G. Eric Francis's Blog, page 9

Dadtroversy...Whoa!

I've been a parent for a little more than 10 years now. While I know a lot of folks have me whipped on experience (including having grandkids, for goodness sake), I, at least, would like to share what I have learned about myself as a parents, as well as apologize to my parents, because now I know why they look like they do.

1. To the shock of no one, I have discovered that kids have no sense. Since becoming a parent, I have used the words "stupid" "dumbass", "jackwagon", as well as other colorful metaphors. However, when I ask my child why did he wait so long to go to the bathroom, and his reply was "I was in the middle of destroying some world filled with other loser children who will grow up building girl robots" does not console me as I am scraping out body waste from the back of the commode. Also doesn't help when the youngest keeps slapping himself, then wonders why it h hurts. (Note, having DS doesn't exclude you from figuring out that pain is a bitch).

2. Kids can be quite, quite, quite funny...sometimes intentionally so. Today, my oldest actually was quite witty, cracking me up in ways I didn't know he had in him. If he can hone that, his good looks and wit will mean...grandchildren earlier than I would of liked, despite the gray hairs that keep popping up on my chest (similar to the weeds in my hacked up yard that won't go away like those bike riding Mormons on a nice Saturday).

3. I don't have patience for this job. While I know this is a massive problem (see statement # 1), the males in my family who happen to b fathers simply don't have it in the DNA (note, my brother, Emmanuel, who seems to be super friggin' dad, seems to be the exception; , My youngest sib, DeWayne (who actually realized he didn't have the patience gene, and avoided parenthood completely...smart man, that one) to deal with smaller versions of ourselves. Yet, we keep making more...like Doritos.

4. When they actually have the dumbass switch set to "off", kids are actually pretty cool...well, until the time where, as I have boys, the other head begins its hostile takeover, ruling them, like it has all men, for the rest of their natural lives. In Cold Stone Creamery earlier this evening, and these teens, maybe 15, boys all buff and shit, girlfriends with their little "growth spots" on their chests hanging out, ripping their parents to shreds. Personally, when ur private parts haven't even been around long enough to have that good funk yet, u should learn to listen b4 u talk all that bullshit. (note, we r all guilty, but well, as I said, see point # 1).

5. My oldest once told me that he hated me....think he was about 4 or 5. It hurt me so much, I cried. I spent (and still do, to a point) too much time trying to be the "dad" as well as the "friend", since I didn't have that in my own relationship with my pops. Then I realized something...hey, until this boy gets a job, I own his ass. (Note, until I get a job, my wife owns my ass, but that's another story). Recently @ a family gathering, I was ripped a new one for being a bad dad. That also hurt me badly as well. But, considering what I saw the other night in the restaurant (mom basically treating her child like shit on the bottom of a shoe...after it got hard and dry), in hindsight, me being rough on the boy is one thing, but I still treat him as a human being.

Until my size 12 has to see if his back orifice needs a visit.

6. Taking away ass whippings was the biggest mistake in history. For those folks my age, u FEARED ur folks when u f'd up. Hell, I finally started cursing in front of my mother....IN MY 40'S. And my mom is 5 foot 3...if she wears her sneakers. Ask me one day about the restaurant story, and how I almost got arrested...after my 3 year old (Jared) at the time clocked me in the face...over fish in a tank. In a Chinese Restaurant. Should of told his ass they were going to cook the sons of bitches just to make him cry.

7. Finally (as that I am actually getting tired, and the little one will be waking us all up in about 5 hours), I have a friend who happens to be a pastor named Erik. Wonderful guy, and is the one who told me to get off my ass and try to get people to read my stuff. Great family...I call them the Latino Brady Bunch. Visited w/them a few years back, and the kids were respectful, nice, seemed to enjoy their parents company, blah blah blah. Now I am not stupid (despite the Facebook general opinion), and I am sure his kids have pissed him off many a time. But, he and his lovely wife got my respect...cuz, when it was all said and done, they raised their kids right. TBFFKATGWCMOOFBBIHNRTSOTWOSAIIKIA (The best friend formally known as the guy who cut me off of Facebook because I had no right to speak on the wrongs of society as if I knew it all...whew, that was long) also is an excellent father, and his kids I know will grow up to be fine human beings. The biggest thing I have tried to accept is this. I am going to screw this up a lot of times. But, if I do what I feel is right, and my wife does the same, working as a team, we may make it, and John Walsh won't be looking for either of our sons.

So in short, I'll continue to share my parenthood experiences, because, as my friend Cathy (one of the coolest ass women I've ever met, period) noticed, I write when I need to get me thoughts out. Also, if I can make those who have raised their kids already (and their kids have kids) chuckle at my and my wife's misfortunes, that's all right. I have received some fantastic advice from "veteran parents", and for that, I am quite grateful. But in the end, speaking for myself as a dad, I can go to sleep (most nights) knowing that compared to some of the folks my wife tells me about every weekend, I should b getting the "Doesn't suck as much as he thought" award in the mail real soon.

OK, I'm going to bed. I know that soon enough, either one of my children will do something that will make me go back to point # 1, and I will then yell at my loins, knowing that they were only doing as I told them to do.

But just as I expect to be frustrated, I look forward to being pleasantly surprised as well...like when a 10-year-old kid makes his dad who is approaching his mid 40's laugh for an hour over a lunch of chicken wings.

For my boy...a quick bit of advice from the semi-old man

My son...

...I wanted to drop a quick note to you, and perhaps one day, as you get older and you make my knowledge of the internet look like a 14 year old trying to pierce a vagina, you'll find my blog and see how your dad thinks.

I won't make this long, 'cuz well, I wanted to play "MLB 2K11" (yeah, I am more than a season behind, but a gamer, like you are/were at the time I wrote this, I am not), and I figured that by the time you read this, you'll still not listen to a damned word I say, figuring all I do is yell at you because I am such an asshole.

But here I go nonetheless.

Don't give a shit about what people think...but give a shit about what people think.

Yup, u r probably saying to yourself right now, "What in Roblox is my father talking about?"

(Private joke btw my boy and I, as that he and his mother will be the only two who get that).

You are handsome. I never was. Now, once upon a time your mother thought I was handsome...before I got fat, lazy, and unmotivated. Don't get me wrong, hopefully by the time you read this, she'll still be my wife, and will still love me. But Channing Tatum (the hot thing of the moment as of the date of this posting) I will never be.

You are so damned smart, it is frightening. As of the date of this post, you have no idea what "super powers" your mind possesses. I guess that my major flaw as a father at this point is that you are too young and senseless (note, not stupid; just at this time you have the sense of a horsefly about to fly into one of those zappers because it looks "pretty") to realize that you dwarf me. Not ur mom...unless she gets senile, ur mom will always find ways to beat you. However, you can be a first in the Flagler Genealogy (beyond your 3 uncle's on my side of the family, and 1 on ur mom's side) to be what your old man is not.

A TRULY good man. Not one who would waste his youth and decades of time because he was so damned afraid of everything.

Does that sound familiar? That is what I've said to you for a long time, isn't it?

You truly could be the man...correction, the ONE. No need to reinforce the silly semi-sexism ideas you have gotten from somewhere. That is one of the few successes I have had as a father...to quote Chuck D (Google him, as that I know you'll have no idea who he is), "Without Mothers, they'd be no brothers; without sisters, they'd be no misters."

Respect the ladies, my son.

But I am getting off track, as I tend to do in my thoughts.

I am less than a month from my...well, further journey into my 40's. My phone doesn't ring with friends asking me to come over to hang out, or join them for lunch, or to be even be seen with me. The social media phenomenon is in full swing, and perhaps I have forced my opinion on some folks, in the foolish thought that maybe people would look forward to agreeing respectfully to disagree with me. But, as it has been the case for most of my life, I am alienated from most, with only your mom brave enough to either love me, or put up with me in combination of loving me.

What I am saying is this. The previous generation before me was a failure as a man. I, sadly, in a lot of ways, have repeated some of those mistakes. My attempt at being kind to my fellow human has mostly backfired, and whether there is such a thing as a curse, or a combination of my poor choices in life, I am truly at times alone, awaiting for my last breath to be taken.

...not to say that I want to die at this moment, but it is how I feel at times.

You, my oldest child, don't have to be that way. The human race is a shallow race, mostly concerned with themselves, their beliefs, the people they deem as "cool", or whatever slang that may be used at whatever time in modern history. I have always gone about saying I don't give a shit about what people think...but that was about 60% false. I would love to be liked more, and it crushes me at times that only a few have bothered to give a damn about me, despite my only crime perhaps was to not keep more of my thoughts to myself.

But your father says that is no crime. Be YOU. Be the best you. Learn to play the cruel human game, but don't become a cruel human. Sadly, unless you hold the reigns, you have to have someone like you so you can move up and on. However, don't change you in order to be liked.

That makes you...human...and while that is what you are, don't give in to what makes us the failed creatures that we are.

You'll fuck up, my son. It's unavoidable.

But when you do fall, don't keep falling. Don't give in.

And whatever you do...don't be another copy in the machine that are the men on this side of the family.

Don't be me.

Grandmother Grandmother Mommy May Lose Tonight

My kid doesn't get it.

Then again, what kid truly gets anything, right?

Let me break down my funk for you...and yes, I showered today. Probably won't get back to it until the water bill is paid, but that is what scented lotion is for, right?

Anywho, my kid has all of his grandparents still avoiding the worm buffet, and he, I believe, still digs them all. I had my final grandparent head over for the main course more than 10 years ago. It is funny, because I see them every day. No, not like Whoopi Goldberg stopped by and did a "Ghost" sort of deelio (besides, have you seen Whoopi? That woman is like friggin huge like a dreadlocked balloon gone amuck on
"The View"). I have pictures of all of my grandparents on the wall downstairs on my soon to be removed home (another story, another blog; perhaps I'll call it "As The Shit Hits The Damn Fan"), and I seem them in all their coolness, blackness, struggles, history, and love.

My son, when he sees his grandmother, sees nothing but his iPod, games online, and perhaps an occasional board game. Now, that is my wife's side. The other side? Umm...well, that is a little more complex...I'll leave that alone and call that "The Bastards." Long story.

He doesn't know them that well, as that they live some 750 miles away. It is interesting, because it was the same way with me when I was a lad (loser, lad, with me, very little difference.). He has seen them about 8 to 10 times in his life, and he never really connected with my mother, and my dad, well, due to he being sick for most of his life (my son's), he really couldn't get down with being close with him. Hell, he actually fears the man, due to his boisterous voice (and the fact that he is hard of hearing, which makes him a little, more, audial).

Now when I was a kid, I was not a big fan of my father's side of the family; I thought there were, well, unsophisticated, selfish, and a bunch of "blicks" (a combo of black folks and hicks; hell, never said I was original). My mother's father was murdered; my mother's mom died too young. These passings hurt me deeply.

My dad's parents? I was upset, sure....but it wasn't devastating.

Messed up, isn't it?

History is a bitch and a stutterer, 'cuz here we are, my nearly decade old spawn doing the same thing, but here's the funkadelic twisty beat about this.

I wonder how broke up he would be when any of them going that dirt yard smorgasbord for the bugs of the world?

I think he'd cry...but he is a weird one; when his uncle's dog had to be put to sleep, he was quite upset; hell, whenever he sees a picture of the dog, he STILL gets upset.

Over something, and don't get me wrong, dogs I understand are like family (and are good with duck sauce). But when I try to explain to him to enjoy his grandparents (none of who are in good health at this point)and the clock's midnight bell about to go "dong", he looks at me like, well, he'd look at paper when he tries to do his homework.

Blank and with no effort.

(Note, the boy is a solid A-B student; just as a child has no clue how powerful he can become).

I'd do almost anything to get 5 minutes with my Grandfather Brown, or enjoy one of my Grandmother Brown's cakes. Those are TIMES of the day that will never go around again.

But I don't feel that strongly about the other side.

Messed up and cold, perhaps.

But I guess that I sort of understand why my son doesn't dig the entire 4 piece set that he has been blessed with.

My mother gets him computers and clothing and cash. The few times she has seen him, she tries to bond.

But he won't even ask her for a glass of juice w/o prodding from me.

History, history, ain't u the cruel one?

Skipping back over like a damn piece of vinyl with the grooves (much love to the Late MCA for that idea).

So the time keeps going over the beat, each chord continuing to move in a different area, and I watch my boy...he'll be double digits in a month. He'll go over to his grandmother mommy mom's again, and I will wonder if I can say anything at all. My situation, I am sure, isn't unique.

But I wish he and I and the history of the groove played a different beat.

A bullied-short pslam from the church of future

You know, I am not going to lie and say I never made a comment or a joke about someone's sexual orientation, race, religion, or whatever. I am a personal believer that very few subject are taboo to humor. But when you are evil about that shit; when you are degrading about someone, just to crush their souls to the point where they end up taking their own lives, well, that just makes you a murder and a punk ass bitch/asshole. It just sickens me every time some kid, who does't have the maturity to say "fuck off' to other kids who don't understand how they are destroying lives, can't take it anymore and ends it all, it makes me wish that there was some law to hold those who drove them to that point responsible. It is no better than any hate crime, except their words are the murder weapon.

Just my two cents, but it makes me worry about my own hypersensitive oldest...all the damn time.

I need to get something that works soon. My boys can't leave where they go to school. Not that it can't happen to them where they are; kids are fucking stupid no matter where u live.

Sorry for the f'bombs, but as someone who was bullied himself/a social outcast a few times, my heart goes out to these families, and these lost souls.

Now back to the NBA Playoffs. That's more important, right?

And onto other, bigger, stupid problems...

....America.

Home of what the chicken snot are we doing to ourselves, where 90% of the paper resides in the hands of old men who if they could, would grab a big ol' bottle of "White Out" and remove the Constitution.

Wait, perhaps they have done that already, huh?

I am sorry that I have been gone so damned long, but that pain in my ass called life has been blocking my synapses from writing something funky, deep, possibly funny to those who get the joke, or just rambling because this blog doesn't cost me anything but time not collecting paychecks.

However, in the several months that I haven't dropped some useless words on my millions (and I mean million) of fans, first, a commercial break, a bit of silence for Mr. Dick Clark. A man who proved that music can come from every area, every race, every place. Cuz music ain't color, it's joy.

Ok, enough of that bullshit.

(Not the music part, but you know, me delaying crap).

I just got bitchslapped by family members recently at a recent roast (oh wait, family get together) where I was lambasted because my oldest kid, who hasn't listened less to me in nearly 10 years than deaf people have their entire lives, pissed me off one time too many and, well...I sold his shit (computer and Xbox).

By law, I am only supposed to supply food, shelter, and clothing to my result of 10 seconds of pleasure (which is leading to so far 10 years of pain, w/more to follow).

Hey, can't whoop ass like slaves like my folks used too (which makes me chuckle, as that a black family, u would think WHIPPING FOLKS WITH STRAPS WOULD BE THE LAST THING U'D DO...BUT ANYWHO), cuz they'll call the police on u.

Beginning to wonder if being someone's jail bitch is less painful than parenthood.

Anyways, his grandmother gets him a new machine, so I can't sell that one...but u know, nothing beats being told that, well, u were too harsh as a dad.

Umm...can I get a DeLorean, so I can go back to the 1970's and 80's?

It is amazing how the memory of parents tends to conveniently go away when called to task on what you may have done to ur children...even if the kids really deserved it...

...and trust me, I deserved it.

But as I enter my 2nd decade of parenthood, I know I can use work. I got a friend who would slap the shit out of their kid, and their kids still do things that piss them off.

I shake my head, as that I know that all kids are, well, friggin' stupid like the characters in "Dumb & Dumber."

Then again, so was I. Actually, as I was calmed down by my wife last night because the same kid who just received a $600 computer system from his grandmother was being a dick drip, and I, well, sigh...sort of got made and used colorful metaphors to let him know I am the big dick in his house...

...even tho I partially acted like, well, a big dick.

So I apologized...and let him know that I was a stupid kid, to, well, 35 years old or so.

The point is...it seems that even tho I make my mistakes as a parent, it ain't even in the crime log of life compared to how folks are raising their kids.

Hate niggers? Check. I have more $ than you, so you are lesser than me, and piss on ya? That was in 2nd period.

I saw some genius bumper advertising about the current President of the US and we shouldn't "re-nig" and elect him again.

What fine parenting came into that brilliant grown up?

It is like planting seeds in shitty ground, over and over again, to get the weeds of stupidity and discontent.

We don't know any better, right? It is the only way we know, and of course, even if that means that our kids grow up w/a ghetto mentality, or act as that they deserve everything because "mumsy" and "father" got paid and think they are gods, that is the excuse, validating dumb-assness.

My oldest said about a month ago that all black people are supposedly poor.

Of course, his black father has purchased or built him 6 computers in 5 years...4 + of those where he was unemployed.

Now, where he got that from, I'll never know. It sure as hell wasn't from me, nor his Caucasian mother.

But I bet that somewhere in school, that seed was planted by the previous sharecropper (and yes, I used that word on purpose), who begat and begat and begat.

Yup, those parents sure have shitty ass memories.

Random Shitroversay Life Cycles

A question to those who have faith. How did u find it? Y do u depend on something as a human being you cannot touch, talk to, feel, or just know it's there? It is interesting, because my mother relies on it, even as she goes through possibly the most difficult time in her existence. Sadly, faith can't write large checks for you...it would gain more followers that way, tho.


I don't' have any faith; my negativity has gotten better over the years, as I have become a father and try to stop the generational pathway of self destruction that seems to mostly befit this last name I have (note, their are a few exceptions). But that is superstitious b.s. Like ignorance, it seems that the mistakes of the father is begotten onto the son...unless one stops it.

A friend told me that I should not get old and say "why didn't I do that?" So I am slowly writing again, and hope to be published on Amazon by the end of the year. Yet sadly, I don't know if I care. I do know that it will be too late to provide that safety net I and my family needs now.

I don't really need to post on a public forum...but it is the only way that I can to let folks know that everyone's problems are large to THEM; but some know how to face them and win...or survive them when they lose.

I don't know if I have been or ever will be that man.

A friend on here said that I have, well, a lot of friends. But it is easy to say that on a computer screen...I guess the way I grew up, b4 computers and social networking, folks picked up a phone or stop in to make sure their friend is OK...or at least ask them out for a beer. Human interaction is dying a slow, painful death, isn't it?

Ray, sorry that I am rattling again. I am probably just, well, tired. Tired of trying to protect my kids from what is probably inevitable. For being selfish at times. Lying to my wife, telling her we are going to b ok.

Anywho, on a side note, Train is an awesome band. Listening to their catalog...and they covered "Umbrella" better than Rihanna's original.

Forgive me...as I said, I'm just...soul tired. Then again, there are folks who don't have computers, iPhones, HDTV's, car stereos, hell, FOOD for tonight's meal. So, I guess I shouldn't bitch so loudly and publicly.

I apologize for my whiny weakness. But I don't apologize for how my problems are kicking my ass...my wife's (slimming) ass, and how my kids have no idea how their Caucasian-shielded world is about to be shattered.

That is the big part that worries me most of all. Ain't the movies, and a lot of times there are not wrapped up in the script happy endings.

$. It won't buy happiness...but it will finance the search.

I need a better banker.

A FB Copy, Book 2

Sort of the Sequel....out!


B4 I head off for a baseball game on the Xbox b4 bed, I wanted to share a quick story about my son and I. Jared and I, well, butt heads like two goats fighting over a Pepsi can. He's, well, different, as was I when I was a lad. A social reject, girls didn't dig me, and well, I got teased more than an 80's white girl's hair.

I see a lot of myself in Jared, which scares the shit out of me, because he is someone of so much talent, intelligence, potential, awesomeness, and a gift that could make him so successful in this world.

Then I think of T. Martin. He sounds like a kid similar to Jared. 17 years old...only 7 years and change older than Jared. Gone.

I butt heads with my boy, I yell at him WAAAAAAY too much due to frustration when he stares at me blankly, and I know he hasn't heard a damned word I said. He's been lying to me lately, and I think about all the bullshit I fed my mother back in the day. Never say Karma isn't a raving bitch (or a non-paying child support asshole, to be fair). However, I love him so, and I can't imaging what T Martin's parents have had to deal with for the past month and change. The outrage that this country has presented is admirable...

...and quite fruitless. No one will change, because it is the human race's fatal flaw.

So, as a father of a child who one day will probably be hated or disliked because of his mixed heritage, never mind the other child who was blessed with a 3rd Chromosome probably hearing "retard" in his future. However, I keep on fighting, trying to make at least the older one see that I am not just the guy he considers "mean." I am just a dad, who grew up in the Bronx, been mugged 3 times, has been called nigger twice, has had older Caucasian females get nervous around me, even tho I haven't dressed like the stereotypical young rap fan in some 20 years. I have also seen my own people destroy themselves, kill themselves, and make it to the point that I am more worried when I am with my kids when I see someone who may look like T Martin did, even tho he may be just as innocent as that young man was.

That makes me just as guilty as the piece of shit who is running free in Sanford. Except I may joke at times about everyone, but I wouldn't shoot a white guy cuz he looked like a skinhead.

Maybe hand him a lollypop (anyone over 35 will get the reference), but that's it.

So, to conclude, Jared and I, well, we butt heads. But I'll keep on risking a stress related heart attack, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, one day I'll get him to stand up, listen, believe in himself, stop being a dumbass (I know, that won't happen; he isn't even a teen yet...get the Reggae Red ready, Carla Updike Flagler!) and well, grow up and not have me bury him because he was on his way back home, and he happened to wear the wrong bit of clothing.

Note, he lied to me 3 times this week, and I warned him that if he did it again, that shiny iPad of his is on eBay the next day.

If I gotta be the meanie that's also a dick, I guess I better get some fitted condoms.

Hope all y'all who stuck around on FB w/me have a good week.

At least baseball starts in 10 days...:)