Grateful to be hitting 30 (4)

This is a bit late, my birthday has come and gone. I have this one to post and one more I'm working on and it'll be the end of the series.

A warning, this is a LONG blog but vital for the story itself. If you are going to read it, have something to drink first, your smokes (if you got'em) and an empty bladder.
Otherwise, enjoy!

This is one of my greatest loses as far as I know to date.

/Flashback

I had an interesting high school life. I dated a teacher beginning my sophomore year and back then I had no idea just how much power that truly gave me. Were I a different person or had a different mind set, I probably would've used that to my advantage, instead I just ran with it as fun and familiarity. I was grateful to have someone to talk to.

In the middle of my tryst with my teacher I had some people sniffing around. I was always around this teacher, I didn't really hang out with friends after a while, it started looking suspicious. So I got a beard.

You don't know what that is, do you?

A beard is another way of saying a decoy. You have two lives basically. You have your private life which you keep just that, private. Then you have a person that you show off in public. No emotional attachment, just someone that you take to functions or you want to be seen with in public so that you don't arouse suspicion to anything odd going on.

I picked a girl named Sue.

I was a Drama/Yearbook brat for the most part of my high school life for several reasons. The first, it was a creative outlet where they couldn't measure how well you did on paper, it was the involvement that mattered. The second, I had creative license to do many things others wouldn't be given the chance to; I wrote school plays and was the editor of my senior yearbook. The third was that the rooms to my two classes, which I had right after lunch, were literally ten feet from each other. So it was home base for me. It's how I met Sue.

Sue, full name Sujiery, she was one year younger than I, putting her at 14. She was from a full blooded Cuban family and had two younger siblings. She was smart, funny, great artist and bubbly. When we met, we teased each other mercilessly, much like kids do when they like each other and don't know how to express it.

When we became friends I was hanging with my little crew.

My Crew:

Rolando – Wheel man. He had an older Supra but had rebuilt the engine to his specks. The odometer was one of those electronic ones, it went up to 99 and then stopped, the car was almost always stuck at 99 MPH, we went much faster. Tall, lanky and full of hurt. He had a family situation that I didn't envy. He never finished high school as far as I know and the one time that I tried to contact him after school I called his home phone, asked for him by name and got hung up on. I wish him the best.

Martha – She was a strange one. I mean that in the best possible light I can think of. We had many long talks; she was the first sister I adopted. Petite, short hair, brown eyes, thin line lips and wide hips. My clearest memory of her was when she came and told me that she had given her virginity to her boyfriend at the time (They're now married with two children and counting.) It broke my heart, don't ask me why, it shouldn't have. We lost contact long before school ended.

Roberto – Martha's boyfriend. He wasn't part of the original crew, more of an add on because of necessity since Martha wanted him there at all times. He was quiet, kind of into the rap scene (His favorite rapper? Queen Latifa). We kind of saw eye to eye but he was threatened by me and honestly I thought Martha was WAY too good for him.

Hector – Heavy set kid that most people would pick on, except he had money and cars so he got some status off of it. He humor was crude and his jokes were lame, he was just trying to find himself like the rest of us. If we ended up with more than 6 people for an outing, he'd take some of the group in his car.

Moshe – If you've been following the series you already know about him.

Paul – out of all of us, he had to grow up the fastest. He was just a silly guy, great to have around when you wanted a good time. I saw him lose his spark when his sister was shot during a drive by. The only thing that I think is worse than losing someone to a drive by is getting to keep them but having them be different. He dropped out of school and stayed home to reteach his sister the things she would need to survive in life.

So out by the track we had a couple basketball courts, a couple tennis courts and some portable classrooms. The trail that leads to the portables was short but at the start of it had a giant tree. I'd say Elm but I know nothing to trees so I'll stick with my original description, a giant tree.

When the lunch bell rang we all made our way to the tree, and from there we decided what the rest of the day was going to look like. Most days we decided to go to Taco Bell and chill. Of course I should let you know that the Taco Bell we frequented was in Miami Beach which was a good twenty five minutes from school. So that meant that we weren't planning on heading back to school.

Now while I was with Sue, my sister found out about myself and Mick (The teacher) because I'm a sap and had kept all the letters she wrote to me… yes she wrote me letters. I did what I thought was reasonable in that situation, I called the relationship, at least for a bit and told her that I couldn't hang out with her anymore. What that did was that it left a lot of time for me to get to know Sue.

Getting to know her was extremely fun. We talked for tons of time on the phone, we were teenagers after all, we ate lunch together, I walked her from one class to another, she told me about her hopes and dreams.

Then I tried to take that big dirt nap.

Now with Moshe and Mick being there, I could understand that. At that point in time the bonds between the three of us were strong, that was our time together and I knew that they would be there for me. Sue didn't have to be but she was. In my fevered condition as my body fought the toxins that were in my system I remember times when I would look up and had my head on her lap, she was there to dry the sweat off my brow and silenced me back to sleep.

That's when I felt loved for the first time.

Don't get me wrong family love is something completely different. This was one human being looking out for another human being in a way that she didn't have to do but did anyway. She did it with compassion and tenderness and made me feel like I had someone who cared about me. In those three days, she won me over.

The time that we had together was outstanding. We would talk for hours about things in life, watch movies together and eventually we got physical. We couldn't go back to my place since my grandmother was always home and we couldn't go back to her place because of her mother and siblings. We did the next best thing, we cut class and hid in the yearbook office. That same office that had seen my twilight was the burgeoning place of our romance and lust. We could hear the classes going on outside of our door while we kissed and explored each other.

Our love his it's peak there, in more ways than one, one Friday after school had gotten out and we were the only ones left in the room. I was so scared at that moment. I remember looking down on her and asking her several times, "Are you sure?" and when she finally looked at me that certain way I knew and there wasn't any stopping us.

Meet Douglas.
Douglas was an Explorer with Miami P.D. and had a bit of an attitude problem about it. He thought that because he was an Explorer we were beneath him. I tried to like the guy but he was annoying, immature and self centered. The typical teenager and the fact that sometimes he and I were confused for one another in the hallways didn't help. He was into yearbook at the same time and we had to work together but didn't have to like each other. Little did I know he would be the Iago in my life at this time.

It was another Friday night. Mick and Moshe were in the yearbook room listening to Peter Frampton Comes Alive (A record that will always be connected to my teenage years) while Sue and I were in the office getting ready to do our thing.

There was a bang at the door. "Sue, It's your mother, open up."

Her mother was the most disinterested person when it came to her kids. She had told all of them the reason for their conception:

Sue: Oops!
Sister: A wild concert
Brother: The outcome of too much wine one night.

So for her to even be near the school when they lived in Hialeah which was a good twenty five minutes away, something was up.

Longest five minutes of dressing in my life. We weren't fully naked but enough to take time and that whole time we can't say much, the walls may be concrete but the doors are paper thin. I finally managed to get dressed and act like I was in front of one of the computers (Like that's REALLY going to help right?) when Sue opened the door.

"Get your shit, we're leaving."

We didn't say good bye or kiss, the eyes of Darkseid were upon us and we didn't want to piss her off anymore. I gave them a five second head start and then came out of the Yearbook office and stared at Moshe and Mick for an answer.

"Guys, what the fuck?"

Mick: "Dude I swear, she came in through the door and didn't even look at us, she knew where you guys were."

I bolted out the door and looked down the hall; I caught up fast enough to watch her mom hit her upside the head. I knew I'd hear from her later.
Douglas came out of the drama room and asked me what happened and I told him the bare bones story. I mean I was at a loss, I didn't know what to say or think.

"Wow, I didn't know that she'd react like that."

That sealed his fate as my nemesis for the remainder of our high school careers. It took everything in my power not to choke the little shit right where he stood. Moshe overheard the little back and forth between us and he managed to stand in between us at just the right moment.

I'm not sure what Doug thought he was accomplishing by doing that except gain my anger.

That started quiet the odd adventure for me…

The first thing that her parents did was take her out of school.

Then they forbade her to talk to me.

Alas, like most teenagers I think that made us both want to see each other more.
I jumped through the hoops that were put out before me. I excelled at school, at this point living with the teacher so I'm sure that had something to do with it, I wanted to go out with her? Fine, I needed a Chaperone, it usually ended up being her mother. First time I saw Desperado was in the theaters with her and her mom. When they came to the sex scene her mother ran out of the theater like she had never seen a naked man before. (Come to think of it, she might not have.)

It was my Senior year and I was still 'dating' this girl. We would run through hoops, call each other every night and I finally managed to get some clout in High School. I knew enough jocks that the coaches wouldn't bother me if I was late to school. I knew enough preppies that if I needed a car all I had to do was ask. I basically had the faculty in my back pocket because they all knew who my 'guardian' was. Plus, I was head of drama and editor of yearbook.

Doug and I had some run ins after that. Most of the time they consisted of me seeing him, then seeing red, then him running away. He tried to call me a few times to try and 'explain' things but it just never went anywhere. He finally transferred out of schools and from what I hear, because a corrupt cop in Miami. Good luck to my people down there, he's a real winner.

During my senior year I skipped full days of school but not like I used to. I would come into school, meet up with one of the preppies and get the keys to their car. Then I would drive forty minutes to go to the campus where she was currently attending. I wouldn't ask her to cut class, instead I hung around, waited for the bell to ring, walked her to class and had more time to kill. We'd have lunch together, I would hang out some more and then walk her to her bus for her ride home.

I kept doing this, and calling her, occasionally going out with her family and even though I had people knocking on my door, I never once bothered to even try.

One of the solicitors was Vicki. Another Cuban princess she was a transfer from Miami High on her senior year. I was also working for the school newspaper and she ended up picking it as she enjoyed to write. She drove me crazy in all the wrong ways. She was loud, obnoxious, opinionated, brash, and full of herself. If there was one person that I felt that I could unload on, it was her, simply because she was such a bitch.

I remember one day, this was right after the yearbook had come out, I had put so much time and effort into it, it was my good bye to the school as a student and I wanted it perfect. She cornered me in the newspaper room and asked me why there weren't more pictures of her in the book. I went off on her real hard. I mean I was screaming at the top of my lungs about how much of an ungrateful little bitch she was being and blah blah blah and I stormed out of the room. Twenty minutes later Ms. MacElrath sent for me to let me know Vicki had fainted.

As much of a bitch she was and granted I didn't know she had a thing for me at the time, she was always willing to let me borrow her car and on a couple of occasions she invited me over to her house to hang out during school hours when no one was home…. Yea I am that dense.

So the school year goes according to plan. I managed to get good grades, put out an excellent yearbook that many were happy with, published four issues of the newspaper with more than just fluff and had managed to keep my girl.

It was a week before prom. I had gone to the Junior prom stag with Moshe where we managed to get shit faced and almost tossed on our ass. This year, I wanted to go to my Senior year prom and I wanted to take my girlfriend with me. I was already contemplating future. Before Sue I hadn't given a shit about marriage or kids or that whole noise. Then on one day she, for no reason at all, grabbed my hand, looked me in the eyes and said she wanted to have kids with me.

Yea, it doesn't take much to get the wookiee all mushy.

So I cut class and beeline it over to her school so I could try to finalize how in the world we were going to figure this out. At the time her mom had sworn me off again, I was a bad influence so it was about stealth and planning.

I got there, it was sunny, as it almost always is in Florida, the campus was quiet, and the year was ending. We basically had the run of the place and I see her and I'm talking a mile a minute and she says:

"Stop."

"What?"

"I've been thinking about this prom thing.."

"Yea? Do you not want to go? We don't need to, just thought.."

"It's more than that."

"How so?"

"I've been thinking a lot about us and life, what it would look like. I know what you've gone through but honestly, I don't think that I can pick you over my family. I'm sorry."

And just like that, she was gone. (Okay, there might have been some serious crying.) Sue and I did run into each other one other time before I left Florida but it was a run in I don't think I'll ever feel like sharing because I like to remember the person who taught me some things and not the one that she turned into.

Two weeks later was my graduation. I was highly drunk for my walk across the stage, Vicki and I had stop talking to each other but I could see her from where I was standing, she looked back a couple of times but I thought it was in scorn. None of my family showed up for my graduation. Only Moshe and Mick did.

As an Epilogue, I ran into Vicki one more time after that. It was the end of the summer and I was on the college campus getting my affairs in order for classes. She was taking some classes there too and she asked how things were going with Sue. When I told her the time frame of the break up she got infuriated at me. "You realize that I had a thing for you all year and I kept waiting for a chance to say something? You were so caught up in Sue that I knew I'd lose your friendship if I crossed the line. I would have been there for you if only you had asked."

I didn't and I never did.

Screwball - Conclusion/Aftermath

Ariel Conclusion

I’ve been focused on my birthday. The “Grateful to be hitting 30” segments have really gotten me going to write more about my misadventures but on my last one posted someone asked about the Ariel situation. So I’m going to try and sum things up in one post. Kind of a bookend if you will to everything that you’ve already read.

Now I was very good about detailing all the little things about the first week that she was back at my place and after that I tapered off for two reasons, first, it felt that no matter how much I wrote it just wasn’t going to catch up to what was going on and the second was that honestly I wanted to try and process as much as possible.

After the first week the petals began to fall off the flower. I know that it happens inevitably, that we go from new love to constant love to comfortable love. It’s a healthy down point where you realize that the person you’re with is going to be with you for a while and you shouldn’t burn yourself out trying to steal as much time as possible and remember to BREATHE!

When it comes to new romance my school of thought is this: you give 150% to who you’re with. You do it to prove that you have something of value that they want in their lives. You do it to show them how grateful you are to have them with you. You do it out of respect, kindness, courtesy, love and admiration. It’s a healthy 150 that you hope to get in return.

I didn’t.

Granted I gave her the first week as a type of vacation. I mean she had been describing all of the things going on with her and in her life and her depression and everything else, I wanted to recharge her batteries. She was here for almost a month.

I went to work everyday, came home and did the dishes from the night before, she would cook, I would do dishes and then we’d hang out. It wasn’t a bad routine but then I noticed some stuff and Jen and Travis noticed some stuff.

I’d come home, the house was in disarray. Nothing had been cleaned up and instead there was MORE cluttere and garbage to be had, empty soda cans, used plates, empty boxes and everything else. I’m not as much as a clean freak as I should be but I’ll be damned if I want my house to look like no one cares. So I’d come home and start doing some cleaning, thinking that maybe she would get up off the couch and help me do it. It never happened.

One of the biggest things that happened that kind of woke me up to what was wrong was three weeks ago. I work a health clinic, one of the front office people was on vacation and the other called in because her son was sick, which left me alone in the front office to check people in and out, answer phones, and answer questions that might come my way. The office doesn’t close for lunch and I had no one to relieve me for breaks. So really I’m working a straight day through, nine hours. While that’s bad, it’s also the day that I stay late, we come in at 11 and leave at 8, then come back in at 8am the next morning. It’s the hardest day I have. Made even harder by not having any real down time to recharge at work. So when I get home I’m going to be EXHAUSTED.

Jen and I talk all day on email so she heard my tale of woe as it happened. She relayed the information to Travis and I called Ariel during my first break and explained to her how exhausted I was already getting.

Okay. Here’s the question for you guys… you are at home all day, your boy/girl friend, significant other calls and tells you of his/her day. What do you do?

Personally? I know my lady’s having a shit day, I’m going to make sure that she knows she’s appreciated, maybe make her dinner or get take out, give a back rub and be ready to listen to the day they’ve had. I’m built that way, I know it’s SUPER feminine but honestly it’s how I was raised and I wouldn’t change it. I show affection by touch, by words and by deeds. I’m not going to try and BUY love, but I will show how much that love means to me.

I called Ariel at about 1pm to let her know what’s going on.

Travis and Jen have basically moved in together but Jen doesn’t have internet access and his computer is at our (Travis and my) place. So he’s got a key, he comes and goes, as is his right. He got home that day about three o’clock and Ariel was still in bed. The house was a sty and she hadn’t done any of the dishes. He was upset.

When I say he was upset I’m not talking about because the house wasn’t kept up, he was upset for ME because of the condition of the house and the fact that I was having a bad day. The possibility that I might come home and nothing had been done.

So he takes it to Ariel, “Hey Ariel, Gabe’s having a bad day at work, are you going to do the dishes and stuff before he gets in?”

“Well dishes are his responsibility and he didn’t feel like doing them last night, he’ll do them when he gets home from work.”

Travis is a gunslinger, he shoots from the hip, eyes like a hawk, reflexes like a snake, his words can bite if he needs them to and at that moment he felt like they did, “That’s pretty messed up, he’s having a hard day at work and you’re going to make him come home and clean? Really?”

He didn’t say anything else to her, he didn’t feel like it was his place. Instead he took charge and started cleaning. Jen heard about this and left work early to go help him clean up as well.

Understand that they’re cleaning up not because I’m that dirty but because they know the type of day that I’m having and they don’t want me to come home to have to do something else. They don’t think it’s fair or right.

These guys, they’re my family. I’ve said it over and over again and while you don’t know the full story yet, each time we get together that bond grows closer because we understand each other in levels that many people strive to accomplish after years. Due to the stress of our lives this year we’ve compressed that and it’s strengthened us as individuals, friends and now family. I can not say that I have EVER had a pair of my friends come to my house to make sure that I had little to nothing to do when I got home because of a rough day.

So with a fifth of Pendleton in hand they begin the arduous job of cleaning the kitchen from top to bottom. They’re both upset, I’m their friend and they feel like I’m getting shafted because the woman that I’m providing for at the time doesn’t want to make sure I have a good evening when I get home.

The best way to defuse this situation if you’re Ariel? Get out of bed, come help them and apologize, show that you care. That goes so far into how they would have seen it. Instead she closes the door and shuts herself in. She doesn’t come out until I get home and coax her out of the room.

That was the first sign.

There are other little things that got dropped on me.

We spend a lot of our time on the front stoop, we smoke and I don’t like that smell in the house. It’s a quick walk into the house to get something to drink if you’re thirsty. I just don’t want people smoking inside so I ask them to wait or they ask someone to get them a drink, we all take turns going in, it’s a friendship thing. I got thirsty and I asked Ariel if she could please get me something to drink since I was smoking. She said sure.

After twenty minutes of prodding and finally just getting up to get it myself, she went in and got me something to drink. I know it sounds petty but to me, you would think that if the person that you’re with asks you for a drink and you sit and wait 20 to 30 minutes and then you only get going after they say they can do it themselves, that’s not really fair.

While I’m showing you that let me tell you how I tried.

She likes to have foot rubs, and back rubs and to get lotioned, I did it every day. Why? Because I was putting my best foot forward and it’s who I am. When she same up she had duct tape holding her glasses together because they didn’t have the money to get them fixed, I got her new frames. I got her new clothes; I made sure that the pantry was always full. Stopped and get her flowers, made sure she had soft drinks at home and a few days I just brought home fast food so that neither of us had to do any work. I did it without complaint. Again it’s because of my personality. I like to take care of people but my flaw is that I don’t look out to be taken care of the same way.

We made two shopping trips while she was here, well three technically. Two to the local supermarket so she could have the things she felt she needed or wanted to cook and the other was to Costco to get some random supplies we thought would be cheaper there and to help Travis and Jen get ready for their camping trip.

She had a checkered past when it came to her sexual habits and while I know that no one is perfect I didn’t dwell on it. Way I saw it she was with me and the past was the past. The thing is that for that to really work, you both have to get over the past, your and the person who you’re with. She didn’t. She would talk about her exploits and while I knew stuff had happened, I didn’t need to hear about it. Still I kept my silence because I really thought it wasn’t my place.

Travis didn’t have the same issue. He tossed out some comments and seethed for me in silence. That’s when I think we realized something wasn’t right.

The thing that happened that Tuesday I was swamped? It happened all the time. I would come home and nothing would be done. She had spent DAYS watching Buffy reruns, playing on the computer and anything else that was relaxing. She didn’t really try to make the effort to help.

While she was here I did laundry multiple times after I got home from work. She never asked to help, or at least offer to switch the clothes from the washer to the dryer…. I was doing her laundry too.

The other stick point were some of my friends. I was raised by women, I get along more with women. One of the women in question is Shannon. Shannon I’ve known for about five months and we clicked, we’re good friends, we tell each other everything and we have a good time. Wednesday nights I’ve started to make it a habit to go play poker at her local hangout because she enjoys it so much.

This did not sit well with Ariel, she felt threatened and what’s more, she felt like Shannon had to be cut out of my life. She was intimidated by her and didn’t want to put up with it.

Keep this in mind. She was intimidated and wanted her gone but she was still going back to her husband. The time with me was sweet but she still felt a duty to try and work something with her husband. I can understand this but the double standard she was setting was, getting to be with her husband while I sat in the wings and waited, alone and having to be okay with her being with him in all ways possible.

There’s only so much that’s okay.

So Travis and Jen went camping this last weekend and I let them use an air mattress that I had been using for a while as a bed, it was something that Amy had let me borrow kindly enough when she heard about my situation. Travis isn’t really at our place so he has been generous enough to let me use his bed. I thought that was great, least I can do is let them use the air mattress and if Travis really liked it, hell he could keep it.

The mattress however seems to have met and early demise at the hands of a sharp object while it was still in my house, someone stabbed it. Okay, jealousy is cute but that’s bordering as far as I’m concerned. She never admitted to it but the body language gave a lot of it away as far as I’m concerned.

Immature, yes. More to the point Travis and Jen were counting on that bed and none of us knew what she had done. They took it up thinking it would work just as well as it had for me and instead the plopped themselves on an air mattress that let out all of it’s air and all they felt were hard rocks against their backs, I KNOW how much that hurts. If not for the quick thinking of one of their friends they would have had back problems for a week.

Tuesday I get an email from Jen that asks me to please stop by their place directly after work. “We would like you to swing by the house on your way home if you get a chance, we’d like to talk to you.”

That’s code for: Something’s wrong and we need to find a way to fix it.

On a side note: That same day was the day that they took Jeremiah away. I was informed that the state took him out of the home of my Ex and was going to place him somewhere else. It’s the third son I’ve lost in my life.

So I’m already having a bit of an emotional rollercoaster and the only two people in the world that I consider my nearest and dearest are calling me out to try and help me.

I beeline it over to their house as soon as I get off of work.

I walk in, “Don’t be alarmed, we’re beaners”

On the stove Jen’s making Pan Fried Oysters. In the oven Travis has, Portobello mushrooms, Baked potatoes, Asparagus, and Garlic bread. I look on the counter and there’s three dishes out.

We’re doing this over a meal.

If you don’t know by now, for me talking to people over breaking bread is an awesome thing indeed. It’s a personal thing, you only eat with those you are comfortable with. You would never eat with an enemy or someone who causes you grief, you do it with those you love and want to confide in.

So they set the table and we sit to eat and the intervention begins.

They’ve been watching from the side lines while this whole thing has been happening. When they met Ariel they gave their vote of confidence and I don’t need to remind you that the vote they give, WAY important.

Then they started showing me the signs.

Some of the mile markers that I’ve already explained.

Travis: “Can I say something? Brother, I love you, you’re a lot like me. You don’t want to be alone. You hate having an empty house and any port in the storm is better than nothing but I’m going to tell you this and if I’m out of line you can punch me. You’re getting played. She’s using you, she doesn’t help you, doesn’t lift a finger, eats you out of house and home, and what do you get in return?”

Jen: “We know that when we met her we told you to keep her and at the time, Hoovey, you look so happy and even though we had reservations about the situation, because you were happy we were happy but watching the dynamic, the lack of respect and caring about you. That worries us. This is a situation that we think is going to cost you a lot if you stick around. You need to cut ties.”

The conversation went on all night. They would remember things they wanted to tell me but were stuffing in the hope that it was something small and petty and they were just overreacting.

The cards laid out on the table. The image didn’t look good. The saying that started all of this? “You can’t tell there’s a problem when you’re inside the box”

I spent the whole night talking to them and having them show me the outside of the box. After a month of me putting out maximum effort to show her that I care and I got had gotten the bare minimum. It was time to change tactics, maybe giving her a break from me would help. Letting her go back home so she could see the contrast between who she’d been with for a month and who she was married to. See perhaps the difference in affection and attentiveness, maybe that would shake her out of whatever she was thinking because for all she was getting she wasn’t showing anything in return.

I didn’t go home that night. I had to think. I went right to work. I had to.

Travis the next day found the final straw. The house was tore up from the floor up. It looked like someone had come in and just let a hurricane loose. Dishes were piled up in the sink, the living room was a mess and she was firmly entrenched in the bedroom that Travis’ bed was in, which is where his clothes are in.

Travis: “I tried brother, I really tried but she’s got to go. I’m sorry. I pay half of everything and she’s using shit up and not helping and not contributing in any way. I want her out of the house.”

I got home and she was pissed. She was pissed that I had been out all night, that I had done it with my friends. It wasn’t fair, what was so important?

So I laid it out for her the best way that I could. I tried to keep myself in check, I tried to be very polite about pointing little things out but I did end it with, “It feels like I’m getting played. Like I’m being used.”

Retaliation: “Well I feel like I’m only being used for sex and food.”

That my friends, that one line was all it took to put everything in perspective for me. She’s a kid, she’s not ready, she may never be ready and in my eagerness to find something and someone of my own I looked right past it and got sucked in.

I gave her the option of what she wanted to do. She decided to go to a friend’s house in the area and they could drive her back to Eugene the next morning.

So just as quickly as she swooped in, she’s gone again. I would love to say that it’s a love story ending but for the Shaman it appears that something like that, if it ever happens, is a long way off and shouldn’t be rushed.

As always, I’m still writing. I’ll continue to blog. This is a chapter I won’t be revisiting any time soon. I’m looking forward and breaking off the rear view mirror as a gunslinger I know is wont to say.

Thanks to all who showed interest and passion in this situation, it was a fifty/fifty chance and I needed to know what was there now I know it was a mirage and I can move on.

/End

Grateful to be hitting 30 (3)

Dipping into the way back machine is weird, if you do it just right, you actually have a lot of the emotions that you did when stuff happened come back to you as well. While the past few weeks have definitely about looking forward at what I want to do with my life, I can’t help but get introspective on the things that have happened in my past.

While most of my stories have taken place during high school, I’m going to jump ahead some time for this one.

/flashback

Michael Cox was from Chicago. He was part of a biker crew down there; he did some real heavy stuff according to him. He was a short and stocky guy. He had a balding mullet thing going which was hysterical to look at. Gruff hands, plastic smile and throaty laugh. Because he was a bullshitter, he and I hit it off instantly.

Did I mention I was in Seminary at the time?

About 2 years into my being in Oregon I was informed that my calling was to be a pastor. Now I wasn’t always a believer. I really only started noticing God when I was about seventeen. I was at the theater with Moshe and Mick, we were watching Devil’s Advocate with Al Pacino and Keanu Reeves. At the time I was still heavy with Sue and we got to the scene where Charlize Theron has finally lost all her marbles and slits her own throat.

I lost it. I got up out of my chair and blotted for the bathroom where I had dry heaves. On my knees before the porcelain god I decided, if anything ANYTHING that evil could exist in life, there just HAD to be a God and I commended my soul to him. I walked out of the bathroom and straight out into open air, it wasn’t until years later that I saw how the movie ended, and Moshe was standing out there. He’d been waiting for me. He was leaning against the guard rail, lighting up a Camel and said, “You just got saved huh?”

I stood up a little straighter and said, “Yes I did.”

“Welcome to the club.” Then he handed me a cigarette and we went about our business.

I didn’t become a Bible thumper. It’s not in me to tell people how to be and what to believe. It’s in me to believe the BEST in all people. So my relationship was a loose one. I’d talk to The Man every day but I wasn’t thinking there was a calling in it for me. Seriously who does?

I come up here and someone ‘speaks’ over me and says that my calling is to be a pastor to the minorities and the people that others won’t touch, geeks in other words. So I plop down my money and as I work full time I go to school full time.

So in 2001 I’m in school with Mike and we BS a lot. We end up coming to each other for the random things in life. He’s happily married and he’s got like five kids. At this stage I’m single and enjoying it, having left one crack whore and having yet to find that kind of interest in Mary.

I was also working as a bouncer for a little Mexican placed called, La Macarena. So I worked there six days a week, Oregon bars close at 2:30 and drinks stopped being served by 2am. I’d get home about 3 or 4 depending on what was going on. Sometimes we stayed after hours and had a couple drinks, sometimes I went over to someone’s house and hung out or crashed. Still, I was renting a room from Mary’s family and I tried to be civil about the hours that I kept. They weren’t thrilled with the job, as church goers they thought it was too close to ‘temptation’ but took with a grain of salt.

That winter I got an itch. It happens every couple of years. I get the itch to FLY somewhere. I don’t care where or why but I just get the urge to travel. This particular time, due to my involvement in Seminary and helping out some other people, I wanted to fly down to Argentina. I wanted to fly down and take about 100lbs of clothing with me to give to a needy orphanage down there. Someone who I thought deserved it basically.

So I got the clothes together, got the money to go on the trip, got my passport and got out of dodge. The trip was wonderful, I have stories for that as well but now’s not the time or the place.

Instead I’m going to go fast forward. I was able to communicate with Mary and her family in Oregon while I was away. I took three weeks off. I spent two weeks in Argentina getting to know the lifestyle, the people and the fact that the nation was crazy and was at the beginning of that time period where they went through seven presidents in like three months.

I spent one week in Florida to catch up with my family. My grandma the most, I miss that old lady.

While I was away I started getting strange information. Bottom line of all that information? Michael Cox had taken things I had told him in confidence, twisted them and then told everyone about them. In his mind, for some reason, I was a coke head, a vein popper and a whore. While I might be a whore to some, I can tell you this, I didn’t get anywhere NEAR the amount of ass it would take to be a whore in that time frame, let alone my life.

Because he opened his yap two things happened. I had a full ride to seminary until he did that, so the school suspended me pending an investigation. The second thing was that the family that I was renting with didn’t want me around because they were doing foster care. So the day I flew back into Portland, there was no one to greet me at the airport. I had to grab my luggage, get on the MAX (Public Transportation Train) and ride down to my school in hope of fixing whatever was going on.

Easier said than done, the dean had been expecting me to darken his doorstep and when I did all he said was, “I can’t help you Gabriel. It would be different if the school had not been notified of these activities. As it stands you’re going to have to confront your accusers before you’re able to go any further.”

Did I also mention I was jobless? Yea. The tri-fecta: no work, no school and no home.

I called in one marker that was owed to me by a teacher in the school, Carl Culley, taught some of the fundamentals in the school and also runs one of the churches in Vancouver. It so happens that the church ground is also a camping ground, so he came to pick me up and took me up to Washington.

It was bitch cold that year. I remember seeing my breath all the time. The cabins were nice and also isolated. I would have some privacy and also die of boredom. There was only one set of people there, they land keepers. They were very nice, geeks after all, but the majority of the time I spent by myself trying to figure out where the fuck I went wrong.

Due to the constant exposure to the elements, my trip overseas and then my stay in a hot temperatures I ended up getting pneumonia. It was the worst kind that had shivers at any time, constant headache. It took me four days to sit and get the ball rolling and by that time I was already very sick. This was a time where there was NO ONE for me to turn to. My friends had betrayed me, the ones that I considered family had cut me the worst.

It took a month to finally talk to my accusers alone. Everyone thought that I was guilty long before anything was finalized. When I did meet them all they had for evidence was slip covers to Stephen King, specific comics and movies. Funnier still? The guy who started this whole thing, Mike, was no where to be found during this little confrontation so all they had was hearsay and my choices of reading and watching material.

Not enough to amount to anything.

I got reinstated into Seminary. If you ever have someone kick or get hitched, you can ring me up and I’ll help out. The rest of it, the friendship with Mike and my trust in Mary and her family, that didn’t turn out as hot.

Fast friends can be fun to have but you need to watch who you trust. Trust is something to be earned, not given and when it comes back to haunt you, it’s the worst way to find out.