am probably just bitter, and a little jealous that he was better at suicide than I am.

I mention this quote because it ties so perfectly to the end to my first three years of writing. I have found considerable enjoyment watching other people read my thoughts. To be honest, I’m a little surprised that a group of villagers carrying torches and pitchforks hasn’t already mustered on the front lawn, with written demands for my head.

I have also experienced some of the predicted disappointment. Although I was aware of its unlikeliness, I still fantasized that my words would be immediately recognized as genius and sent viral; launching me toward fame and fortune. The blogs about writing told me not to expect too much right out of the gate, but to my dismay, I hoped regardless.

This is a struggle for most modern writers. Amateur wordsmiths all seem to begin convinced that their arrangement of twenty-six letters will change the face of literature, only to find that nobody really cares what you have to say in the beginning. Being a successful writer used to start by getting the attention of a few gatekeepers. Those same gatekeepers are still in charge, but they are definitely losing their power.

Indie publishing has created a new environment, where you start out trying to get the attention of the many. The democratization of prose has brought millions to the party, which in turn has made it nearly impossible to get noticed. To be a modern author means more than just being good with the words; you must also be a great marketer with plenty of social media savvy.

Competition may bring out the best in some people, but it almost always brings out at least a fraction of hate in all of them. I write like a fighter, and should you want my best game you had better be ready for some hate; even if I love you. Every success I have achieved involved loving what I was doing, while simultaneously hating who I did it for. I’m not saying my personal dichotomy for success is normal, but it has remained true so far.

You should know that I am an expert on hate, and a firm believer that hate is not always a bad idea. We like to pretend love and hate are opposites, but they are merely identical feelings viewed from different perspectives.

All of that being said; I have done the math and found that I have exactly seven-thousand, one-hundred and four hours of hate left for all of you. I won’t bore you with the details; it’s accurate, trust me. The good news is that I started with ten-thousand hours of hate for you, and we have already worked off the first three-thousand or so hours, without you even noticing.

How do I know, so precisely, our current tab?

I recently finished reading Malcolm Gladwell’s third book, Outliers, in which he postulates that it takes ten-thousand hours to become a master at almost anything. There is nothing I love more than “pop economics”, so to Malcolm I say, “Dare accepted”. If I want to be a world-class writer, I will need to spend at least ten-thousand hours occupied passionately toward that goal. I have a lot of work to do.

Dares can be dangerous for me. Mostly, because my passion looks very similar to insanity. When the right dare registers, it is as if the beast within me that accepts dares is goaded to life, and he is not happy about it. With one eye cracked open, this beast has noticed an intolerable impossibility and decides that the gauntlet has been thrown. The beast and I know that I am relentless and unstoppable during these quests, so there is about to be some serious hate. Psychiatrists have named the beast Mania, on several occasions, but I’ll call him Richard.

From here forward, everything I write will be done to master the art of writing itself. I will carefully pick my words every time I use them. If you send me a text, my response may be a simple, “Yep”, but it may also contain an eight-hundred word dissertation on my opinion of our friendship. In whatever form, I will be working toward mastery, five hours per day, every day, for the next four years. Richard is a quirky task-master; maybe I should call him Dick.

I also plan to outright annoy you on social media. I will learn to use every medium at my disposal to practice my attempt at cleverness. There will be rants, reviews, praises and diatribes; all peppered with hate and vulgarity. Lots of vulgarity. I can’t help it; I am offended by the fact that you are all so fucking offended, all of the time. Lighten up. I know your god better than most of you, and he just high-fived me there.

Finally, for those who know me best, there will be some hope. We all know that hope is the key to happiness, so I don’t normally allow that sort of optimism to penetrate my thoughts. It’s not really my color. I also know that there is no way I will make it through the next four years if I don’t, on occasion, substitute a little hope for hate.

Hope, for me, means things like keeping the self-destructive drinking to a minimum, or spending less time fantasizing about my own demise. You would be shocked if you knew how comforting to me, to imagine jumping off of a building or shooting myself in the head. Those thoughts are just one of my idiosyncrasies. I also shit my pants a bit too often for a man my age, but I don’t think that will get in the way of the writing.

Please don’t worry; I know there will be plenty of time and money for booze, whores and crazy thoughts after I am a successful writer.  What do you mean you weren’t worried about that? You’re selfish.

So that is it then; the gauntlet has been thrown and it will be answered with vigor. I have dedicated myself to this craft, and I think I have a good chance of being a great writer four years from now. The elements for me to be successful are all there. I will be doing something I love, and since I will be working for myself, I will hate my fucking boss.

Post script: Just so you know, I have almost no adult, formal education at all. I tell you this because I want you to know how ridiculous I am, for embarking upon the above-mentioned quest. I left school at fifteen-years-old, and never went back. I have never passed a single high-school English class. Even before that, my rebellion against the people masquerading as my parents took the form of a terrible student. Picture a very young me, holding my report card in one hand and the bird in the other.

Finally, when I was sixteen, I was emancipated, making me a legal adult. Everything important I know has been learned; not taught. There is an important distinction between the two, but if you have only been taught, you will likely never understand that.