F.E. Feeley Jr.'s Blog, page 14

When Heaven Strikes (spoilers inside)

Here’s a link to a long interview (spoiler alerts) I did with MDNeu over my novel When Heaven Strikes. We talk about the book, the writing industry, KU, food, and a review! Stop by and again, Spoiler Alert. 

 

Fire The Butler (poem)

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10 thousand you told her

when you covered your tracks

10 thousand was the number she 

rattled off to me over a static phone line

I stood in the battering wind

my device pressed hard to my ear

trying to understand the significance

and depth of your lie

as well as your flagrant disregard for me

Did you ask him for 10 thousand

the gears in my head were working overtime

what do I say? What had you done?

10,9,8,7,6

No, I didn’t I replied

5,4,3,2,1

two truths smacked me as it whipped

through the lifeline pressed against my face

around the tall library off to my right

The first, you cheated on her

the second, I was your scapegoat

the poor boy, the sometimes desperate

and you – your money and your lies

entitled you to a

Flieschman’s Whipping boy

i denied any wrong doing, any involvement,

I knew nothing of the 10 thousand

Antagonism reached my ears

as the line disconnected

staring at the device like it was a snake

I texted you a question

Dude – what the fuck – tell a brother

Silence

silence

A reply

I’ll talk to you when I can face my shame

you’d said

I haven’t heard a word from you since

That’s okay – its cool

I saw your woman a year or so later

she proudly showed me her ring

and forgot her words before she’d hung up

I noticed the desperation in her eyes

even though the diamond was her truth

it didn’t convince her of what had gone on

her gaze was frantic as she begged me to respond appropriately

silently we communicated what we knew

but polite society prevented it from tumbling out

I knew my place, I knew my role

as I walked through the mall with my meager gifts

bought with hard earned money

we passed each other in a book store

you couldn’t even look at me

I watched you walk away into your lie

and I with my scars and pretty paper wrapped Christmas gifts

the pauper fired the Butler

The Peculiar Timing of the Nashville Statement by The Southern Baptist Convention

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Pana Vasquez

I’ve been watching the news of the absolute devastation that has taken place in our country over the last week or so.

Houston, Texas, along with many other smaller communities along the Texas gulf coast was slammed hard by a massive Hurricane.

Yet in the midst of the wind and the rain, the destruction of homes by wind gusts topping 140 miles per hour, the wiping away of family homes and business, the upending of lives in an area so large it would cover Michigan from end to end, in the midst of turmoil and death, evangelical leaders decided at that particular moment to hold Houston’s head underneath the water.

150 ministers from the S.B.C gathered in Nashville to build and ratify a manifesto that takes aim homosexuality and trans-gendered folks. The language is divisive, it’s old age fundamentalist rhetoric, with debatable versus thrown in for good measure.

To a lot of people, including the Mayor of Nashville, found not only the statement appalling and not reflective of Nashville’s values, but people really questioned the timing giving what has transpired over the course of this past week as well as the ruining of many people’s lives, lively-hood, childhood homes, as well as the death of people caught in this terrible tropical storm.

I, however, am not looking at that.

The Southern Baptist Convention was formed to push back against the wave of northern Baptists’ vocal dislike over the institution of slavery years and years ago. It was created in Virginia on May 10, 1845, oddly enough, the very same state where the author of the Virginia Declaration of Rights once prophesied that, “A national sin will cause a nation calamity.”

The sin: Slavery

The calamity: The Civil War

Do you ever sit back and wonder why the Civil War was so bad. Why so many people died? Why Jim Crow was so bad? Why the KKK was so powerful during the lynching years of the 1920s? You ever wonder why race is still, 17 years into the 21st century still such a hot topic of debate?

Look  no further that the Southern Baptist Convention. In short: These people used the Bible, the Holy Word of God, not to cover up the sin of owning, beating, selling, mutilating, raping, and murdering human beings, but to justify it. The ministers preached it out of the pulpits using some pretty impressive mental gymnastics and the ‘Sin of Ham’.

Heck it was southern ministers like Oral Roberts and Bob Jones Sr along with Jerry Falwell who, being furious over Brown v Board of Education, sued the government to be allowed to open whites only Christian schools using their 501c3.

They lost 8 -1

However, just a day or so ago, The S.B.C reached back into it’s utterly ungodly past and just like their predecessors raised the devil of bigotry and divisiveness once more.

This time, however, their beef wasn’t with the Northern Baptists and their sudden revulsion of the inhumane treatment of slaves that threated rich landowners. No. It was directed, purposefully, at a southern city in one of the proudest states this union has ever known. Houston.

Houston, Texas is the 3rd largest city in the United States. I believe it boasts the 13th largest G.D.P in the entire country. With a population of about 6 million people inside Houston proper and it’s outlying areas, the great city of Houston is a proud, beautiful, and diverse part of the gorgeous lady that calls her name Texas. A name derived from a Native American name Tejas meaning ‘Friend’ or ‘Ally’.

I hypothesis, leaning hard on ‘knowing’ because I was once a nut job fundi, that this storm provided a perfect time to condemn Houston for recently having an out, married, lesbian mayor Annise Parker who served her city for six years.

While the debate of Climate Change rages through the country, and through the world, these S.B.C ministers in their desire to cling to power, didn’t just pass condemnation of gay people and people who were trans-gendered. They decided to release this statement as a counter argument that God brought destruction to the Gulf Coast for Houston’s political decision in electing Mrs. Parker.

Alas, in the past 72 hours, when pastors like Joel Olsteen of Houston couldn’t be bothered to open the doors of his massive mega church to those in need, Texans did as Texans often do in these situations. They didn’t wait for help to arrive, they didn’t sit idly by while neighbors suffered, they didn’t blame people for their suffering, they didn’t do things for political reasons, although the Southern Baptist Convention surely did.

They became like Christ.

Even in their limited capacity as human beings to be perfect, political ideology died, racism died, divisions about sexual orientation died, gender, culture, heritage, all the things that serve to divide mankind into camps of ‘Us’ vs ‘ Them’ things that were nailed to the cross of human suffering  2,000 years ago and in this great hour of need mercy, charity, forbearance, benevolence, and the complex and fickle and hard to kill human spirit stepped in.

In the days and weeks ahead, there is going to be a lot of discussion over what happened in Houston. There is going to be a lot of money required to put these people’s lives back together. There will be homes needing to be rebuilt. There will be schools needing to be cleaned out and repaired. There will be churches that will need the same. And, as tragic as it is, there will be people needing to  be laid to rest and families will gather to mourn.

In the divisiveness of this past year, in the chaos of the world, Houston Texas and it’s outlying areas came together to show people in this country who we really are. We are America. We will survive. We will not only survive but we will thrive. And we will thrive because American’s of all walks of life, all religious backgrounds, all faith backgrounds, all cultural, ethnic, and orientations – have a promise woven into their hearts. A promise hard fought and although sometimes having lost it’s way, the ties that bind are as strong now as they ever were.

That promise is:

We hold these truths to be self evident. That all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights and that among those rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

And an even older promise than that,

For God so loved the World that He gave his only begotten Son that whosoever beleiveth in him shall not perish but have ever lasting life. John 3:16

For God so loved the World, SBC

Not some of it. Not some of them. Not just white ones. Not just republican ones. Not just Straight ones. Not just Male and Female ones. Not Southern Baptists, alone. All of it.

You were wrong then, you’re wrong, now.  The statement made by S.B.C and it’s signatories ought to be seen for what it was, shameful, a low blow, and a sin.

She deserved better than that. We deserve better than that. God deserves better than that.

I hope Houston, once she get’s her cowboy hat on again,  responds accordingly.

Sources:

http://www.baptisthistory.org/baptistorigins/southernbaptistbeginnings.html

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/05/religious-right-real-origins-107133

Hurricane outside, Maelstrom within (poem)

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Flickering lights and uncertainty rolled out in front of us

myself, my family

the wind crashed whistling through the eaves of the house

like an errant train in the dead of night

lightning danced 

Death had come ashore and ghosts were marching to martial music

thundering heels against the coal black night

the telephone rang

in foolish compassion I answered

and a voice from the grave spoke to me

suddenly I felt thirsty, ravenously hungry

and though the conversation was pleasant

my veins began to ache

and my body began to ache

to be possessed by old habits of a foolish youth

spent locked in torment

after we said goodbye

to fight against the desire of anonymity

I flung the doors open to the storm

wind, leaves, and rain rolled inward

when the threat between my ears

became greater than the one that ran screaming through the night

I pulled up shades

threw open windows and breathed in chance

in giant cleansing gulps

hoping against hope that I could exorcise my dutiful mistake

between The Father, and The Son, and three glasses of red wine – the blood

This I did in remembrance

I all of a sudden felt needy

to be possessed by creatures of the veil not far beyond my touch

I watched the storm blow the rest of the night

between flashes of lightning and gusts of wind

the fourth horseman I knew galloped close by

I waited for upon my cross of bones and childrens toys

for the sound of his thundering hooves

my gaze locked in on the shadows beyond the trees

At some point I fell asleep

only to awaken at dawns first light with my mouth

tasting like yesterdays news

and my clothes just barely damp

I rose from my leaf littered bed

my solace sleeping soundly next to me

my protection asleep soundly on the floor

I rose and peered into the stillness with a heavy head

a tongue that cleaved to the roof of my mouth

I noticed the lightening of the sky with the rising of the sun

now that the storm had blown itself away

and though there be no track marks, no bottles laying strewn on the floor

even though I knew the name of the man next to me in my bed

I still felt the shame of a misspent night

and the lingering feeling of poison in my veins

I’m an addict without a habit

no that isn’t true – no, there’s a habit there

and it isn’t in recklessness or immoral lack of judgement

it was in a simple act of compassion

that now, today burns a hole in the center of me

that wracks my body with a guilt even though I never did anything wrong

In the stillness of that morning

I slowly rose up from my sleep as a hangover

thudded mercifully between my ears

and before the rest of the house woke

I stripped down and walked naked into a cold shower

humming, “Precious Lord, take my hand.”

as shakily, shivering from the cold, I washed away my shame

and I climbed back on the wagon

Authors: Get Paid!

Not so much a rant as an observation.

People’s work has value.

If that person punches a time clock, or if that person is a salaried employee, if that person works as a contractor, or if they work for themselves. That work has value. I haven’t said anything wildly out of line there. Sort of a ‘no duh’ statement right?

Why, then, do we have such a hard time paying people what they’re worth?

Or better yet, why do we expect certain work to be done for free?

I’ve seen so many posts in the last couple of years about raising the minimum wage, universal health care, teachers salaries, wallstreet screwing over the little guy videos, antilobbying videos, pay equality in the workplace, and on it goes.

Yet, people are working harder and harder for less and less. I always hear people put it off on bloated corporations like Walmart – but I am starting to think that that isn’t the case.

I am starting to think people believe they are entitled to more, for less.

Well, There is no such thing as a free lunch, is still a valid economic observation.

Someone is paying for that shortfall.

However, it’s not just the consumer at fault. Someone had to have come along and devalued work for a reason. That reason is to jump ahead of the competition. However, take books for an example, someone came in and sold their book at 99 cents and suddenly they have best seller status . Then another one does it. Then another. Soon you have 60,000 plus word novels being sold in their entirety – months worth of work – for the cost of a bag of Doritos at the gas station.

That isn’t the end of the story, now readers who’d been buying up these dollar books now that the trend is set, balk at 6.99 for a novel. It’s not their fault. Why would they?

Then comes KU and for less than a paperback a month, you can read till your head explodes. The author is paid 0.0046 per page. Amazon publishes 3,000 books per day. I was reading other people’s sharing of the blog from the author who announced she was leaving KU. One commenter replied, “I know these people are being short changed BUT without KU I couldn’t read all I want.”

I’d been working for a company for a little while. Was hired in, excited go work for them, excited to work with them, we’d agreed on a salary and I set off – full steam ahead.

I poured everything I had into making this thing work, late hours, sometimes in the middle of the night, sometimes all nighters. Project after project. I worked as a troubleshooter, liaison, Public Relations, head hunter, you name it.

Yet, before too long the emails started rolling in. At first they were pleasant enough, then they started being a little more curt, then brash, then demanding. Not only was I doing all this stuff over here, now I’m dealing with multiple personalities and that was just from one person.

However, the work was finished. Everything planned out for a year, signed, sealed, delivered. Yet through all this they pay started to diminish before it disappeared entirely.

Yet work remained, maintaining and daily ops work remained, but I couldn’t stay.

I quit.

My time and effort was worth something to me. The work I had done was worth something to me. Yet like the KU lady – the work I had done became something they were entitled to.

Even after three months of not getting paid.

There is no such thing as a free lunch. People are NOT entitled to it. You are ENTITLED to get paid for work you do. Stop selling yourself so goddamn short. Your work has value. Make them pay for it.

This isn’t about money at a certain point it becomes about self respect.

P.S. I think I may have been a Union boss in a former life.

My book Trailer (When Heaven Strikes)

Award Winning author Micheal Scott Garvin calls When Heaven strikes – ‘a magnificent gem..’

Paranormal Romance Guild said, “The author holds a beautiful line of the interaction of the new lovers, and the suspense of the upcoming Garden Party and the imminent storm; which was genius in its flow.”

Others have said,

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Here’s the book trailer

When Heaven Strikes

Here’s the buy link

When Heaven Strikes

Enjoy

Violence and Scars ( a call for passive resistance)

 

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Photo by Gerrie van der Walt on Unsplash

I remember the day 9/11 happened. It’s something that is seared into my memory.

The whole day I was in shock.

I fell asleep to CNN and woke up to it still playing on the television with picture after picture, replay after replay of the hijacked airliners and the damage they’d done.

The body count.

People standing outside of The World Trade Center weeping, begging God and passerby’s to deliver them their loved ones.

The next the numbness of it all wore off and there I was, nineteen years old, weeping into the arms of my sister.

I was scared.

Knowing all those people died, it broke my heart.

I remember asking my mom if she thought there were ‘saved’ people in those buildings.

The other day, with Charlottesville I sat down and cried again. I’m thirty six years old and later on as I prayed the ‘Our Father’ with my husband – clinging for some kind of comfort – when I got to ‘Thy Will Be Done’ I choked it out.

I’ve lived a long life.

Not in years but in experiences.

I am a survivor of fundamentalism.

I was raised in the belief that I had no inherent ‘good.’

That the world had no inherent good.

I was beaten. Often. The religion was rigorous and I often rebelled against it.

I knew as a kid there was something inherently wrong with them.

I couldn’t put my finger on it – I mean, the people we talked to were polite, they dressed nice, the churches were nice, they drove nice cars….and in a lot of ways, it wasn’t the worst of circumstances.

Until it was.

And when it was, baby, it was a honey.

I’ve seen and been through things too bizarre to put in 9 books let alone one.

My sisters, can even top my experiences.

Those experiences have put a scar in me, on my heart, so deep it cuts into my very being into the foundation of who I am as a person.

And if I am not careful, those scars, get infected.

I have to be vigilant.

There is an old Sunday School song that goes, “Oh be careful little ears what you hear. Oh be careful little ears what you hear. For the Lord above is looking down – in love – oh be careful little ears what you hear.

It’s in what I hear – that requires the most vigilance.

Like someone who’s had a weather related injury, such as heatstroke, or frostbite or someone who’s come in contact with poison ivy – I’ll always be susceptible to the tone of a message than the actual message itself.

Passion, rhetorical flourish, and charisma are the cornerstone of any good speaker. It’s not really in what they say, that makes us listen, it’s all in the delivery.

Think of your favorite speaker, preacher, politician, or public persona.

Don’t listen to what they say, give that a rest, listen to how they say it.

There’s a lot of umph to their message, a schtick they use, they’re just like you….but they’re not. If they are public speaking, have their starched white shirts rolled up, can deliver a speech without any reservation or nervousness, they haven’t been one of you for a very long time. Most people I know HATE public speaking.

Right now, there is a lot of talk about Nazis and their alter ego – Antifa.

There’s a lot of passionate rhetoric being tossed around by both sides. Promises of violence. Actual acts of violence and confrontations.

A whole lot of passion.

We should always stand against fascism. Always. There’s no room in a free society for authoritarianism. Period. White supremacy and it’s ugly older brother antisemitism and ugly older sister bigotry – ruin and destroy – and have never once created a thing.

It’s led nations into ruins and took its people along for the ride.

And while there is something in the idea of standing up to a Nazi and ‘giving them their just desserts’ violence never creates anything. Like racism and bigotry – violence only begets more violence.

I’ve seen so many people on social media talking about ‘getting ready ‘ for some kind of showdown with the evil that is Nazi’s and no doubt – they are evil.

Yet these same people are unaware, or maybe they are aware, that they are slowly becoming being pushed into the very thing they’re trying to fight against. They become the other side to the same coin.

I feel like a fool when I quote this man, because everyone does who try to drive home a point. Bigots have used this guy, which isn’t too far a stretch since a racist will use Jesus and the Bible to justify their deep rooted hate. But Dr. Martin Luther King stood against much worse, so much worse, and was far more effective in his methodology of passive resistance than any armed conflict can ever accomplish.

War is not about success no matter what General stands up and delivers his speech ‘to the boys’.

War is about failure.

It’s about people failing to come together and work out their issues.

It becomes mindless.

To commit an act of violence against another human being, you have to work yourself up into a state of mindless rage and once that line is crossed – there’s no coming back.

Ask the vets who’ve come back from Iraq and Afghanistan how they feel.

I am not telling you to march. I am not telling you not to resist. I am not telling you to just let them hit you or hurt you. No. You have a right to defend yourself from bodily harm.

All I am asking you to do – is listen not to what your side says – listen to how they’re saying it. Listen to the words they use, not in a way that convinces you to join their cause, but what they are calling for.

The French know about this.

While their revolution was probably 100 percent just. It became a mindless stream of violence and death because people couldn’t back out of the frenzy they found themselves in.

There were so many different factions inside of that event that when someone starts to talk about the French Revolution – you are 100 percent justified in asking, “Which one?”

Are we facing some dark times? Yes. No doubt.

‘ The other’ regardless of where they fit, are in dire straights.

But ladies and gentlemen, there is power in numbers.

Passive resistance like Dr. Kings wasn’t very popular in America. He was murdered for it. Like Christ, he used to the parts of the society in which he lived to shame the wise. He held a mirror up to this country and let it get a good look at itself.

Sure you may face violence and worse when you stand up for what you believe in in any capacity.

But there is one sure fire way you’ll be unable to avoid it and that is by being violent yourself.

A man that lives by the sword will die by it each and every time.

Whoever got a hold of those 15 hijackers used passion to convince them 100 percent of their righteousness. The man who plowed into the crowd of protesters was 100 percent convinced of his righteousness.

The man who sucker punched his little boy, and bounced his head off a tile floor in the kitchen because they were angry, was 100 percent sure – in the heat of the moment – he was right.

Curtail your passions. Or they will destroy everything around you and trust me, there are some fates that are worse than death.

Violence is NEVER the answer. All it does is create a whole myriad and painful questions. Questions like, “Why me?”

What’s worse, is some questions then, have no good answer and because of that – there is are scars that never heal right.

Silver Haired Man (Poem)

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Photo by Shamim Nakhai on Unsplash

 

silver haired man

brother, I hear your hearts song

though martial music fills the air

like thunder it rumbles and shakes the world

there is familiarity here in your words

like the soft sighing of grass

there is a longing, there

the shadows of what could have been

ghosts of ‘what if’ gone silent and still

as your path turned left and you

leaving ‘what could have been’ behind you on the floor

weeping behind their glass wall

winters, oceans, the strangers house

I know these things as well

the hungry, the longing, nuances others overlook

I’ve cast mine eyes there

it’s one thing to view the world

it’s another to inhale it, hold yourself still, and see it

Silver haired man

the hand of God hasn’t been removed

its mark is still burnt onto your being

as now, you speak with his tongue

and notice the infinite in the cracks, pot marks,

and driftwood of humanity

You see the lesser, because you are the lesser

but the greater for it

for the veil has been pulled back

and the truth – that drove priests mad

stands in stark nakedness

exposed this time to eyes that seek to cover

not it’s shame, no

No, what you do isn’t an act of embarrassment

what you do is an act of empathy

you cover it not to hide it from the world

but to protect it, you, us, from the cold

like a good father would

Last Day of my blog tour: When Heaven Strikes

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http://lovebytesreviews.com/2017/08/14/blog-tour-interview-prompts-excerpt-giveaway-f-e-feeley-jr-when-heaven-strikes/

 

Last Day of blog tour. It’s hard with everything going on right now to give a shit about book sales and book reviews etc as our country worships at the altar of our lady of perpetual bullshit.

However, I do want to give a shout out to Lily for being amazing and for taking care of this.

All the people in my life that encouraged me to keep going with this. You’re in my heart. Thank you very very very very very much.

All the blog spots that hosted me.

It means a lot. 

I know we’re kind of in a funky place right now – especially gay guys being shut out of publication.

Your life, your love, your road, your sex, your pain, your passion, your faith, your lack of faith, your hopes, your families, your marriages, your failures, your triumphs, your lives, your deaths, your spirits, and all that comes before you and will come after you – are important. You are important. You’re a thread woven into the tapestry of life, without you there would be a lot of color missing from the tableau.

Don’t be discouraged. Self pub if you have to.

You’re stories are important. They should be told. Popularity isn’t the standard.

Feedback isn’t the standard.

Ability is – talent is – hard work is – if this is what you burn to do. If this is what you feel you were meant to do, male or female, gay straight or whatever, you should follow that.

Don’t let people talk shit to you. Don’t let anyone put you down.

Aspire to the art. Aspire to make yourself better at your craft than the book prior.

Stay humble to those who have been supportive of you.

Take criticism with a grain of salt.

Evolve.

Don’t argue anymore. Don’t get into fights over trivial things because people will always try and distract you by raising the bar.

You’re enough. Be enough.

That’s all anyone can ask.

Thanks to everyone who spent their hard earned money on this book. I am so thankful to you. Without your support – I couldn’t go on. I love connecting with you, I love meeting with you in mutual understanding, and giving you a break from the crazy. Thanks for ‘getting me’ and my work.

See y’all soon.

Healing Hands (poem)

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turn on the light

bare your bruised chest

throw your head back

take it all in

show the cracks in your armor

call out to God

let the stranger place his hand

on your head

Go walking in your sleep

there’s no salvation in skin color, child

nor should there be any burden there

no promise in your bones

But the healing touch

of another’s hand

can deliver you from the deep

fathoms of your broken heart

let a cool hand

caress your fevered brow

don’t worry after the color

the faith, the culture, the labor

those hands have known

Trust it, feel it, and

Weep for our foolishness

no politicians can save us

only we can

Then let those hands

dry your eyes

and let them clothe you

as you lay your weary head down

Turn off the light

and fall fast asleep in the deep

sleep of someone forgiven, child

rest there knowing your safe

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(R.I.P Hero Heather Heyer – A casualty in America’s war with it’s own conscience. She stood up for love)