Thank God I Don't Look Like What I Have Been Through

It’s July 2009, and I am reading an email from my father – a well written letter about him disowning me. He writes, “I no longer consider you my son, and you should not refer to me as your father.” I have not spoken to him since. This comes 12 years after my biological father had slipped into the afterlife 9 days to my 9th birthday. Two weeks after I was disowned, I failed my second academic year. My world officially ended. I didn't die. It was too early. A year later, I failed the second academic year… again. July of that year should have seen me with a first degree in Economics. Nearly my entire year group had thrown their hats off in joy. The testimonies at church were numerous. "God must hate me, or have a twisted sense of humor." I thought. If everyone was laughing, funny didn’t even come close to describing it. I had thrown my life in service, putting needs of other first. Friends shook my hand with gratitude as they ambled on. Two years later, the odds had favored me and pushed me to my final year. It’s July, 2012 and I have become more paranoid, and suicidal. I had failed again by 0.9 in Math- Algebra to be precise. Not that it ever added anything to my life. But I lost it again. During this entire time, I had one thing going well for me; teaching and writing. The conclusion was either July hated me, or I was being puppeteer-ed by some god who was bent on crucifying me one way or the other. My Pastor one fateful Sunday afternoon, looks at me and says,“God knows why, and once there is life, all hope is not lost.” He thought there was encouragement in his words. No. Far from it. His words simmered my anger like a boiling pot. Words could not possibly describe what was coursing through my mind at the time. I had thrown in the towel, disavowed my oath to God, and told Him I was done. That failure hurt me so much, I was ready to call my entire existence into the unknown. I wrote a suicide note, left it on my bed, and at 12 midnight I ascended the stairs to the rooftop patio to jump to my death. I recalled everything; failed relationships, academics, family, and all the other things that were not straight in my life. It hurt. I hurt badly, and it was time to call it. This was the second time I had failed at dying myself. I had hit rock bottom. Flat on my ass. The following morning, I kept reminding God of how he had failed me. Ironically, my housemate who had graduated, just kept playing a french song, "Je suis dans la joie". Really? I felt like he was celebrating my loss. 

My experience reminds me everyday of God's love. His endless love for me. Priceless, profound, ultimate. 

O the Feels

There is a young woman setting pot pies on the balcony wall to breathe; she believes nature will kiss them with sweet fragrance and taste. How could she be wrong with such radiance bursting through her long maroon hair. Her smile reminds me of the first time in my entire existence when I was happy. My heart grows flowers for her, and each glance at her makes me feel at home. Jobe Blanco said, "The hardest thing about being an outcast isn’t the love you don’t receive. It’s the love you long to give that nobody wants." Years lingered and my spirit was poisoned by the people that had refused the love I gave. But at the bottom of my heart, however, I waited for something to happen like castaway turning despairing eyes upon the solitude of my life, seeking for a great perhaps. When I could not bear to bear the weight of such loneliness, I would occasionally burst into wrenching sobs of anguish and grief. The connections in my heart flickered and dimmed like a candle in an open window. Everything was inside out. All the highs and lows.

Doggy Day Afternoon

So while sitting on the edge of my wall, trying to pump the brakes on my emotions. A crooked smile creases my face with thoughts that can old be resolved in action. There is nothing like having a doggy day late afternoon with your mind caught in the crosshairs of chaos. It feels like an orchestrated symphony of nothingness. Two days ago was my birthday- now three days, and I took stock of the people who have treated me like shit and the ones I have axed out. I felt proud of my achievement seeing as I used to be Jim Carrey's character in the movie, "Yes Man." (You should see it.). I am not typically given to lengthy explanations about the emotional trauma the actions of people who supposedly love me have caused. Naturally, forgiveness is my first point of action but that ship has sailed. With all little over half a decade to mid-life crisis- the voldemort of life for men- the erosion of my resolve is,  "at my age, I should not give a shit about how people feel". This is affirmative for me as a person whose entire existence until recently has been naivete, and always thinking that people deserve second chances. Well, and again, let me state for the record that if you are messing up after 28 years of existence then you don't deserve a second chance, Your bare ass needs to be kicked to the curb on a rainy day in the pit of winter in Iceland, or maybe  drop into an active volcano. #meekbelike Niggas aint loyal.

I have lost friends I do not miss, and axed confidants with relief. Second chances may be an attribute of the strong but doing the same thing and expecting different results is lunacy. Accept it. Know well.

8263772- 69-4328

Dear January, 

It's a pallid afternoon, and I have attacked with great resolution the matter, and, consummating my resolve with the fact: she is wheeling my heart away. The avenues of my emotions are numerous and strange, but my thoughts betray me with the hope I crave as the thoughts creep in like the monsters. My first encounter with her was nothing short of odd. I heard her mocking laugh, behind me on two occasions, both were followed by silly comments. I am not given to long bouts of depression, and I have had my meagre share of unkind truth. In my younger days, I thought of myself as a sunny day on the beach, which was as true as a river in the sky. It occasionally lifted my spirits and dissipated the walls that shelled me from the sinister comments about how I looked. As the months unfolded, an unusual friendship found us, and sent us on a journey. Now I am falling for her. Her absence lately has shuddered my heart into questions of her return. Dear January, I miss her smile, and the butterflies that have always reminded me of the unkind truth- as much as my heart will offer her a place which she may kindly and gently refuse, it will continue to with the motion of the constellations. Don't tell me you love me if you cannot even have me. I can only wait so long