Dear God,

Remember when you asked Adam about eating from the tree? And he said, “The woman YOU put here with me, she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”?

Sounds like me don’t it?  I know me being a failure wasn’t your fault at all. I just don’t understand. Anything. “You’re supposed  to know my heart. And know all the hairs on my head.  So I highly doubt you missed the tears. Even if I don’t know how to pray right there is no way you couldn’t have heard one.

Supposedly you’re touched by our feelings. How could mine have touched you and you leave me lost and alone. Alone except for the enemy. Alone except for all the people I’ve hurt.

I became what I  hated and fought. Please Jesus be touched. Please. It wasn’t the woman you gave me. It was the calling. I thought it was from you. Please help.

My own beard and hair are streaked with gray. I don’t recognize myself much in the mirror. Good. I’m dreading the point at which I have to shave. I came in weighing 320 lbs.  Went to medical for vitals to be read. Getting paperwork straight. Current weight is now 260. I don’t believe it. Blood pressure low. Pulse 128 bpm. Have horrible dizzy spells so bad I almost fall out of bed when I roll over. I think in addition to destroying my short term memory my little spell of drug abuse might have messed up something a little more serious. 260. I always thought my skeleton must weigh at least 180.

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All things work together. I’m praying for you. Trust in the Lord. I can do all things through Christ. Read the Bible it will strengthen you.

I think people stop using cliches after someone uses one on them during a crisis. I have a beautiful Brand New BIBLE. Took a lot of trouble getting it to me. When I’m at my lowest I take it out for a little help. I look at it like its an instruction manual for a Russian nuclear sub. Written in Russian.

I guess I’ve lost my mind more than I realized. I don’t even know how to use the Bible anymore. Try letting it fall open to a scripture. Did that. The building specs on the badger skin coated tabernacle didn’t really lift my spirits. Nor did UFO’s seen by a naked profit.

I’m reading through even the New Testament and words are blurring together and my mind is loose and ungrasping. I don’t know anything.

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Whoeever battles with monsters had better see that it does not turn him into a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.

 There was a time in my youth where my mother called me the antichrist. (she however, does not remember this EVER happening.). Just several occasions but enough  for it to take root. My brother thought and thinks it was a hoot. I didn’t and do.

At the time I puzzled over it. I didn’t feel like the antichrist. Sure I got trouble but I loved the sweet Lord.  Wouldn’t dream of overtly trying to derail any plans he might have.

A few years later I asked my Pastor if someone could be the antichrist and not know it. Perhaps the ultimate Manchuria-Candidate.

He laughed and assured me that no the antichrist was or would be fully aware of his role and participating in it with enthusiasm. Needless to say it took a huge load off my mind and heart. Now I’m portrayed as a monster. By more people I loved and cared about. I don’t feel like I’m a monster. I certainly don’t want to be a monster. But what makes something real? It is all of them treating me as if I were?  Or how I feel?

Is the value of my soul based  on popular consensus even if only a partial view is available to them? Or is my self-worth based upon what I view it as? I’m not sure. Frankenstein’s monster was created. It came into being with faults not its own. But its faults nonetheless.

In the beginning it wanted out of the cold and developed a friendship knowing something was wrong with itself but not sure what to do.  When all those around it began to attack it, it reacted and became the monster. And suffered an exile as the end result.

Maybe I’m a monster only if I become one based on my reaction to everyone. If I become what they accuse me of being then I am a monster. But if I am what my heart thinks I am then I don’t lose my humanity. I don’t know anything.

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Don is an idiot. As much as I lover Raymond I hate Don. Even his name is stupid.

Don doesn’t mess with me. I hardly ever talk to him. You ever meet someone who  makes you wanna punch  him just  by the way he looks?  It was probably Don. He’s real scraggly looking like a bit fat stupid looking muslim. He actually, and I’m not making this up, wraps a sheet around his head like a Muslim headpiece.

When the guard gets on the intercom (its against regulations to put anything over your face or on your head) or say something about it at the door, this moron  tells them  its his religious clothing and if they don’t bring him a prayer rug and tell him where East is that he’s going to sue the jail. And they laugh and walk away.

One day he wanted them to refund $8 for a haircut he didn’t get. He ACTUALLY told them that he was going to blow up our pod if they didn’t give him his money. Someone from our pod was getting a haircut up front and told us that they heard over the radio that a Muslim was going to blow up our pod and all the guards left.

Don had told them he was a suicide bomber with 12 pounds of dynamite. They thought he was hilarious. The guards. I think he’s an idiot. He’s always saying goofy stuff like “Oh boy” and everyone starts it all the time. Hardened criminals.

The other night he told Lee that once he’d caught an albino catfish. Named it Wayne and put it in a bucket of water. Little by little he drained the water until one day there was none left. He had trained the catfish to breathe air. He just kept it damp so it wouldn’t dry out. Said that  he took that catfish everywhere. Trained it to flop beside him around the house.

One day he went fishing and took Wayne with him. Just set him right on the dock beside him. Well one of the bait crickets jumped out of the little cardboard box into the pond. Wayne, being hungry and loving crickets, jumped in after it, And drowned.  Yeah they all think he’s soooo funny. Well I don’t. I think he’s sad.

IMW

6699

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My former pastor (and I use that term in the most liberal sense)told me that I had a problem with authority. His brilliant protege (younger than me) promptly agreed. I thirded the motion. I did and do.

Enduring schools I dealt with a teacher who stood me up in front of the class and showed them my misspelling of my middle name. They laughed. I didn’t. She stood me up and showed them  the book I was reading and they laughed about “Pipi – Longstocking”. They laughed. I cried.  They laughed more. I was eight.

Another had a wonderful program called “Fun Fridays”. If you didn’t get “three check marks” by your name in one day then the week on Friday you got to watch a movie and eat popcorn and drink red Kool-Aid. With my bad attitude (many people called it A.D.D., she called it ‘bad attitude’.) I hardly made it to ‘Fun Friday’. One week I was able to pull it off. With her own words “you need to be made an example of” she gave me three check marks that Friday morning.

Not content to sit me  in the back where the bad attitudes were usually set, she brought me to the front of the room. Next to the T.V. Facing my classmates. They laughed. I turned red. I was nine.

One screamed at me for twisting my hand in the light coming from the window. I had done my work already but she was upset about something. She told the class that I might be retarted and should be in Special-Ed. I cried. They laughed. I was ten.

And on and on and on.  I was taught to trust  and obey those with authority. They abused it. Church wasn’t much better. Sunday school teachers pinching the backs of my arms or twisting my ear in front of all the other kids. Angry sometimes at a parent or family member they came after the ones who couldn’t defend themselves. Wasn’t just me.

I seen chuch ushers slam kids to the ground and put them in headlocks. Young teenagers I was thirteen when they left me and a kid from the bus-ministry to paddle  8 hours by ourselves. “Sink or swim” laughing.  Our canoe was capsized under a tree branch and the kid ws stuck underneath.  A nearby power boat came to our rescue and saved him. Oh boy how they laughed and laughed when the boaters brought us to the church van. Being laughed at hurts worse than being punished in the face over and over. Those bruises heal, but I can still hear the laughter.

Cops who lie, lawyers who cheat, pastors who “only keep you around for your money”. Yeah, I guess I do have a problem with authority. And my bad attitude.  IMW

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tie a knot in the rope

i’m so tired of breathing.  i’ve been told to tie a knot and hang on.  i’ve been told to stand.  i’ve been told to keep fighting.  i’ve been told to minister to those around me.  I can do none of them.  I’m just laying here broken and battered and my only struggle is to just keep breathing.   I’m hurt.  I’m filled with anger and hate.  I’ve heard the worst part about Hell is the complete absence of Gods presence.  Then all thats lacking is the flames.  I don’t want to keep praying.  I have nothing left to fight for.  My physical health is wonderful.  I’ll probably live to be old.  Thats what I have to look forward to.  I have family who loves me beyond belief.  But their kindnesses are like those shown to a stranger.  I see them. and appreciate them for what they are.  I’m too tired and bitter to keep praying.  I can’t pray for strength or grace or mercy.  I have no hope.  How can I pray for vengenace when I’m the worst of everyone?  I have no recourse.  For all hope to be taken.  For every vestige of hope to be completely removed is a terrible thing.  To know that those that hurt me all are happy in their lives.  I’ve fallen.  I’ve failed. But the people I was most loyal to and helped the most have their pleasure in completely destroying me.  I hate all of them.  All I know now is pain and hate.

imw

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I don’t know anything anymore. Nothing any more. It’s hard to be humble and gentle when you’re incarcerated. All the time hearing people talk about the horrible stuff that got them in trouble. And making it worse hearing their desire to get back out and do it again. Everyone in here is innocent. I think I’m the only one who thinks I’ve ever done anything wrong.. Two guys got into a fight today. Upstairs by my bunk. Raymond and Brad. I tried splitting them up and holding them back. Raymond stabbed Brad in the face with a broken plastic spoon. Everyone wanted them to fight so I let go and went into a toilet stall.

Brad beat Raymond up. Both were bloody. Blood all on the floor by my bed. Raymond kept calling Brad ‘nigger’. An older black man was here for a couple of days to testify in a trial. He was locked up somewhere else. I sat in the toilet stall and cried while I heard the yells of encouragement to the two fighting. When they were done I cleaned Brads mouth up from all the blood with a wet towel. I apologized for the word nigger being used. To the older black man as well. They were both taken into isolation. My nerves and soul are just being trashed. More and more. I’m not even in a position to reach them or have a desire to. I don’t know I just don’t know. I’m real sad.  IMW

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confused? lost? or empty?

i’m so confused. or lost.  empty?  i don’t even know what i am.  i could fight and fight. spiritually, emotionally, mentally.  for my life. but to what end?  what would i fight for?  i don’t know.  no one can tell me. or will tell me.  i don’t know.  i’m just so lost.  hopeless and alone.  and awful.  i’ve told countless people totrust in Jesus.  but i don’t.  can’t.  is there anything worth saving?  the two that knew me best obviously thought not.  He’s done and so is she.  i just don’t know anything.

i hate how so many people would constantly ask me if i were their friend.  like it mattered if i said yes.  so concerned with labeling a relationship as a friendship then throwing me away so quickly.  i don’t think friend means what they think it means.  i hate them too.

imw

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betrayals

despite my cynicism and bitter nature the level of betrayal man is capable of is crushing.  still.  an old friend and former employer let my family know he was concerned for me and cared about me.  which doesn’t quiet explain the dearth of letters or  calls from him these last 6 months.  i went through life holding people arms length.  never wanting them to get too close because i know when it comes down to it people are not true or loyal.  it was general consensus that i was just misanthropic.  hardly. i cared about people too much.  instead of me hating them all i loved them far beyond my abilities.  but always knew they would never be there for me when i needed them most.  only jesus will always care but even him…..  i think He’s upset too.

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I was always Sure of Prison

Everyone thought I was crazy for being so sure that I was going to prison. I’ve known since I was a child that I would spend time here.  Was it because of all the teachers who kept telling me I was rotten and would wind up there?  Or was it somthing I just knew? Maybe.  I was certain beyond anything months ago. I had everything. And for two years I kept praying, “God please take everything from me. Take it all and let’s see if I’m still going to love you. Make sure I’m serving you for the right reasons?” Every single day I would pray that. Lost my home, my career, my reputation, all my belongings, people who claimed they were my friends. And my wife. I didn’t count her because she was part of me. Don’t pray stupid prayers. Even the disciples had to ask Jesus how to pray.

Then like the idiot I am I kept praying that same prayer. So I lost my health. And short term memory. And basic motor skills. My hands shake. Badly. Then like the idiot I am I kept praying that same stupid prayer. God you forgot my freedom. Hey Mrs. Jones! Ya forget our test today? But I know the sweet Lord very well. So I knew he would take that too. And he did. God answers prayer. Every single prayer. It just might not be the answer you want to hear. And I think I asked for too much. Because it hurts. Dear God it hurts. Losing the other half hurts worse than anything. But I haven’t left God yet. But it hurts terribly. Beyond anything I could imagine. Maybe forever. Probably forever.

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