All in Time Due ((Part 7))

So, I wrote this something like two weeks ago. Then, proofed it a week(s) ago. As such, I might be procrastinating in all of this. Either way, I was also stuck in the woods over the past week. This leaves me a little detached, not only from people in general but also from this piece and my need to finish proofing it.

IMAGE OF A MAN, DUDE, SQUATTING IN THE WOODS

NO TOILET PAPER OR BATHROOMS

NO NEEDS %% NO WANTS

A WELL-TIMED PAUSE.,

A SMILE,

IN LOVE AND LOVE ITSELF

There we were, just kids. Kelly and I, in Sturgis. Surely, I’m not so sure this is where I left off from. But, it’s DEFINITELY where I’m going, from. So be it.

And deal with,

TWO DISTRACTIONS

Camera fades before NOT fading again.

It was Bike Week, WE were under the shady-shaded stars, at the pinnacle of our togetherness. It was a dream, and still is. She was SO beautiful that night. The sweat of her face had left, from having been there, so many times before. It was cold outside. Bikes, I’m talking Harley’s and Other Hogs, all over the place. Picture a hummingbird, magnifolded in the moon light, replicated to the point of a monstrous buzz, again and again. There we were, just two (2) kids. From Florida, making love in the rear of a semi. The silk tree driver who had led us there, exchange: work, had allowed this. Was maybe even at fault.

Maybe, , , And either way – …. .- -. -.- -.– — ..- –..– -.. ..- -.. .

Thank you, dude. I hope you’re well wherever you’ve ended up.

[Attention ::: Was Temporarily Directed at THE TRUCK DRIVER

Now Directed at YOU, THE READER]

I hope this is NOT to say prison. Because, man. This guy was rowdy at heart. That very night, the highlight of OUR trip, happened to be the low point of his. He had gotten into a brawl under that delicate moon, perhaps even a couple of fights. When motorcycles are involved, it’s usually a brawl. Because || This is how loud noises and cyclical aggression work. The nerves become on edge, like all the time. Maybe THIS is why they wear so much leather? I’m not sure. I’m NOT even unsure it has NOTHING to do with their potential for road rash and other post-midlife-crisis-related issues and such; all and every, the same. When he finally got back to the rig, he was fuming, and I think this was the next morning, after Kelly and I had slept nice. We slept SO nice that night. Under a moon that never left us alone. There were NO BUGS. And no one to bother us. We could have been ACTUAL HOGS, man.

TWO BEAUTIFUL HOGS

SOLD AT AUCTION

FOR CHEAP

So, when he comes back, in the fire of that mornin’. The sun was coming up and-as he was, certainly, coming down. Fortunately, he didn’t make too much of a stink in the direction of ourselves. Y’know, It;s good when people DON’T take out their irrelevant matters on others. very Good And, When he DID finally calm down, it was back to discussions of where we would, and should, go from here-there. He still had deliveries to make, still had time to kill, him. Because: Time ALWAYS kills. But before it did any of that, we were headed south yet again. For us, the destination was ,;, Texas. For him, whatever he had, was headed back to, in whatever state he was, living. I would be naive to assume that he lived in Florida, where we met him. So, it’s wherever his bed is. I can’t remember so much about this trip south as we ultimately ended up in a rather bad situation of our own. We would not succumb to any brawls, fights, or existential animal encounters, but we WERE headed for trouble.

When my memory EVENTUALLY returns, we were headed through-along that highway connecting Oklahoma City to Dallas. Why he didn’t let us off closer to my grandparents, I don’t know. Maybe I do know. It was dark-night dark, and seemingly moonless. It’s weird how THAT works. Moon upon love, trouble hidden. I recall him saying something along the lines of here’s how you’ll get up to where you’re headed. I can still see the cash he gave us to get there. The highway was desolate. We weren’t supposed to be there, at all. Especially not at that time of night. This is Dallas, and Texas is NOTORIOUS, for getting into people’s business. Now, based on how quickly we were picked up by the police, he must’ve called us in. There is NO WAY that a cop happened upon us in less than 15-20 minutes, but they did. I was admonished as though I had orchestrated the entire thing, like her wherewithal didn’t exist and therefore wasn’t even there. To me, she WAS there. I was NOT alone.

Not even in the planning.

Two wrongs really CAN make it right.

1 = (-1)(-1)

READS: ONE EQUALS NEGATIVE ONE TIMES NEGATIVE ONE

BUT WHO CARES?

They went on about how I was 17, an adult in Texas, and how I would be in A LOT of trouble for carrying along a 16 year-old woman. And, yes, she was a woman by then. Trailer living IS like THIS. Of Course, She WAS probably older than me in terms of wisdom and things like it. Still, She WAS actually a year younger than me, in spite of everything else. When things with the cops finally calmed down, as they often have to do, we were told that we were NOT actually in any real trouble. We were classified as runaways, her parents having called her in. As I say in my song 17, “mine just couldn’t seem to find the phone.” And this is true. I had NOT been called in as a runaway. I was left, at 17 years-old, to leave home for good, under the neglectful guidance of my shit father. HE knew from all of my running away, and my having been homeless at 14 years old, that I truly wanted to get away from him. When I finally did get away from him, some year or so after this, I didn’t really make a habit of looking back. I still don’t look back, man. Definitely not at this “man.”

Have I gotten this right?

IMAGE OF A DOG RELIEVING ITSELF

ABSOLUTELY

Still, I question myself every time I hear that song at the end of Copeland’s fifth album, Ixora. Here, in a track labeled “In Her Arms You’ll Never Starve,” Aaron goes on to repeat “What if you can’t turn back? What if you can’t turn back when you’re finally tired of running?” My good-ness! What a power lines, man. How apt to so many things, in life. And, speaking of Aaron Marsh <> I once MET him following THAT aforementioned/impromptu run-in with Tim, from Underoath, at that practice space in Florida. After meeting the whole band, they gave us tickets, to their show, at a church, in Hudson the next day. When Aaron sings at the end of They’re Only Chasing Safety, I cry. I TRULY cried there in that church that night. Afterwards, I met him in the back. They had given us the kind of passes that allowed us to enter the backstage. It is here that, for the first time, I told Aaron that his music makes me cry. In terms of bands I’ve seen the most, that would be a toss-up between Pinegrove and Copeland. I’ve seen both of these bands in so many places, states other than my own, even. But, don’t let me get too far off topic. I have a story to tell.

So far, I’m glad to NOT be able to turn back. My father has since had a stroke and so largely cannot speak. This means that we never really got the chance to talk about things. And by this I mean something along the lines of “Why the fuck did you beat me up all the time, when I was growing up?” He would punch me in the face in a crowded store, would make me piss myself in the kitchen by kicking me repeatedly, in front of the whole family, my sisters, in the background telling him to stop. At least they did that once. I had forgotten about this part until now. Maybe I shouldn’t write them off too. Who knows? I can also remember another time, later on when I was about 16, when he came home from work, in the middle of the night, pulled me out of bed and beat me like he had done so many times before. I still to this day have trouble sleeping. What an asshole.

KITTENS, PLAYING IN A FIELD, ALIVE AND WELL

TWO BEARS SHARING, AN ENCHANTED KISS

ANYTHING ELSE

Now, that was everything between memory and 17. This was my abuse. And all for nothing more than being hard to understand. He even had me tested for being mentally handicapped when I was a bit younger. Dude, I am one of the smartest people I have ever known. As such, this could only have been MORE ABUSE. So, when I had the opportunity to finally leave home in the Summer, at 17 years old, and with the love of my life, I did it. I left. Never to be called in.

[IMAGE OF A PHONE, NOT RINGING]

The UNNECESSARY police lights were blinding us the whole time. Like I said, once things boiled down, we were left to mere runaways. As such, they took us to the local juvenile detention center, not as criminals but as lovers under the infinitely hidden light of the moon. Right from the start, we were told not to look at love, not to even glance between her and ourselves. Still, we did it. We even snuck holding hands for a brief moment in that facility. BC:fuck them. They didn’t understand. And maybe still don’t. It’s hard to love like the kids do. This I have learned all too well since no longer being a kid. My mind is still a kid, but my body is lesser so. And this is OK. I am human, and humans do this. They die. That’s part of the bargain we were born with. You HAVE to be OK with it. If you’re not, then maybe go read Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, not just the quotes but the whole book. It is a brief piece, something like a pamphlet. So, do yourself that favor. Read the pamphlet.

AVID NON-READER STARES AT PAMPHLET

ASSESSES THE SHAPE OF SAID BOOK

WHERE TO BEGIN?

READING, THAT’S WHERE

I can’t recall if we were placed in jump suits, but I don’t remember that part, so probably not. It would only be a few days of this, held captive en route back to everything we ever knew. To the trailer park. How sad. We had made it, all the way to Texas, within some 100 miles of our intended terminal point, and we were headed back. Not under any free duress, or autonomy, else if. If else, and so it goes, AGAIN. They sent HER home before they sent me home. She was beautiful then. I can vividly recall the glow she had for me before heading home. This would be the most in love we ever were. Ever would be. Things wouldn’t be the same once we got back. Things were too the same for us to remain the same. Our love was never strong enough for that. And this is in spite of that-said love’s beauty during that Summer, of ours, on the road. When they finally sent ME home, in the days to follow, I was more than ready to go. Kelly was no longer around and so neither was I. The tragedy of these days was too much for me. And maybe still is. We COULD have made it just fine, could have set up a new life somewhere else, and together. But, then,,, I might not have ended up being a mathematician, posh, ANY SUPER POWERS. I may have just ended up what I am trying to be now, a musician; o’ bonafide,, status. I would call it famous if fame didn’t seem so damn annoying to me.

I mean, think about it. You’re camping, someone sees [INSERT CELEBRITY X] and comes up to ask for an autograph, a few answers to a few MORE of life’s questions. Parts of it seem cool, like having enough security, guards to stave off the rat-people I have met recently, but that’s about it. Even the money ($) seems like a burden. Still, it COULD be cool.

[IMAGE OF AUTHOR BLING | || BLINGING,

AMONG, ALONG, AND ON, A GREEN | SCREEN BOAT]

[EXPENSIVE -|- LOOKING PEOPLE, DOING THE SAME,

IF ONLY FOR A SLIGHTLY SMALLER FEE]

Like they had done for her, they had done for me. They had CHOSEN to send us home on separate racing dogs, free of charge. You know, Greyhounds. Mine was lonely, and while I’m not entirely sure about it, I hope hers was too. Still, I was ready to move on. I was ready to see her again, too. And this is in spite of my having met some beautiful woman I sat and chatted with for hours on that bus. We had a lot of ground to cover, to undo the distances Kelly and I had made. So, naturally, we passed the time. At some point, I remember falling asleep, accidentally leaning into this woman’s shoulder. This was ::::: wrong. But for some reason, she didn’t take it that way. Maybe she was in love with my stories, the ones I now had? I hadn’t had any of this before this. Outside of bad ones, depressing ones, stories. But, this is my life and so to call it depressing is to assign a mental state to a myriad of different mental states. Growing up, I was scared, and proud, and so many other things too. Proud for the good grades I was getting, no matter what the others thought. To wit, they once pulled me aside in, I believe 6th grade, to test me by myself, to ensure that I wasn’t cheating. I was too poor to be doing this well, and so they didn’t trust me. I DID that well. And, STILL do. So, fuck off, dear school.

[OPEN LETTER TO SCHOOL READS,

“I’M NOT SURE IF THIS MAN IS A GENIUS

BUT I’M CERTAIN ABOUT YOU SUCKING ass!”]

Let me ALSO offer same to that woman who said I was too truant for the Gifted Program around the same time. Perhaps they were afraid of how it would look if some poor, abused kid bested the BEST of their donor-types; same school, same time. It WOULD look bad if your kid, rich, wasn’t as good as you thought they were. And I would have been the thing doing that. I was even asked to sit in the back of the classroom in 4th grade, for the smell of my shirt. Mrs. Nesbitt, was an ASSHOLE. She stopped the class, focused in on the smell of smoke coming from my shirt, a smell I did not cause, and told me that if I wanted to sit up front, I would need to wear a cleaner shirt to class. I didn’t have any cleaner shirts. You should be ashamed of yourself. I am a teacher now, and can definitely see how foolish she was being. It’s not your classroom. It belongs to those learning. Your name just happens to be on it. Still, I digress. This is, once again, about Kelly and me.

[IMAGE OF AN IMAGE FROM THE EARLY 2000’S:

KELLY, SWEATING, IN SMALL SHORTS, FOREGROUND: A TRAILER]

I would describe the bus ride further, but that’s not needed. Something about how it smelled, or about how the bright colors had faded and so looked old. The bus WAS old. But, I know nothing of Kelly’s bus. And that’s what mattered to me. No matter how many snacks this new woman gave to me. It’s funny to think that somewhere there is this woman, the very same I sat next to, going on about her life. She’ll probably never read this, and certainly’ll never meet me. How weird life can be. It’s like. Well, you know what it’s like. When the bus finally pulled into the station in Clearwater, the one still by the very same mall, I was ready to get back and see her. Was she as excited to see me, too? Or, had the words of her parents made her lack ANY, and therefore ALL, tastes, for me? Was this WHOLE thing finally over? Was my life, in love for the first time, finally gone? Yes, and this is no matter what was about to happen, in spite of whatever I was about to know. Her parents had picked her up from the bus station. Mine, as expected, didn’t do the same. I would NEVER expect so much from the low-life that progenated me. Even then, barely. Sometimes, I feel like I AM THE CHILD, of something else. Call it nature. Call it the trees.

Maybe I’m just hoping.

STOPPED HERE FOR TWO WEEKS

PROOFING SUCKS.

When I finally got back, having walked some six miles or so, I had nothing. My father had thrown away all of my things. I had nothing. At all. Nullified, and nil. What WAS his point in all of this? Love letters from those girls in St. Pete, from that period when I wore hats all the time, even to the beach, INTO the ocean. What WERE their names? Sam? That brunette I liked just as much????? Man, in thinking about it now, I have always been relatively popular with the ladies. Nowadays, these things are hard. But, and maybe, this is just how it works, no matter how cool you are, or HAPPEN to remain. Most of the unmarried people of my childhood have taken to marriage, could by now have been married for a decade, ‘s plus. Either way, I’m pretty sure this is true of virtually everyone, I have ever dated. Still, those things were gone. My LEGO sets, my memorabilia , too. I even had a STACK of Weekly Readers which would by now be worth SOMETHING or OTHER. If you grew up in the 90’s then you should definitely know what I’m talking about here. You may even take a bit of pride in knowing. And that’s cool. Maybe even as cool as THAT newspaper I no longer have, the one from THE day that THE DEVIL RAYS became THE RAYS. Now THAT would be worth something today. But, I’ll never be able to find out. My father is-was too mean for all of that. I was gone. All of my things, were gone.

My childhood ITSELF was over.

Just like the life of that small bug I killed, just now, by accident, on my screen. I meant to move this bug, but it didn’t go that way. Generally, I get quite sad when I am the reason something’s life exists no more. And this includes bugs.

INSERT: BUGS OF THE FUTURE

A PAINTING

AS BIG AS A DINOSAUR

‘S BACKSIDE

THE CAPTION READS

Should I stay or should I go? I didn’t know. I wouldn’t even know where to go. By the time I moved into Ashley’s place, with his father and SOMETIMES his mother, I had a few things, so I must have stayed long enough to acquire SOME new things. Why I stayed, I will never know. Maybe it had something to do with my being 17, but who knows. Oh yeah, I DID stay. I know this because sometime around this time, I recall my father pulling a loaded shotgun on me, cocking it back, pointing it right at my face from point-blank range, and saying “I’m not your father. You can get a blood test.” maybe he was hurt that I had left him behind and therefore had rejected him. And maybe this is just how he showed it. What a monster. As I type this now, I can see that what I took for CHILDHOOD was merely a string of traumatic events. Hence, THE WAY I AM. The way I may ALWAYS be. And this even with therapy, which SEEMS to help. Still, I stayed.

AUTHOR, CONTEMPLATING A LACK OF FINISH

SHOTGUNS, TOO

KITTENS, THREE

I stayed, but following the shotgun incident was no longer abused. I believe that, around this time, he realized that I was about to leave home. In general, the psycho doesn’t want you to leave. Their intentions are good, THERE. But, they are psycho, and so you MUST leave. What a conundrum. This was my return. Largely the same as when I left. I came back to a life very much the same. But, my eyes now knew better. I knew that OTHER THINGS were out. Other states, and other states of being, too. There was and still is more to life. Abuse didn’t HAVE to be it. I COULD leave. And so, eventually, I did. Now, this was me, my life upon return. Not Kelly’s, and certainly not Kelly and I’s return. When it comes to that, there would be no return. She had finally listened to her parents and now saw me as an issue. I had run away with their daughter, had gotten her pregnant. Oh yeah, THIS was the reason we ran away. I had gotten Kelly pregnant. Why it took me ’till the end of this story to remember this, I don’t know. But, here we are. She and I. We met following our return, if only to make sense of all that had happened to us. We were so different then. The WHOLE WORLD WAS SO DIFFERENT THEN. Nothing remained. Not my things, never my father, no longer my father. Kelly, too, no matter how hard she tried, was never the same. When I looked at her, I NEVER felt the same.

We had grown apart, and all they had to do was send us home at different times. Well, that and give her an infinity of talking to’s about how BAD it is to run away as a pregnant kid, a teenager. In retrospect, yeah, that’s pretty bad. Maybe even stupid. But, I wouldn’t erase it for anything. It DEFINES me. Her, maybe it DEFINES, too. Still, there would be no more holding hands, for hours, no more sneaking out to Vincent’s to do the wrong things. The very same that sent us along, to other states, to find ourselves, to test our love, so heavily. In the end, everything is about sex. And this story is no different. I called it love in the last piece, but at some point it was just SEX.

A GALLON OF SWEATY MILK

IN PUBLIC

By the way, I bought WAY too much milk yesterday, at the dollar store here, and so MUST consume its remainder, in THIS coffee shop, whilst writing; about love. So, I’m a man. The kind of man who hasn’t known Kelly in SO long, who drinks milk right from the gallon jug, in a packed-ass coffee palace. Oh, how nice these people are for not kicking me the fuck out. I mean, I can tell that my behaviors are weird, but you know what? I can’t stop doing them. In other words, I can’t manage to stop being so weird. if the milk had remained in the car, it would spoil. And we can’t have that. We cannot have a world where things go bad. Things like my relationship with Kelly. We were truly in love, and then we weren’t. And this is just how life works, I guess. Man, a bummer. But, it’s the memories and lack thereof that define us. And, here, I remember, we ran away. That we made it so far, but came back to be so different. This is the difference between life with another and another life. This is how things work. I am left to memory and writing and recall. Someday, when all three of these are no longer possible, what will become of our love? Will it die with us and therefore leave a blank slate for some other trying couple to re-do. Will other kids run away the same? I mean hitchhiking is certainly more dangerous than it was 20 years ago, but also 20 years before that, so who knows.

What I do know is that once Kelly moved into a new place, a few digs along the hood, with her parents, and by the Pinellas Trail, we continued to date. I believe that we HAD taken a break, had come back to the whole thing. But, where there used to be love, there was now lust; never, no longer the moon. Now, when the moon finally DID come out, it just meant that things were a little brighter. It didn’t mean two kids under the spell of love and running away, playing hog. Playing love itself. It no longer meant these things. Life was back, to normal. And that meant shit. For both of us. When Shannon came into my life, Joe’s Daughter, Kelly meant even less. From that point, things drifted REALLY FAST. I was headed into a new relationship. And so was Kelly, and I. But, not before that last time we “did it.” On a bench, near a playground. Wait for it. At night. We had both snuck out, absolutely HAD to have each other. And so we did. We did it, without meaning, where kids would play the next day. And this is what goes on when you’re sleeping.

When you’re sleeping, love dies.

So,

What if you can’t turn back?

What if you can’t turn back when you’re finally tired of running?

PS — Man, have I been wild. I came into town, one day, attempting to finish this, before, and then, heading back into the woods. As such, this piece has been delayed by several [INSERT EXPLETIVE] weeks. I have been HEALING, and that’s what counts. Still, I should have finished proofing this before now! I’as only something like two paragraphs away when I put it down last. Here’s to hoping THE REST doesn’t take so long % || ;-_-)

Double PS — I am FINALLY done proofing. Thanks, Aaron. BTW, Kelly is now married, has recently asked a mutual friend of ours to join in on her and her husband’s fun. So yeah, that’s DEAD. And this is OK. I have moved on, if only for the sake of this piece. And peace itself.

Triples is Best — The next two pieces, of this series, have been written. They just need: PROOFING. Here I am, back to the proofing. Dammit. Note to self: Stop front-loading the fun part(s).