Day 2: The Purpose Driven Life

"You are not an accident"

Beginning day 2 in the purpose driven life it was nice to know that i'm not an accident. I first had some issues with accepting my mother and father. I always considered myself somewhat of a mistake or life as somewhat of a mistake given all the bullshit that happened to me in my childhood. It's very hard to accept or even consider that my rape, abuse, abadonment, more abuse, neglect was all for a reason. I didn't know if i could believe in that type of god.

chapter 2 in the purpose driven life talks about long before i was conceived by my parents, i was conceived in the mind of god. I decided to stick with my orginal train of thought and take the book philisophically rather than literal. There's so much bad shit going on in the world. The other day i read on the CNN website that some five year old kid was beaten and then burned alive. HE survived but would have to live the rest of his life with the scars:mentallly, phyiscally and spiritually. I think that child would always question god. I think that child when it's older will alway ask if god thought of him before he was born why didn't god protect him. Why doesn't God protect many of us?

I'm gay and wasn't the most masculine kid on my block, why didn't god protect me from the harassment? and now that i'm grown, i've been the victim of gay bashing a couple of times, why wasn't i protected? If god concieved of me before i was born, he obviously knew what i was going to be, so why is it the so called conversative christians always question thier own God?



I think the second chapter is more about trust, that no matter what man does with my life, my life was never an accident. I think God in itself it's not the pain or reaction of life, but life itself, how it doesn't discriminate, that there are no illegimate children. We are born. We didn't ask. We are born. It's the living that makes it hard. It's the living that tests faith. I think the second chapter gave me great insight to understand teh difference between god and man.

THe question i'm spposed to consider is "I know that God uniquely created me. Qhat ares of my personality, background, and physical appearace am i struggling with?"

As a black gay man borned in the ghetto, the answer should be simple. I don't think i ever struggled to accept my physical form and it's characteristics, I think it's always been faith. I don't ever think i considered myself or life an accident, i questioned the reasoning for some of the pain. I questioned why my father had to die or why did my mother get addicted to crack. I questioned the poverty.

I don't belive everything happens for a reason. I believe there's a difference between god and man. I no longer think of God as the details, like war or racisim, i think of God as the universe, that its big and getting bigger everyday and we're just specks of dust in it, none of it accidental.

This is love

This is love


That night on the streets
The lights dimmed
The folks didn’t call the cops
Didn’t know my selfish heart was so confrontational
But before that
On the dance floor
Something so real
Even if it’s ending
No one will ever love you like I loved you
Sometimes I think love is just fucking with me
Because love is god
The world can begin or the world can end
Life can having meaning or everything must end
Love is like accidental
You can bring it up with respect or you can drop it off like a coward
And never care how loved survived the abandonment
You can listen to the song on the radio
Or drink or drug until you pass out\
You can sex all night
Or asked for half of life

Some of us
love
getting high on
that chemistry with a sticky dollar bill
But it interacts with you
Your passiveness
It’s still loving you how they didn’t love you
And you must go back and correct the math
Correct the soul
In the clouds behind closed lids
Interacting and loving what you think you can’t love
Addiction
Pulling you under water like crocodile to a zebra that got to close
But it’s all love
Even if it’s the devil
But what if I choose heaven
Maybe we have the problems we have
Some things I do, make it clear
I love you
Some addictions are good
Because I’m not afraid of dying
Because I love you

Day 1: The Purpose Driven Life

The first sentence in the first chapter states “It’s not about you.” That made me laugh out loud. Supposedly it’s all about God. It’s not about my happiness, family or career but God.

I must admit, the first chapter confused me. If everything is about God and god’s plan, why the fuck does he need me? Am I just a rat in a maze teased by the smell of cheese so that I could bump in corners and hallways, so some scientist could document how long it took for me to figure out the puzzle for the prize? Why does God need anybody? If god knows all and sees all and already plan it before I was bored, wouldn’t that be boring? I mean if he knows all and see all; he’s going to know those who just going to say “Fuck you.”

I mean if god knew all , why didn’t he see the devil coming. The devil was once one of his best angels. And what about Eve. I mean didn’t he know Adam and Eve were going to eat that damn apple. Maybe god doesn’t know all and see all. I would think knowing what’s going to happen next would be so boring.

Which brings me back to why the first chapter in "the purpose driven life" pissed me off. I first had to decide if I believed in God and then I had to decide if God was an asshole. I mean I have no desire to spend eternity worshipping anybody. If god is that lonely, he should get a dog.

I decided god is not that lonely. Not my god. I think god is individual like I believe God isn’t taught, he or she is discovered. I don’t think you can teach anyone god. I think you can teach rules and rituals but that’s not God. Growing up we were made to go to church five times a day, eat the cracker and drink the wine, pray at night, but that didn’t teach me anything about god. It taught me that when I grew up the first thing I was going to cut out my life was church. I hated the ritual and all the hypocrisy. I hated that I couldn’t question anything.
Growing up I realized quickly that others exploited and manipulated the word of God for their own personal gain. If god was all knowing and seeing and I had questions, wouldn’t god allow me answers? I mean he knew I was going to question, since he was all knowing.

Funny, at the end of the first chapter the question I was asked to consider “In spite of all the advertising around me, how can I remind myself that life is really about living for God, not myself?”

I laughed because the book itself I figured was some form of advertisement for its own personal gain. At least that was my first impression. I wasn’t going to go into the book with fearing god or any of that bullshit. I was going to go into the book that if I believed my life was purposeful; I was interested in seeing how I could fulfill its meaning. I was ready to read more.

The Purpose Driven Life: The prequel

By no means am I religious. I’ve only been to a church in the last twenty years for a wedding or funeral. I only bought the book, “The purpose driven life” because a good drinking and drugging friend of mine suddenly decided one day to find Jesus. I’d known Myron since our freshman year in college. We spent the next ten years of our life cruising bars, clubs, bathhouses, drug dealers houses and etc. He was a great club friend, the type that would tie the rubber band around your arm to find a vein and shoot you up with the latest drug. One day he decided to get sober, which I thought meant he was just going to let the hard stuff go, but he meant actually sobriety, not even valium. Because we were friends for so long, I decided to entertain what I considered his latest phase like when he fell in love with ecstasy and xanyx.

I bought the book so that we could have something in common. I grew up on the bible so talking about God was nothing new to me. I was actually intrigued. I never considered Myron one-dimensional because I always enjoyed his intellect and humor, so I was excited to see where the new adventure would take us. But Myron wasn’t having it. He decided he was conservative Christian despite the fact he was gay. I knew underneath he was just trying to protect himself and his new decisions. Actually, my interest was only to discourage what I considered his newest annoyance. I wanted the old Myron back. I wanted the “fuck up” that made my life seem somewhat normal. We stopped speaking. Ten years of friendship gave us too many issues. That’s the thing about some friendships—the longer the relationship the more shit to be rehashed. “Remember when you did this, and I did that” bullcrap.

It very hard to forgive people you’ve known your entire life.

A year and something after I stopped speaking to Myron, I re-discovered “The purpose driven life;” mostly because I hate having books in my library that I haven’t read. I hate going to those people houses and they have books on their shelves and when you ask them about them, they haven’t read them. I refuse to buy books I don’t read. Every book on my shelf I’ve read from cover to cover and if I like it, it goes in my reference collection to be quoted and re-read.

Anyways, beginning the “purpose driven life” beget a question I hadn’t considered seriously in a long time. I had to ask myself, did I actually believe in God. I knew I didn’t believe in my childhood God, or heaven or hell. I got over that the first time I sucked dick. I had to ask myself did I believe in God which mean life had purpose. I used to be very dark. Very dark where life was just fucking meaningless. I read every existential book. I wore black. I constantly fantasized about my death. I remember making the decision in my head that I was just going to piss my life away. I wasn’t going to do anything with it. I was just going to get high, have sex and fun. That seems romantic when you’re twenty two years old. Turning thirty years old and surviving my twenties gave me a different perspective on life. Just having fun suddenly seemed stupid. Anyways, I had to ask myself if I believe in God. I thought about the big bang theory. I thought about evolution. I thought about Adam and Eve. I thought about the trees and wind and the human body and how it all seemed so specific and planned. I couldn’t ignore the sun rises for a reason. I couldn’t ignore the purpose of bees and ants and even the germs on my body that I can’t see. I couldn’t ignore purpose. That everything on this planet in one form or another has purpose. And if there was a purpose, meant there was an intelligent mind behind it, that someone planned this. That someone decided it. I knew I wasn’t an atheist. I grew up a church boy, there was no way I can ever be an atheist.

Indirectly I believed in God. Which mean indirectly my life had some purpose? That was new. I never even thought of my life having any purpose. Yet intellectually I couldn’t deny the fact I wasn't0 exempt if 99% of life on this planet in some small or big way had purpose. The wind blew despite the fact if I wanted to feel it on my face or not. So if my life had purpose, I needed to figure out what that was.

I knew part of me would have a difficult time digesting some of the crap written about the bible. And I’ve read ever self-help book on the shelves at Borders, so I knew it probably wouldn’t tell me anything I already didn’t know but I was up for the challenge.

The book begins with I must take forty days out of my life and read each chapter and process it slowly and sincerely. I knew I wasn’t going to take forty days to read a book. But I did decide to dedicate individual blogs for each chapter. I call it my purpose driven blog.

Now that I know I believe in God, the first chapter is “It all Starts with God”

The worse day ever

Yesterday was probably the worse day ever. I went to the doctor for an inner ear infection. This is were speaking up for youself is important. I told the bitch I might be allergic to Batrim but she prescribed it anyway. The last time I took Batrim I was in the hospital for a two weeks. It wasn't for sure if it was Batrim that turned my eyes bloody red or the infection or whatever. I just know, the second i swallowed that pill my temp rose like five degreess and then finally to 106.

I don't know why i didn't listen to myself yesterday. I don't know why i didn't push the issue. I know my body not my Doctor. I took that pill again and spend the last twenty four hours in agony, again. My head was spinning, my eyes turn bloody red, i got such a massive fucking headache i thought my head was going to explode, my breathing slowed down, my temp rose to a 103.

I'm still suffering the side effects. But the lesson is to speak up for myself. Authority figures don't know it all. Just because she wore a white coat didn't mean i should allow the bitch to kill me.

But as i lay in agony like a year ago when i laid in that hospital bed, i discovered there's a lot about my life i need to change. I was alone going through the agony. Tom was there but he barely paid attention. He probably just thought i was being dramatic. Whatever.

New

I woke up this morning feeling new. My therapy is going great. I don't know why it took me so long to get help. I guess growing up a baptist boy in church five times a week i thought all i needed was Jesus.

The main reason i dediced to get help in the first place was because of Hurrican Katrina. I'm from Lousianna. I know that poverty. I know that racism. Shit, help never came quick enough in the ghetto. I wasn't surprised by the goverment response. Part of me wanted all those n****** to drown. I figured the world would be better off because i only felt the ugliness of the crackheads, drug dealers, welfare moms, gangbangers, thieves, hustlers, just the fucking poor.

Funny, i used to be one of them. Funny, i'm still one of them, i get foodstamps. But that was self hate. That was a past i still haven't healed from. That was from growing up in the ghetto and feeling worthless. I had to face my dark skin and nappy hair and love it and see humanity. I had to face my own blackness watching Katrina and not allow rationalization to make me turn away. I had to face all the uncles and cousins in prison. I had to face my mother who is a crack whore. I had to face my father who was drug dealer. I had to face the desperation of too many poor black people in this country. I had to face slavery, segregation and oppression and not allow it to take my heart again, not this time. I had to help. I sent money. I still send money when possible. It's not much, five dollars, sometimes twenty, but i also send my heart and tears and prayers. I keep talking about it until we're all free.

I've been thinking alot about my past. Why i am the way i am. I remember screaming at my sister, "I CAN ONLY TELL YOU HOW I GOT HERE." I now can tell everyone where i'm going.

My life has been full of so much self hate. So much destruction. I got out the ghetto but didn't go very far. I got out the ghetto but my soul stayed behind. That soul that was told he was too dark, too smart, got his ass kicked for wearing the wrong colors in the wrong neighborhood. That soul that had to grow up with a mother who prostituted herself for drugs and then abadonened. That soul that got hard and wouldn't let anybody in, not sexually, not emotionally, not nothing. That soul that walked around the earth with his fists balled. I thought that was how i was going ot get into heaven, with my fists balled. I don't know why it took me so long to get help.

I thought i was prepared for life. I was just prepared to survive at any means necessary. That's not a life. I was prepared to hustle, steal or whatever to get to the next second. I was prepared for instant gratification. And then add in gay.

You see the thing about trouble kids they are always looking for some validation for their pain. They usually want to be models or actors or something in the spotlight to rationalize in order to believe in God. As if God owes them. I used to believe God owed me. I owe God for this life. It's the living that makes us forget.

I think in the beginning the only reason i wanted to be a writer was for the fame. I wanted the attention. I got a book published. I sold like sixty comics, but it wasn't enough. I wanted more attention. I wanted more money. I didn't realize i was that empty. And the more attentino i got the more destructive i behaved.

There's a movie called "El Cantate" with Marc Anthony and it spoke to me. It's when Jennifer Lopez said, "The more love Hector got, the more he sanked into his sadness. It was as if he couldn't feel it or want to feel it. I guess the sadness was too deep."

I understood what she meant. I never had the words before but i had that same sadness. It was a moment i was stuck in. It was that childhood quicksand i fell I was pushed into with being raped at five, abandoned by mother crack head mother at eight, foster care and then the neglect and physically and emotional abuse i would endure because daddy was dead and mama didn't care anymore. That sadness, quicksand, was thick and unforgiving, and more love people showed me made my heart heavier and it sunk me more. I decided if i rebelled agains the love, i feel lighter. i wouldn't have to struggle because the more you struggle in quicksand the faster you sink.


It's hard not worshipping the wound. The sadness is the quicksand. I've been in it for a long time. Trying not to move or breath. Getting high to forget that i was drowning. Not calling for help because being ashamed that i was pushed into the quicksand. And the more people tried to save me, the more i rebelled or pulled them in. some of them saved themseves. Most of them save themselves and left me. They couldn't understand. The quicksand was the only home i knew, and i was going to give it up so easily. They couldn't understand so they yelled at me, they tried to punish me, they stopped speaking to me, they ran away, they shook thier heads, they read thier bible verses, they promised to pray for me, they tried to love me, but i kept sinking and that made them frustrated.

the thing about that sadness is was stubborn. The thing about that sadness it stop trusting a long time ago and i called it home. It was the only home i knew. I wasn't going to leave it so easily. Ironically the sadness gave me protection. It was how i was suriving. The older i got in that quicksand the more lonely it got. Soon i was alone. I was alone. Nobody but the darkness and the cold nights and the addiction. Everyone had given up.

But sometimes we have to leave home to grow up. I didn't want to spend my entire life a child. I wanted to be part of the world. I wanted to see more than beyond my block. Funny again, I thought when i left San Antonio Texas, i got out of the ghetto. I thought because i've been all over the US and overseas, i did more than many in my family. Yet, my heart never left the ghetto. My heart never left the quicksand.

I ask myself, how does one rebuild the ghetto. You don't. You uplift. You educate. You inform. You give people choices. You get some in therapy. You tell the story.

I woke up this morning feeling "new." I'm finally in thirty years telling myself the truth. I'm in fucking quicksand and if i don't get out, a bitch is going to drown, die, stop existing. And nobody can save me but me. Funny, the entire time, a fucking tree had been leaning over my head. I thought it was just shade. All i had to do was reach up and pull myself out. I don't know what i was waiting for. I know what i was waiting for. I was waiting for it to love me. It's never going to love me. I was going to have to redefine love. The love i knew was going to let me die without my life having any meaning. The quicksand would've let me die. I wasn't ready to die.

I don't want to be a writer anymore because of love, fame or attention. Shit nobody reads the blog except for like five people. I want to be a writer because i get to tell the story. I want to be a writer because it's my soul. I want to be a writer because it's how i'm saving myself, therefore, it's my proliferation. Somebody will be reborn again because of my words.

I trust myself, that's new. I'm out the quicksand, that's new. I'm learning to be careful. I don't want to go back.

Now I must face the wreckage. Being in quicksand for thirty years takes its toll on the body and mind and spirit. I must learn how to love again. I must teach the world who i am now. I know it'going to be difficult and lonely. That's why i asked GOD for LIGHT. I can tell you where i've been and now i can tell you where i'm going. I'm walking out the jungle. I walking towards the sea. I'm going to build me a new home where the sun rises. I'm going to live by the light.

Silence

I've been sleeping alot. I think i'm gathering up strength. I don't go out as much as i used to. I don't drink as much as i used to. I don't feel the need.

All i need now is silence. I asked God for light. that was a mistake. i just wanted to know why i had been fumbling around in the darkness for so long go every direction but the right way.

I asked God for light, and got a flash. I saw the road ahead of me. It was more like climbing a mountain. I suddenly felt like Sympus. I read that book by John Camus, loved it. My favorite line "there is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide."

Why do we do anything. Why get up in the morning. Actually, two years ago i tried to kill myself. It was the sixth time. But two years ago was the worse. I still have scars. Two years ago one day i just didn't feel like getting up anymore. I didn't call in to work. I stopped paying all my bills. I just laid in the bed for like five months. I just walked away from all of it. Of course i regretted it.

That's the thing about suicide they don't tell you about. It's what if you fail. What if you get to that point and change your mind. It's hard coming back because you know rock bottom. Suicide was like accepting my death. It was so beautiful. But not dying is like figuring out why to live.

After the last suicide attempt i became very afraid of me. I gave up. I knew i could give up again. It makes it harder to rebuild knowing another storm may be in the new future. I guess you can compare my last suicide attempt to Huricane Katrina. It's not just the storm that happened in New Orleans and its devastation its how to rebuild the ghetto. Can one rebuild the ghetto? Isn't the ghetto the very essence of devastation and poverty. That's the real issue with New Orleans nobody is talking about and when i think of my last suicide, it's like how can i rebuild a broken soul. The storm was only the symptom. The storm only brought attention to what was already brewing.

Maybe that's what i'm most afraid of, that my soul is the ghetto and what happens if another storm comes into town.

So i dedicate this to silence.

Day 2 of light

I asked god for light and i still acted up. Am i that hopeless or helpless. That voice in my head started acting up again yesterday and i listen to it. I didn't have any money but yet i found somebody to buy me liqour. what the hell is wrong with me.

The last fuck up standing.

I’m not sure if that’s the title I want to bear but it’s the truth. Back in college and afterwards, I was surrounded by other fuck ups. We went to the bars and clubs six days week. When did recreational drugs. We constantly complained about how our lives weren’t coming together.

Friend by Friend got into rehab or found religion or became really great liars. We each became liabilities to each other. We used to be each other’s family: myron, edcoco, Miguel, paul, mita, Sha, Crystal, Curtis. I mean these kids had problems. Myron family hated him. Always hated him. He was so ignored. He grew up to go to college, get his masters and sustain a very expensive cocaine and ectasy problem. He used to be one of my best drinking buddies along with Johanthn. WE used to call ourselves “Trash.” We even got t-shirts.

I remember when Edcoc was in the free clinic every other weekend. I got tired of going with him. He always had something. He always called me over to his apartment and asked me what this or that was or if he should do something about it. They all used to call me if they got sent to jail or got in a fight or needed to find whatever drug dealer in whatever city.

I remember when Sha became a stripper. I knew she only did because Cyrstal had been stripping all throughout college. I didn’t like Crystal. I found her ghetto. She liked men who beat her. She also loved her cocaine. We all loved our cocaine. She kept her’s in a vile she wore around her neck like she seen in the mover Dangerious Liasons. Crystal was the type of girl who didn’t like to wake up sober. She kept drugs on her nightstands to do when she woke up in the morning. I loved her for that. I just didn’t like her attitude.

Sha became a stripper. Such a typical tragic girl looking for a man in all the wrong places. She loved men like her father. The men she grew up knowing that cheated on her mother and then abandoned them. She never dealt with her childhood rape. She grew up to like the liquor. She was also the coolest in the group. I love Sha the most because she was an abandoned child like me. I thought we had more in common. I never thought she would become a conversative housewife after the stripping career ended.

And then there was poor, sad, pathetic curtis. I’m still pissed at him, so I will say nothing more but fuck that bastard.

There was a time I only hung with the strippers, escorts, drug dealers, addicts, alcoholics, but all that had to change. We got older. We grew up. We started looking at each other as liablities. First there was my Sister and suddenly I was any good anymore. Then curtis who told me that night in the grocery store when I vomited in the baby aisle and thought it was funny because I was high that I was pathetic. And he meant it.

I’m the last fuck up standing. Maybe I was too loyal. Maybe I didn’t get the memo that I was to report to Rehab. I tried going out into the world and getting more fuck-ups but my heart wasn’t into any more. I also didn’t like what I called the “shiny happy” people. The normal people. People I reblled against. People I told myself I would never become. But things change. The rules change. It hurts. I couldn’t go out in the world and get more fuck-ups because it’s like trying to recreate Woodstock. Those things, clikques, only happen once in a life time. I couldn’t recreate it. That’s when real addiction begins. It’s when the people you used to party with begin to disappear and you’re still at the party dancing on the dance floor by yourself. Maybe I needed it more. Maybe I wanted it more. Maybe I still need to make it make sense.

I’m the last fuck up standing from the class of fuck-ups from 1996-2007. Thad went to jail. Will got killed by his boyfriend. Frederick went to jail. Gaylon died in a car crash. Mita died. Rick died of an overdose. It’s just what happened.

And when I’m out now, I see the new ones. The new class of fuck-ups. They don’t know it yet because they’re drinking they techno-colored drinks, dancing, fucking, thinking they have all the time in the world. But when it’s over, they will come looking for me. Like I went looking for Tim, the ex-drug dealer party boi, like I how I found Emanuel Xaxier, how I found those people who would allow me to have peace with my past.

So dance baby, dance the night away. I’m baking cookies so when you get tired of dancing, we can talk.

The beginning of accepting the wreckage

After my much to do about nothing rants for the last two weeks I started thinking about chances. We always pray to god when we figure out world is going right asking for another chance. I’ve been asking for chances for years. I’m on like my one millionth second chance; but last night I decided to do something different. I didn’t ask for another chance. I was referring to the fact I missed out on a very important job last week because I didn’t check my email or phone messages because I went on an alcoholic binge and drug rant. I missed out on that job that one paycheck would’ve got me back on my feet with my bills. I’m really pissed about that.

So last night I asked god for light. I asked god for some common sense. A year from now my life will be completely different. I will either be dead, homeless or free. Those are the only choices. It’s funny how life really hits that fork road in choices that you either die or live. I know I stopped living a long time ago. But that’s another subject. A subject that will aptly be called “Wreckage” in the future. I know longer care about becoming the best seller writer extradoinare. Last week I was watching the movie “El Cantante” with Mark Anthony. It was a pretty good movie but the story about Hector Lavoe was just sad. I decided I didn’t want a life I didn’t get. I didn’t want a life where you supposedly get everything: money, fame, legacy but you don’t get sanity. I wasn’t going to be one of those artist boozing and drugging my life away and everyone after I die say how brilliant yet tragic I was, that used to be romantic to me, now it’s just sad. It’s sad not to get your own life, your own brilliance, your own purpose.

So I asked God for light.

A year from now I will not be Dead or Homeless, but I will be enlightened. I will be on my own in my own apartment. I will still be trying to get it together. And I’m not afraid of the loneliness that comes with getting healthy.

I asked God for light because I no longer wanted to act like the victim or as if I don’t know consequences. Life is just a bunch of choices and some of them lead us in the wrong direction that we’re lost for years. I’m in the dessert, I know that. I’ve made a LOT of bad decisions. I’ve been fumbling around in the dark like I could feel my way to salvation. I should’ve asked for a damn flashlight a long time ago.

I write this not for my self, but for you, you who will come looking like I did when I started asking questions and couldn’t find answers. You are not alone.

Writer in Exile day whatever: let there be light

This little light of mine
i'm going to let it shine.

Day -9

I'm counting back now. I'm no longer calling it "writer in exile" but it's more like "soul in exile"

i found a really great psychtrist this week. I think he's going to work out. i don't believe in taking prescription medicince. i tried that. it made me feel weak and tired all the time and when i stop taking it made me feel suicuidal. i want behavorial therapy. i need to talk it out. i need to write it out. that makes me feel stronger.

it's a good day because i'm finally understand and facing me without the smoke and mirrors. Some people think me writing this candid blogs is about me putting my business out there. So not true. I'm not giving specifics, i'm revealing insecurities. I'm hoping in a way not to only save myself one day but use these revelations to help others. I get so tired of reading somethign where a person killed themselves because they didn't reach out. It's hard to reach out when you get older because it's so much more you have to hide. Nobody wants to be weak. Nobody wants to be disappointed. It's like after 23 we all pretend that we're so busy and important. Yet too many of us are suffering in the darkness.

life is hard. it's so fucking hard. it's like you keep thinking you get to a point where it's figured out but you realize the floor keeps slipping away. i don't know shit. i'm a student everyday.

so what is it that i want to say on day 9. hmmmmmm. i want to forgive. i want to get healthy. i want more to be stable than successful. i don't care about being such a great writer. i don't care about being rich. I don't care about having the perfect relatinoshiop or life. if i can just wake up and like me, that's good enough.

i'm getting there. i am so getting there.

Day 8

I put together the pieces this morning. i tried to figure out why the train derailed, what happened to make day 3 and 4 be so tragic until i went back to day 1. it was the money. it was when i got the money and of course i became concern. i could now afford the demons.

now i reazlie it's not the money or me working, it's the convenience. those demons are real. the only problem is trying to figure am i the demon or am i the victom of the demon. i tried to figure that question out my entire life. did i become what it made me or am i still being harassed by the past. which begs the fucking question, who the fuck am i?

i like day 8, finally i'm asking the right question without outside interference, that's what has frustrated me the most. i get tired or people and thier opinions on my life, telling me to get over it, that i like being the victim, tell me all kind of crap i don't care for. i need to figure this out. nobody can help. they never could.

Writer in Exile, day 7

i actually thought of suicide this morning. i think it's the pills i'm on. i'm having this urge to take a butcher knife and carve in my chest, "i hate me" i hope that though passes.

why am i so damn depressed. i'm on the medication. is it the medication that's making me crazy. or is it the drinking, smoking and all the other shit i've been doing. i'm panicking. i'm need to stop. i just ruined another job pontential. i didn't even seen that the person called because i was high the last day and a half.

i need to stop. i was reading up on Amy Winehouse today. i actaully felt sorry for her and then i thought of myself. i feel sorry for me. i feel sorry that i have such low self worth. that i think so low of myself. that i think i'm weak. that i feel so damn alone all the god damn time.

but i'm not alone. i have friends. they care about me, i should stop pushing them away. i have fans. today, i have decided to end this rants with something i like about me.

today i like my hands and feet. i think i have really pretty hands and feet. i'm saving myself for my hands and feet. my hands are typing these words so that the universe hears me. my feet allowing my body to stand and run when i need to. i feel better. i feel better.

Writer in exile, day 6

This is what I didn’t want to happen. This anger, I din’t want it. I tried to bury it at 18 but it’s back. They are not going to like me angry. I don’t give a fuck anymore, maybe this is the change I need. Maybe this what this loneliness is really about. I’m so tired of disrespect. I’m so fucking tired. It’s done. I’m no longer nice.

Writer in Exile, day 5

i woke up this morning and realized i'm liking this self-imposed exile. I have reduced my communication to fifty percent. I guess by next week it will be a hundred percent.

i'm realizing why i'm in exile, i think it's for the transition. i need time for me to be alone.

funny, i also realized this morning that it will take twelve thousand dollars to change my life's direction in regard to where i live and getting out of debt. but will the money really change my life or have i learned why i made the mistakes in the first place.

i was reading up on happiness the other day, there's something called "destination addiction" which is how people basically feel as if their chasing happiness or it's a destination. As if they get the promotion they will be happy or in my case i finally got my book deal i would be happy, but if i stoped all the distractiosn and noise i would realize i'm already happy.

hmmm, i wouldn't say i'm happy, i'm concerned, i'm distracted, shit i'm going through a break up. i'm trying to get toxic people out of my life and stop unproductive behavior.

i look at my energy, i used to go out to the clubs four times a week, which meant five days out of the week i was getting fucked up or recovery. That's more than seventy percent of my energy that's wasteful. it was fun but wasteful.

i'm tired of complaining and i really wouldn't be that concerned if life hadn't taken the "thirty year old" twist in the road. It's like all my friends have changed. We are no longer college kids and it's not just keeping up with the jones but disrepect. i'm feeling so much disrepect like everybody is treating me like the kid or something. I called my friend Sha the other day about some emergency i was having, and she blew me off, thought i was overreacting or drunk or high.

that's so fucked up. it was a monday morning so why would she just assume something like that, and it's not just her, it's like everybody and they think i don't see it.

these days everybody is busy and they go on and on how fucking busy and important thier lives are, so i've decided to become busy and important too. i'm unavaliable. adult friendships are so weird and i thought high school was over.

i'm learning as an adult male i can't be vulnerable anymore, it's all about reputation and respect. it sucks but it's true. you can't no longer just kid around, funny i was at a dinner party and everybody seemed so concerned with how others were perceiving them. when i ordered a cocktail, first there was a hush, like nobody wanted drink around each other or show thier true colors.

life is so changing.

Writer in Exile, day 4

this weekend taught me that i'm not as stupid as i think i am. i mean i have money but i'm suddenly thinking about the bigger picture. normally, i would've got me some hotel, bought like a hundred dollars of weed and a half of Tina, a liter of rum, and fucked until monday morning then drag myself home against the burning sun.

but i didn't do that. i put that money aside, paid off some credit cards, and started plotting my future. i want to be happy, that' s what i beginning to realize. i want the house, the yard, cool as dinner parties, i want that shit.

and i''m not going to feel guilty. funny a drug friend called me this weekend, actually he harassed me this weekend, and i almost gave in to it. but i started think, why did i attract that person in my life. why is that i have so many around me who don't want a life for me. we just use and we use and be used. i'm so tired of that. i'm so tired of those people who don't think i want a life, or want the best for me. i see it now. i can't pretend that i dont' see it. steven told me getting healthy isn't a easy thing. it's hard. it's hard. some days, i just want to go back to the abuse, i know the abuse, but i'm tired of hurting. this weekend, it was beautiful. i feel proud of myself. i said no.

Writer is exile, day 3

I’m beginning to realize I can’t keep people here, in my hell. They want out. I can’t bully their existence, it’s so funny, how I help but yet how I make it all about me. I’m beginning to realize, I never loved anybody, I just wanted it, I just wanted the fantasy, and I clawed and cursed, and pissed off and went to jail and tried to murder because I want those to stick to the script I have in my head. But this is life. I can’t control other souls. And no matter how I manipulate, I can’t control the wind.

Thomas wants to leave. I should let him leave. Charles wanted to leave. I punished him. It’s like I grew up to be the abandoned child with issues. Let them go. I need to let them go. They were weak to begin with. I’m going to let him go.

writer in exile, day 2

i think about all the ideas i have in my head. When do they become real. I'm beginning to realize dream and reality are two different hells. the dream nobody will every know. Teh reality everbody gets to have their fucking opinion. what is that i want. I asked myself yesterday, seriously, do i want to be happy.

and so people would think that's an easy question. i never wanted to be happy. I never wanted to be happy. i wanted to suffer like Jesus, i thought it would make me a matyr. but as i get older it only makes me more alone. it makes others stop speaking to me. i get so tired of it. after twenty five, we hide our intentions.

and then i think of jesus, how lonely it was at the ending. why is it they appreciate you after the fact. what if jesus never died on the cross. what if they believed to begin with. why do we have to go through such extremes. and maybe that's why i never believed in relegion. such fucking extremes. why can't we believe we're already happy. why do we need the ultimatums.

writer in exile, day 2, and nothing much has changed. i talked to that albino yesterday. i think it's funny how he wants everybody to pay attention to him, so sneaky but he pay attention to no one and he thinks no one notices. maybe he doesn't have the time. maybe he is one of those people who are so busy, and they always telling you how busy there are like it means shit. i laugh because i figure out the riddle the first day, and now i'm just letting him make it true.

he wonders why i call him the albino, he aint got no shadow

but anyways, back to me

The End: the last of the Shirtless Writer

Five things I learned while preparing for a marathon.

1. Can’t do tequila shots before the run. I thought it would make the run more entertaining but it only made me spew exorcist vomit.


2. Can’t smoke weed before the run. It seems like a no brainer but I had to do something to get me motivated.


3. Can’t have sex. It just makes you lazy. I know every time I get off, I just want to go to sleep or to Taco Bell not run twenty six miles.


4. Can’t cheat.


5. Can’t quit.
   

When I was twenty-five years old getting drunk with a couple of friends at a bar we all decided that we were going to run a marathon. When I woke up the next day the idea seemed fucking ridiculous and diarrhea silly. The most running I had done in my life was probably as a fat kid chasing an ice cream truck.

The next day, hung-over, of course my friends backed out before we even started to train. I decided to keep my word. I wanted the challenge. I just wanted to do something healthy. When I told my friends I was keeping my promise, they laughed. They considered me too lazy. They joked that I was always the first to the liquor cabinet and the last to leave a bathhouse. I knew I wasn’t the most discipline person in the world. I liked bad decisions. I liked dancing on table tops until seven in the morning. I decided to run the marathon because I figured I needed the discipline. I had something to prove to myself. I wanted the bragging rights.

I also figured if Oprah fat ass could do it, I knew I could do it. I started slow, a mile four times a week. In the beginning, I felt Forrest Gump stupid. Run, Forrest, Run. I was actually waiting for me to quit. It seemed so unnecessary to get up at dawn and run five miles. In the beginning I was angry. I tried to convince myself that I didn’t care if my friends laughed at me or were placing bets to see how long it would take for me to give up. I hated that others thought I was so weak and basically a crack head. I knew I had nothing to prove. In the beginning I felt like the white rat in the maze trying to avoid the cliche of cheese. I knew that was the experiment. After three months, I learned I was going to have to do it sober. That really pissed me off. I couldn’t do the ten miles after a night partying. I needed all of my energy. After three months I was running thirteen-16 miles. My body no longer accepted toxics. But something beautiful happened after five months of training. I got to the twenty mile mark. It was like an outer body experience. I completely separated from my body. I could feel myself running but it was like I was standing still. I could feel myself breathing but it was like water. It was such peace and serenity. I felt gentle calmness. I would even dare to say I felt God. And I never had been so healthy in my life. My eyes went from that yellowish alcoholic glare to brilliant white like a Colgate commercial. My brain didn’t feel like something holding my body down during a hung-over but energetic and suddenly I was good at jeopardy.

In 2001, I ran the San Antonio marathon. It was the proudest day of my life. The next week I was back at the bar. Funny, because i had gone missing for half a year, everybody thought I had gone to jail or was in the hospital. That’s gay life, can’t get old, sick or sober without conspiracy theories.

The only part I hated about the marathon was the ending. It seemed so anticlimactic after twenty six miles. I wanted to keep running until my body gave up. I wanted the ending to be brilliant but I just crossed a line with forty other people, given my time and another bottle of water. I guess that’s the same with every sitcom I ever loved. I hated the ending of Seinfeld, Sex and the City and Sopranos. I guess because I didn’t want it to end. Most people don’t’ get endings. We just disappear.

And then it’s that nagging question, what was it all for? It’s usually that feeling I get after a drunken one night stand. Was I lonely? Was I bored? Am I a slut with no conscious? Probably the latter. What was it all for? I once stood in line for a day and half for Star Wars movie tickets. The movie sucked. I once masturbated thirteen times in a twenty four hour period when I was twenty one years old. I had to go to the emergency room and get a tube stuck down my dick so that I could pee. Yet, that’s not my most embarrassing moment. I once entered a hot dog contest and won second place, dipping hot dogs in water and forcing the pig slop down my throat without gagging. I threw up so violently afterwards. Till this day I can’t look at a hot dog without getting sick. Shit, why did I go to college? I had the nagging question that it has to make sense or mean something like Christmas and Valentines Day. Do Hallmark sell cards like, "Why the fuck did i do that?"

Some think running twenty six miles like a seven foot black drag queen in red pumps without getting chased by the KKK is unnecessary. But why do we do anything. In college I could blame peer pressure like doing 13 tequila shots in a row. I wanted to be cool. As a grown man, I don’t have to do shit I don’t’ want to, sober. So what’s the difference between romantic and crazy? My grandfather would say crazy is when you get caught with your pants down and the other person laughs at you-- but if that person pulls his or her pants down too, it’s romantic, but if you both get arrested its pathetic.

Yet, I know romantic often turns into crazy or creepy. I knew this guy in high school who set an entire street on fire to spell out “I love you Tamika Shanice Walker.” It was romantic until the fire spread and burned down like three houses. Tamika immediately broke up with him and got a restraining order. She said he was crazy. And let’s not forget Lisa Nowak who cemented her status as the only astronaut we’ll remember because she fell in love with another astronaut, then drove 900 miles to confront/kidnap her love’s girlfriend wearing a diaper. 900 hundred miles is like twelve hours in a car, at one point did she ever tell herself that she might’ve gone insane.

But back to my point. This is the worse part of a writer’s life, the ending. It’s the last chapter in the book. I want to commit suicide at this part. It means “what the fuck was it all for?” Why did I spend the last two years of my life writing these damn comics? Am I crazy? Did I need attention? Was I lonely? Am I going to get paid? Am I going to win an award? Why did I quit my job? Why did I try to make it all make sense? Is anybody going to care? Has anybody seen my damn dog, he ran away like a month ago when I stop feeding him? So many questions and not enough answers. Why do we do anything?

This is the worse part of my writer’s life. This is when I feel like a loser. I’m still nobody. I can’t brag. Nobody cares unless you get rich or famous. I owe too many money. I laugh because I know there’s no money in writing. It’s depressing. It’s the reason why probably so many writers become drunks. I need a drink. I laugh because being a writer is like being homeless. It looks romantic and everybody thinks you’re scheming or got cash stash somewhere. I’m afraid of seeing my landlord because how many jokes can I make why the rent is late this month. He doesn’t think I’m funny anymore. Nobody thinks I’m funny anymore.


Damn, am I somebody yet? But happiness can be so fleeting. It’s like the marathon; you get to the end and want to keep running. You want to keep trying to make life or death make sense. It's only worth it when i pull down my pants and show them my dick, they don't laugh. I guess that's what i've been doing these past two years, i became a flasher. It's worth it when they give me the dollar and the next they say i made them laugh. I suddenly don't feel so pathetic anymore. It inspires me to keep looking for the gentle calmness. Maybe it’s god. It’s over. This is the last comic. I got to go back to reality now. I got to get a new dog. I got to get a real job. Thank you for being so kind to me these last two years. You made my life romantic. The end.

Writer in exile, day 1

Sometimes I hate having money because too many unproductive options began taunting my demons. It’s better when I’m broke because I sorta forced to remain productive, make my life make some sense. I sometimes like to think of myself as weak and then I get nervous and start calling friends hoping they would be some sorta of distraction so I wouldn’t do what I already know that I’m going to do and that is buy drugs, get drunk and have sex all day. Why do I feel so weak? I don’t have to do those things. I can keep working on my novel. Actually this post has made me feel better. I went into exile because I wanted to focus on my bigger picture. I need to learn sacrifice and restriction. It doesn’t always have to be so extreme.

I think when I wake up in the morning I have to remind myself that I’m not starving. I often forget so when I get any joy I usually overdose. I need to think of the bigger picture. I don’t have to call my friends. I don’t have to be a baby. I’m a thirty year old man who needs to get a job. I am not going to spend my entire day getting drunk, high and looking for sex. That’s so stupid.

Whatever crossed my mind

Five o’clock in the morning and sober, I started surfing the net in between going back and forth on a4a and manhunt. I wanted to see if there was a list out there of black gay writers. I remember I put one together about four years ago that was when I was with my ex, the bastard’s name will not be mentioned. I put together such an extensive list of the published and unpublished, I called it the library. I’m so pissed that I deleted all my files off his computer and website. I can get really angry sometimes. I need to work on that. I guess I can put the list back together which will take so much fucking time that if I’m not drinking seems ridiculous because I mean who cares. I care. I fucking care. And I like to think that there is some black punk out there who wants to know his history. I always forget the lesbians. I really need to read more lesbians books. I mean women are great writers and story telling by nature. I wonder why men get more credit than women writers. HMMMMM.

Anyways, I woke up this morning thinking about what it meant to be a black gay writer. What it meant to be a writer of color and gay. I stand on the heels of people like Countee Cullen, Hughes, Baldwin, Hempphill. Lourde, so I should take my writing more serious. I think what it means to be a black gay writer is for me to tell my story. The story I know and connect it to the world. It’s for me to love my life and what a fucking life it has been. To be a writer is so many things, first I’m human, then I’m black, then I’m a male and then I’m gay. Lastly, I’m also fucking broke and curse a lot. But the stories I tell are just now beginning to make sense to me. I’m part of it. That feels to be part of something. I mean I ain’t getting no fucking check, but at least I’m part of it. I want to be part of it. I need to be part of it. I should put that list together and put my names in BOLD to remember my family.

part one: The End

I don't expect my love affairs to last for longNever fool myself that my dreams will come trueBeing used to trouble I anticipate itBut all the same I hate it, wouldn't you?
So what happens now?Another suitcase in another hallSo what happens now?Take your picture off another wallWhere am I going to?You'll get by, you always have beforeWhere am I going to?Time and time again I've said that I don't careThat I'm immune to gloom, that I'm hard through and throughBut every time it matters all my words desert meSo anyone can hurt me, and they doCall in three months time and I'll be fine, I knowWell maybe not that fine, but I'll survive anyhowI won't recall the names and places of each sad occasionBut that's no consolation here and now.Don't ask anymore.

No espero que mis romances durar para de largoNunca engañarte que vendrán mis sueños verdadSiendo utilizado para preocupar me lo anticipo¿Pero todos los iguales lo odio, no?¿Qué ahora sucede tan?Otra maleta en otro pasillo¿Qué ahora sucede tan?Tomar tu cuadro de otra pared¿A dónde estoy el ir?Pasarás, tú tienes siempre antes¿A dónde estoy el ir?He dicho repetidamente que no cuidoQue soy inmune al abatimiento, de que yo son duro por y por pero importa cada vez todas mis palabras me abandonaTan cualquier persona puede lastimarme, y hacenLa llamada en tres meses mide el tiempo y seré fino, sé bien quizá no eso muy bien, pero sobreviviré de todos modosNo recordaré los nombres y los lugares de cada ocasión triste pero ésa aquí y ahora no es ninguna consolación.No pedir más.

My dick

First impressions do not count: In the case of Growers vs. show-ers.

Disclaimer, I’m going to say dick so many time in this article. Small Dick. Fat dick. Skinny Dick. Dick. It seems my adult gay life has been about my dick. ”Show me your dick” was an actual scientific study. Sexologist John Money wanted to prove that the quintessential characteristic of a man. With government money, he conducted an observational study of the dick in a many major American cities-- hiring sociologists to stand on the corner asking men on the street if they possessed a penis. When I read about the study in a medical journal I thought it was a joke and damn bold. I can barely get my boyfriend of nine years to show me his dick in bed. Maybe I should tell him it’s an observation study.
What does it mean to be a man? I’m still trying to figure it out which is why I’m a grower. What does it mean to be a grower? It means that I’m willing to learn new things. It means I’m constantly trying to figure out my sexuality in despite the fact I don’t give really great first impression. I’m not boring in bed. What does it mean to be a showoff?. It means there are those only about their ego. It means there were decided by a system not their souls. It means they constantly think others are looking for them. I’m a grower, not an entertainer, in every definition of the word. I only exist to those who are willing to nuture me or pity me or give me thirty seven seconds.
In my opinion, to be a man or not to be a man, first impressions do not count. It takes so long to like me. It’s like solving the Rubik cube, if you don’t try to cheat. I can often be ghetto crack head awkward. For the record, I don’t do drugs like Nancy Reagan unless Rick James is buying. I don’t like my first impressions. I have a tendency to sweat and twist like a 50s dance because I always feel inferior which makes my neck itch and right my ear stutter like SOS. I get shy and very nervous around too many people. I don’t know why maybe because I think other people know I’m broke. I aint got no money. I don’t like first impressions because they seem unfair to the socially challenged with bad credit and bad teeth. And it’s so subjective, what someone would consider corky another considers psycho. You never know what people are looking for, so fuck first impressions. I made mistakes with first impressions. I once showed up to an interview high on weed and terribly hung-over, so I decided have another drink during it in a Starbucks cup to balance the equation. What happened was that I got too happy and confrontational like each ever time alcohol is in my system. But was worse I made the very bad decision to wear all black, I sweated like a fat drunk Marlon Brando cat burglar the entire interview. Another fucked up first impression was when I once got on a crowded bus with my dick out. I say that again. I got on a crowed bus with my dick out. It was an accident. I was running for the bus and my zipper came undone and I wasn’t wearing underwear. I went to pay my fare, and the bus driver asked me “Are you going to put that away.” I looked down at my crotch and the cold chill I was feeling suddenly made sense. I looked up at the crowded bus and almost passed out. I was going to have to stand next to those people for the next thirty minutes until I got home. I have so many awkward moments in my life, so fuck first impressions. I ain’t got a big dick. I’m a grower.
But it got me to thinking what really makes a man a man. I’ve shown my dick to so many strangers but never really felt like a man. I guess it first began with gym, having to be naked in front of other guys and feeling smaller in comparisons. And suddenly in high school there was the pressure of sex. Losing my virginity to a girl was supposed to make me a man. I lost my virginity at fourteen years old to Keisha in her bedroom. I didn’t feel any different. I didn’t even have an orgasm. I just stuck it in, pounded a couple of times until I got bored. The only exciting part was bragging about it to my male cousins who touched their dicks when I described her body and how it supposedly felt. That turned me on. I lost my virginity to a guy at sixteen years. That didn’t make me feel like a man but more confused. I had to deal with the fact I was gay. I had to deal with that bastard never called me back like I never called Keisha back.

Like my dick, my masculinity or manhood has never been exuberant or much of a show-er or showoff. I don’t know how to fix a car. I can’t watch sports without getting bored. I rather watch Martha Stewart. I don’t drink beer. I don’t gamble. I’m no John Wayne with the deep basing Barry White voice or that ridiculous walk. And I don’t have the biggest dick in the room. Maybe my dick is bigger than a midget but it’s not the typical black dick. My family came over from Britain in the 1900s, need I say more. I must admit I’ve always wondered if I had a bigger dick how my life would be different. In middle school would I won the Spelling Bee? Would I have made the basketball team in high school? Would I have gone to Harvard and became a hustler for the preppy rich kids. My obsession with my dick probably started the day I watched porn. The guys seemed so huge. I couldn’t imagine that was the normal. And I was a black male, I thought getting the big dick sort of made up for the years of oppression and racism and getting pulled over by the cops. And then I wonder is it because I only have an average eight inch dick, did that turn me in to a writer?--instead of getting a real job like a street walker or stripper. My intention since I was fourteen years old has been to distract those from my dick, tell a joke, wear a shiny necklace, don’t make them look directly at it or pull out a ruler, shave my pubic hair to make it look bigger, put a pretty cock ring around it, anything to get it touched before the person changes their mind like getting drunk and sleeping with a ugly person and regretted it.

But I’ve always be a grower never a shower-er. When I was a boy, I never gave much thought to about the man I wanted to grow up to be. I think I was just trying to survive. I often wondered what would happened to me. I worried if I would be okay. Will I be happy? Will I ever find someone to love me? Would I ever feel good enough? Will I ever have a family? In the beginning, I didn’t have any male role models in my life. My father got himself killed when I as five years old. Before that, he was never around. I only had three memories of him and none of them were pleasant.

But back to gym, now it’s no longer High School but Bally’s. I have no fear of walking around naked in the shower. I know I don’t have the biggest dick. It’s just average. It’s a grower. I’m not competing. I’m a grower not a show-er. It’s not like I got extra dick under my bed or in the refrigerator to pull out just in case of an orgy breaks out. But it works, Should that just matter that my dick works. And when I’m fucking I only need thirty seven seconds to get off. The rest of the act is just fluff in my version of foreplay. You get what you get. It ain’t bad. I’m a grower because it’s taken a long time for me to get comfortable with my body. I’m not that masculine. I’m not rich. And when I’m a top, I know the bottom is probably thinking about his last fuck, but then again I only need thirty seven seconds. It’s taken a long time for me to accept that my dick is as good as it gets and that’s beautiful. My dick is beautiful. Let me say it again, my dick is beautiful in its starving eight inches glory. I’ve had showoff dicks. They think you just supposed to service them. And when I think about it, I don’t want a really big dick. Having a smaller dick made me want to explore the rest of my body and I found I had nipples that liked to be twisted, an asshole that liked to be licked, toes that like be sucked, balls that like to be spanked, eyes that like to be blind folded. Not having a big dick made me a freak and it’s the better life. When I was a young boy I wonder what type of man I would grow up to be because I didn’t have many positive role models. I guess my father had a big dick, probably that’s what got him killed I didn’t realize I just had to look to my dick. I have a “relationship” dick. It’s a grower. It grows like planting a tree, be patient. Every day I’m learning how to become a better man. It’s how I’m growing. It’s not how I’m showing off. That’s my dick. And that’s why I don’t believe in first impressions. I only need thirty seven seconds to get off.

Me Making funny Faces

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QMujKFoCNg

My song

go back and correct those wounds
not have mama abandon
not get raped
deal with the pain instead of run
speak its name
stop feeding it soul
save
talk to somebody
stopped trying to kill
self


close them eyes
stop
the belt forcing itself it down
stop
rape
forcing itself down
stop trying to make it normal
love it
love
love words
truth
hold
claim
save
me

my shit

In the case of the Happy Ever After

In case of the Happily Ever After

Who wants to be happy? It’s creepy. Ever walk in a room and see a person smiling, it’s disturbing. You’re automatically suspicious. If you’re too happy people think you’re on drugs or joined a religious cult; either way it’s the human instinct to kill the buzz. When I was a young boy, I asked my mama when I grow up will I be good looking, will I be happy, will I be loved and she said shut your black ass up, don’t you see I’m trying to smoke my crack pipe.

It was supposed to be so easy, the happily ever after. I was supposed to grow up, get a good job, marry a good Christian girl, buy a house and go to church every Sunday according to my grandfather. There were so many things wrong with that picture since I was a Buddhist and allergic to pussy. In the fairy tale I was supposed to be the Prince, ride up on my great white house, saved the damsel whiny Princess, and then ride off to the sunset and live happily ever after. Yet history has shown royalty (king, queens, prince and princes) never really have a good life. If they are good looking it usually ends in tragedy. In Egypt Ramesses III and Amenemhat I were assassinated, Nefertiti went missing and Cleopatra committed suicide. Let’s not forget the Marie Antoinette who got her head cut off, Grace Kelly drove off a mountainside and lastly Princess Di crashed into a wall chased down by her fame. Not even American Royalty unofficial had it better. Need I say more, the Kennedys, shot in the head and plane crashes. It seemed not even the real Prince Charming and damsel Princess lived happily ever, just the opposite, life only got more complicated or tragic.

Yet it happens to the best of us--that need to try and make some sort of sense out of our lives. I called it the last chance for happiness. It’s the age when most of us begin the adult negotiations. It usually happens when we start approaching thirty years old. There’s an innate panic of high school reunions and fear of failure. It’s usually the time when alcoholic friends suddenly find Jesus and strippers become soccer moms. It’s the last chance. I’ve seen it happened so many times. My sister was fat and approaching thirty years old when she met her husband. She was a college drop out and working as a receptionist for a law firm. One day she disappeared. All I was told was that she met some guy at work and was no longer speaking to the family, especially me because she blamed me for her last failed relationship. She ignored the fact that guy was a deadbeat meth addict. In the beginning I was insulted because I didn’t want to be a dirty little secret like herpes. My older sister had always had anger management problems but the day she met her soon to be husband she turned into an uber-BITCH. She stopped answering her phone. She wouldn’t loan me money. I felt as if she abandoned my irresponsibility. I didn’t meet the mystery man until the day of her wedding. I was only invited because I promised to bring a gift and not show up drunk. I brought a present. It was very difficult for me to be happy for her since she excluded me from possibly ruining her happily ever after. But I understood. It was her last chance to be somebody. She was pushing thirty years old. She wasn’t so cute anymore. She was used. She had a life time of fast food jobs. She had too many secrets. It was her last chance to be the bride and not the bridesmaid. Women take that shit serious. She was beginning to feel the pressure of loneliness. She met the guy and six months later they were man and wife. It turned out he was already married and never got a divorce.

A happy ending is an ending of the plot of a work of fiction in which most everything turns out for the best for the hero or heroine, their sidekicks, and just about everyone but the villains.. A happy ending at the China Town Massage therapist is getting the dick jacked off. I rather get my dick jacked off. Growing up I fell in love with fairytales I fell in love with family sitcoms on television. I fell in love with idea of the happy ending or happily ever after where problems can be solved in thirty minutes. I watched shows like Leave it to Beaver, Family Ties and the Cosby show like it was the bible. I guess because my real life was such a mess. Daddy got himself killed when I five years old. Mama got addicted to drugs. We were dirt poor. It was a lot of reality for a child deal with so I fell in love with the television. I fell in love with romantic comedies.

I based my life on a fantasy. I believed so much in it I refused to face reality. I based love on that lie. I based friendships on that lie. I based my life success on that lie. I couldn’t understand the implausibility of Rachel on the show Friends, a high school graduate and waitress could just one day be a buyer for Gucci. That’s doesn’t happen in reality. And I couldn’t figure out why nothing was working for me. I was trying to live the life of what some drug addict writer wrote on a binge like West Wing. I should’ve known better because I’m a writer. I thought love was “When Harry Met Sally” and didn’t know love was “When Harry tried to kill Sally.”

I had to pretend to be this good boy that came from a good family, a mom and dad with a good job, so that I could grow and have a good life. The truth was haunting. I was from the ghetto. I was from the back of the ghetto, not the front, but the back where the crack heads passed out and drug dealers played dice. I was from the bottom of the pudding cup; life wasn’t going to be so easy for me like Theo on the Cosby Show. The more I surrendered to the fantasy, the addictions begin to happen. I needed to drink more. I needed to abuse more. I needed drugs. I needed more sex. And I’m a stubborn person who refused to be wrong, so I couldn’t see I wasn’t happy. I was fucking miserable. I grew up to be a liar. I grew up to be a hustler. I grew up to be the villain. I wanted to be Prince Charming but name itself sounds like gigolo or gay rapper.

And being gay didn’t help coming from where I come from. It’s such a fantasy of young hot boys with great bodies and big dicks. As a homosexual it seemed that the first thing I learned was to lie. I had to hide it. I had to be convincing when I hid it. I had to create some personality that was a lie. I had to pretend to like women. And then lying didn’t stop when I came out. That day in church when I was recruited to be gay, it all seemed like a fantasy. I was told I never have to worry about getting anyone pregnant. I was promised techno-colored drinks, all the sex I could handle and dancing all night. It seemed so much fun that rainbow flag flickering in the wind. It seemed so tempting, the intoxicating lights, the basing music, nobody ever said I had to grow up. Yet, we do grow up. I came out when I was fifteen years old. I am now thirty years old. I lived five lives in that fifteen years old. But the lying didn’t stop. It was still about sex. Men lie. Show me a man that doesn’t lie and I show you a third nipple, they are that rare. And how was I to know when I came out that I was on my own. My family didn’t ask any questions about my life anymore. I was alone. Nobody told me. All I knew at the beginning of my gay existence I starting lying. I didn’t know how to stop. I lied in my online profiles. I lied about my age. I lied just to sleep with a guy. I lied to myself. I told myself my youth would last forever. It didn’t.

Yet, the happily ever is haunting. I still wanted love. I still wanted a home to call my own. It didn’t matter that I was gay. I was still going to have to grow up. A friend of mine called me at three o’clock in the morning. He wanted to go to a park and cruise. I thought the idea was silly since we both were thirty years old. I only went because he promised weed. In the park at three in the morning on a Wednesday night, it seemed ridiculous riding around in the car in circles looking for dick. Everyone seemed so young. I felt I was dressed inappropriately in beach sandals, cargo shorts and a t-shirt that asked “Who would Jesus Do?” I looked more like I was going to a yard sale than looking to get my dick sick behind a tree in a gay park. I knew I had a nice bed at home and I suddenly wanted to be in it. I couldn’t lie anymore. I couldn’t conjure that desperate spark in my eyes. I couldn’t pretend that it was all so damn unnecessary and hilarious grown ass men sniffing around each other like common street dogs. I wanted more. I wasn’t so young any more.

I was still going to have to become a man that scared the shit out of me. I guess because I was afraid to say that I still wanted to be happy. I thought I had given up on the fairytale with my first STD. I’d seen how it worked out for some of my friends and relatives but I still wanted the American dream. I still wanted the advertisement. I felt I was owed it. When I was twenty one years old, I couldn’t see my life past Friday and Saturday night and now at thirty years old, I was saving for my down payment for my dream home. It’s because it’s called “the life” not “my life.” In that park cruising with my friend I suddenly knew when I’m gone the liquor stores will still be there, so will the drug dealers, the bathhouses, the clubs, the bars, none of them won’t close down because I’m no longer dancing on the dance floor. It’s called “the life” not “my life.” I wanted my life. When I was recruited that day in church and signed the contract to be a promiscuous homosexual I should’ve read the fine print. I decided to hire me a drag queen. I needed a need contract. I didn’t want to be the old man in the park flashing teenagers. I didn’t want to be the botox tragic fag with ass implants and fake teeth trying to pretend I was still in my twenties. I wanted to be home watching television with my lover. I wanted the fantasy of growing old with him on the porch and sweet tea. I was still a romantic no matter how many bathhouses and orgies I’ve attended. I was still a boy standing in front of a boy and asking him to love me.

I don’t’ understand why it has to be called happily ever after. It sounds like a place where the Easter Bunnies and Santa Claus go to commit suicide. It sounds so damn final. I don’t want to ride off into the sunset. I want to wake up to sun rises. I can’t understand why the story can’t end “the two lovers did the best the good.” Why couldn’t it be called “good enough?” I didn’t want my story to end that I lived happily ever after because I know that’s another lie. I’m TIRED OF LIES. I want my story to end that I did the best I could every day and practiced forgiveness. I think that’s the key to a happy life. It’s hard work. You have to constantly learn how to rebuild. You have to learn how to start over and keep forgiving your past. I am not my past. I am now. I am not happy. That’s creepy.

The Writing on the Wall: I WAS HERE

The need to say “I was here” is as old as slavery. The Romans carved graffiti on walls and monuments, with examples surviving in Egypt of Latin curses, magic spells, declarations of love, alphabets, political slogans and famous literary quotes, providing insight into ancient Roman street life. Disappointed love also found its way onto walls in antiquity:
Whoever loves, go to hell. I want to break Venus's ribs
with a club and deform her hips.
If she can break my tender heart
why can't I hit her over the head?
-CIL IV, 1284.

Over eight hundred years later, not much had change and I was sitting on the toilet at the Men’s Country in Chicago, trying not to touch the toilet seat looking at all the writings on the walls. Some guy named Derrick likes to get off on the smell of men after a long day. He writes in a red permanent marker on a gray wall that he “likes to pull yo clothes off and give you that head to toe lickdown after a long day or a workout. Hang those nuts in my face while i lick on yo dick after its been swingin all day. Hit me up.” He leaves his number and phone number. I laugh that anyone would be so horny to leave their name and number on a bathhouse wall. I pray that what I’m expelling doesn’t make a smell or cause attention. I try to be silent.

Why write on some gas station bathroom in middle of Nowhere, Texas with a ballpoint pen, “I was here.” Did the person forget? And who carries the specific permanent marker for such graffiti: maybe a John Doe that’s afraid no one will miss him if he’s abducted by aliens.

They usually leave their name and date. Sometimes they draw boobs or a man’s dick. It’s usually in those bathrooms where you only stop because you ate some bad “truckstop” tuna or Mexican food and it wants out. On the toilet, you bend down just far enough where the booty hole can aim correctly but your butt check won’t touch the seat. And in that awkward Yoga move between explosive convulsions, the eyes wonder especially focus on the cracks of the bathroom stale hoping nobody comes in like a relative or ex-lover or current lover or the newspaper or news team with cameras. Your eyes wonder and splattered all over the walls are messages. Somebody is looking for a dick sucking around 5 in the evening on Sunday and left their phone number. Somebody doesn’t like a certain gang. Somebody wants to get fucked with an umbrella. You chuckle thinking of all the freaks in the world. And then it’s that ubiquitous, “I was here, 6-17-1997.” You suddenly feel not so alone that somebody was there in the same position you’re probably in ten years ago with exploding Diarrhea.

I often wondered who those people were. What did they look like? Are they still alive? Did they find happiness? Did that guy looking to get his dick sucked finally get a phone call? And what would make them write on the walls? Is it loneliness? Is it that human need to record our existence even it’s a kinky need to get fucked with a canary yellow umbrella? Do anybody ever call those numbers. Does anybody care the Saprina Ellis is a slut/bitch and isn’t that a double negative?

I started writing on the bathroom walls “I was here” when I started to question if I could save myself. I was twenty five years old. I was drinking too much. I was partying too much. I was getting older and scared. I wrote on the every wall at bathhouses, bookstores, clubs, bars, that I was here. I knew eventually I be another ghost. I guess to say that I was once young, that I was horny, that I was lonely, that I was scared, that I was drunk and I once thought I would live forever.

And then there was epidemic of Graffiti in the city in the early nineties what some called the desperation of the ghetto for attention. Images or lettering scratched, scrawled, or more usually spray-painted on property that didn’t belong to the artist, and was often regarded by others as unsightly damage or unwanted vandalism. It was the name of gangs. The names of those shot down in the streets by gang violence. The artwork of young ghetto artist trying to make their mark on the world. I remember being on the train in New York and thinking why spray paint on the sides of the building when the “man” was just going to paint over it the next day. And some of the artwork was better than some crap I’ve seen museums. It spoke to me. It was my cousin Pookie, Ray Ray, or that guy I slept with behind that building on a musty New York Saturday night. It was my history. I had to understand, why say I was here when people would eventually forget.

I was born October 5th. The doctor slapped my ass and recorded the time. I was given a birth certificate with my footprints to prove I existed, an American citizen. And when I die, I’m also promised a death certificate and tombstone to say that I was here. But the real question, why was I here in the first place?

There was time when I started writing on the walls because I was really asking if I would feel good enough. I tried being a whore. I went to the gym five times a week. I slept with a different man every other week. But it didn’t’ mean shit. A condom in the trash didn’t mean shit. Hoping they remember or I remember meant everything. I wanted to carve into their bodies that “Michael Whitley was here” because I often I forgot who I slept with that drunk night but that would’ve probably sent me to jail or to a mental hospital. So I carved in into the trees, walls, on the floors. The real question was if I would ever feel good enough. I had to check the mirror so often. I wondered if the wounds of my childhood abuse could heal. I wondered if they abandoned child would ever feel good enough for happiness. Good enough to be a writer. Good enough to love myself. I asked the question. The universe gave me the challenge.

So I set out for physical response. I pushed in hopes that it would push back. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t some ectoplasm. I ain’t no invisible man. I guess vandalizing walls wasn’t enough for me. I wrote a book. I just wanted to be able to put my name in the computer and see it come up. To see Michael Whitley come up.

For two years I was the “shirtless writer.” An alcoholic drag queen named “Bing” gave me that name. She told me I could rule the world if I wanted. I believed her. Some people called me the “shitless writer” or “full of shit” writer. They didn’t understand. Some thought I was a hustler, a common prostitute or pathetic con man. I was all of it. For two years every week without fail, I wrote my weekly column about my pathetic life living in the city. I sold it at the local gay bars and clubs for one dollar. I still can’t believe I got away with it. I figured people gave away their money all the time. They gave it away to bartenders who made weak drinks. They gave it away to overpriced clubs. They gave it away to strippers. They gave it away to aging alcoholic drag queens. I figured why not me.

Like Graffiti I’d see on my comics on the floors of bathrooms, dance floors and parking lots. It would make me feel alive. I know “I was here.” Just in case I forgot. I wanted to be a lot of things in my life. My first break as a writer came in third grade. I wrote a poem called “mirror.” It was basically about how I was scared to look in the mirror because I was convinced the person behind it was trying to kill me. I thought he was mocking me. I showed the poem to my teacher hoping that she knew the ghost busters. In second grade I wanted to Valentine Day king. My teacher laughed at me when I raised my hand to nominate myself. She said nobody was going to vote for a nappy head snot nose kid, so I should just save myself the embarrassment. I didn’t care. I stood in front of the class wiping my nose as they voted. I told myself that I should do the politically correct thing and vote for the other guy, because I didn’t want to seem vain. When the votes were tabulated, I had gotten zero votes. I didn’t even vote for myself. That’s what bothered me the most. I didn’t even vote for myself. I vowed to never do that again. The next year I ran again and that time I not only voted for myself, I changed the votes. I won. When I was in fourth grade, I wanted the lead in the choir. I was told I couldn’t sing and that I sounded like God murdering a basket of monkeys with a toothpick. She said my vomit would sound better. The choir director told me I sang through my nose and it was always full of boogers. She said I should be happy being in the back, therefore nobody could see me. I didn’t stop singing. Actually I sang louder. I got kicked out of choir. When was in high school I tried to be an actor. My drama teacher told me I acted like Scarlet O’Hara with an obsessive compulsive disorder. I didn’t understand what that mean. I thought she was a bitch. In college I wanted to be a model. I was told I was too dark. Not too good looking. Too short. The first photo shoot I pissed on myself. I was wearing white Calvin Klein. The director told me the shoot wasn’t about waster sports. I didn’t find out what that meant until years later.

But the need to say I was here was still tormenting. It’s why I kept doing the comic every week. I didn’t care what they thought. I didn’t care if they gave me money or not. I was fucking h ere. “I so want you to succeed.” His name was Mike. He was more than a little overweight. He and Jabber the Hutt probably wore the same pants size. I liked Mike because he was a Negrophile, a barfly and every week he had a ten dollar bill to stuff down my pants. I knew he was in lust with me, had been saying he was trying to lose weight so that he could be with me. I was also sure he said that to all the young black boys with flat stomachs and a nice dick print. I was always happy to see Mike, mostly because he gave me money with few complications. Hearing him say that he wanted me to succeed made me feel so good, because it was hard trying to hold on to a slippery dream at twenty-nine years old. It was hard hustling the bar with my little comic that I put together at home. And it was hard wearing my heart on my sleeves for every pervert just to try and look down my pants. I only did it because I got to be a writer every week. I got to live my dream, and until I was discovered by the “powers that be” that write checks, it was all I had to look forward to in life. So I hugged Mike, put my skinny toned arms around his fat waist, and that’s when he whisper it in my ear again, “I so want you to succeed” but it didn’t sound so supportive anymore. It was more suggestive and nasty. He whispered it again to make sure I heard him, “I so want you to pee on me.” Needless to say, I let go of Mike’s fat nasty ass.

I was shirtless writer. I was here. And I was horny, often scared, trying to figure it all out, and trying to make myself feel good enough for happiness. I laughed. I danced. I sold a comic in the club for two years. I kissed. I sucked dick. I ate ass. Vice Versa. I sold jokes. I was in love. But most important, I lived.

30 by 30

When you turn thirty, take the mamas out the room, your dick still gets hard and the need for sex increases. I think it's I got to make a baby thing but i'm gay, talk about paradoxes.

When you turn thirty and ghetto, too many black gay men aint got their own place, either cheating on somebody or staying with somebody that's more than just rent, like there isn't any sex in the champagne room, there ain't a thing as the roommate; it's just a hard dick inconvenient truth.

You can no longer call your friends at 3 in the morning about some weak trick, they're usually sleeping or getting ready for work or your girl friends burping babies or playing wife and the college party friends have become reborn Christians or republicans and you only left to the drunks at the bar, so here’s the AA number.

All gay relationships are testaments too bratty ass kids compromising, somebody got to be dependent or it ain’t going to work.

When you turn thirty years old, you're an automatic top. That's stupid.

When you turn thirty, no more free drugs or liquor, unless you're willing to play like you're dumb again or get fucked raw. And the drug dealer no longer takes credit.

When you turn thirty years old, the hunt for sex becomes a bitch, with work, and working out and having to maintain friendships or a career, casual sex takes a lot of free time that could be better used for cleaning the house or writing that novel. So sex after thirty years old is more direct, no foreplay, if he don’t tell you he’s fucking in the first fifteen seconds, move on.

When you turn thirty years old, porn stops being so sexy when everybody looks like their sixteen years old and a crack head. Also porn becomes a reminder that you’re not using your gym membership which distracts the jacking and dries up the lube. Also, you learn with porn there are only really two good minutes of worthy lotion time that you have to keep rewinding.

When you turn thirty years old, bartenders are assholes and don't like broke black people.

When you turn thirty years old, paying twenty bucks to get into a club is like not buying your next bottle of poppers when everybody is fucking in the parking lot anyway or wasting money that could’ve been better spent on a good bag of weed. I see you in the parking lot.

When you turn thirty years old, threesomes feel like a gang rape. Two aggressive tops feeding off their aggressiveness treating the bottom like a slutty cheerleader getting raped by two hyper-DL freaks, but when you’re thirty, it’s more difficult to play Buffy the dick slayer.

When you thirty years old and still a bottom and you’ve figured out you're not the girl, that you get attracted to toys and used them alone, and soon as your ass become your own, he starts raping the newest eighteen year old who has to go through the entire process of learning how to clean, take dick, open up. When you’re thirty years old and still a bottom, just when it starts feeling good, suddenly you're too old, they say stupid shit when the see your large sex toys "so what does my dick do for you" like what did you dick every do for me except get hard and got off. Man, it's not about your dick. It's about the fucking ride. Some idiot once told me if you're going to be a good bttm your priority should be the dick, making it stay hard but he was like 50, that's like a full time job and i got shit to do with my life.

When you’re thirty years old and a top, your dick becomes your gun, even if you’re not that masculine or aggressive, for some reason you become an animal when fucking, it’s like you got to treat every hole like your bitch or slut.

When you’re thirty years old, why are so many black escorts like 22-25, like they know their dick, it's like blinding a horse and having sex with it, maybe that's the point.

When you’re thirty years old, cockrings are the new engagement rings in gay life. I get so excited when a trick brings me lube or poppers or a new cockring. It’s like bring me chocolate and roses.

When you’re thirty years old, the truth about drugs, they can be cool but most people don't make it cool, are idiots and broke. With drug life, you can't trust most tricks or leave them out of your sight. And party and play is most likely placid and petrified, or posing and flaccid, or he's a drug whore or crack head or he's just hitting you up to see if you got drugs, when you're looking yourself.

After 30, there’s no such thing a free drink or drug

When you turn thirty years old, you don't have to go to the gym, you can always starve; get a drug habit, because no matter how you get thin, it's a must for being successfully gay.

When you turn thirty years old, the internet is not about sex most of the time, it's about patience being tested and jacking off alone.

When you turn thirty, if he doesn't tell you he's fucking in the first fifteen seconds, he just wants attention. I hate anyone asking why you like me, it's because you have a dick and hopefully it gets hard.

When you turn thirty and black and gay, there's no such thing as the white men who don't see color. He sees black dick. He sees a black hole. He sees contrast. It’s most likely a fetish, a collection.

When you turn thirty years old, everybody got a fucking opinion on how you should be living right, not living right, what they could do better, how you should buy their self help book.

When you turn thirty years old, money becomes blood, and there are so many fucking vampires especially when the drugs or liquor aren't free anymore.

When you turn thirty years old, you understand that you weren’t' cute at 21, you were just stupid with a dick that got hard if grandma farted.

When you turned thirty years old, you most likely formed some type of addiction.

After 30, I really haven't met a man that hasn't lied about something. Most of the shit people put in the their profile, no fems, fats, old heads, is only porn, real life is often way too desperate, trust me, if the lights are dark enough and the dick is hard enough, it’s what people do when nobody is watching is the truth.

When you turn thirty years old, you realize as much money as we as gay men spend on clothes, gym memberships, sports cars, lube, condoms, fisting gloves, poppers, weed, drugs, will be enough to send three kids to a very good college yet we learn nothing.

When you turn thirty years old, you’re going to demand a new gay contract, because worshipping youth or going out to clubs get old real quick. You now have mortgages, boring friends, and trying to live a long life without getting really really bitter.

When you turn thirty years old, in the middle you realize, young gays, 18-25 are just as stupid as old gays 40-65, the only difference somebody is paying and somebody wants to get paid.

And lastly, very few people like sucking dick, it's a courtesy, it's foreplay, but every man likes getting his dick sucked, you're only deep throating his ego and he will let you suffocate for it. If you can form a life of either somebody always sucking your dick and doing less dick sucking, you have a successful gay life. But the best thing about 30, is that the sex is so much better. you know what you're doing, you know what you want, you know how to get yourself off even if he don't and you know how to get him out of your apartment.