Step 5: Admitted to God, to ourselves and to an(other) human being(s) the exact nature of our wrongs.
it's monday again. i feel pretty good. it's a rainy day, gloomy out. didn't get any residuals from the eclipse, but i wasn't expecting any. i haven't been tuned in that way for a long time. physicality requires spiritual sacrifice, and vice versa. so i slept okay, with the ocean in the background, and i got up okay, though my thoughts were a bit diffuse, and my workout was okay, though my music was not shuffling like it was supposed to. but i made an amend to Patricia, a friend i've known at the gym for a couple years now though i just today learned her name. she's a lovely, tall black woman, and i would make statements about how she was getting taller with all the pedaling she was doing on her machine, while she would always offer me kind words and encouragement. i know enough about me today to know that though consciously i wasn't trying to be unkind, pointing out someone's height without thought of whether it could be an issue for them is a misdirection. in this time of self-exploration, i have to see what's really there, not just what i want to see. and when i saw her friday and realized that's all i've ever had to say to her, i knew i had to own it and make that amend. that's step ten: continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. which is a great segue to the systems check.
the reason why i altered step five as i did is because i don't know who the recipients of this will be, if anyone. i only know that this week is going to be dedicated to digging in the dirt, as Peter Gabriel sang. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0C3DHp36zc) in order to live unburdened by the past i have to see the past for what it really is, what is has been, what its dimensions are and how they have impacted my todays. and it's not an easy process when it's done as written. going back through the bad times, seeing the people and the attitudes that i fostered and nurtured against them, back to where i was on the playground with my demons, thinking it was fair games being played but discovering later in life that they were all rigged against me. that's the nature of a fourth step by itself. and then to have to tell someone MY PART of those situations, to own the stupidity and the ignorance of who i was...it is humbling in the most plane crash surviving sort of way. but it is the basis of everything else to come. if i don't know how my system has been designed, there is no redesign that will take. if i don't know how it's supposed to run, there are no repairs that will make sense. and if i can't repair the system, then i am at the whim of the universe, moreso than i already am. and i don't want to just float out here forever. hell, i've only got a year, one day at a time.
so let's get started.
born normal, but grew fat. mom and dad were at war. oldest brother, resentments. he was the golden boy. he was special to everyone. he was like an uncle more than a brother, because of the weird dynamic of my grandmother's youngest being several years younger than my mother's firstborn. he called my grandmother 'ma' because he was partially raised with my uncles. he didn't get in trouble from my dad, whereas Jerry and I would get the hell beat out of us for the slightest infractions. i know he exposed himself to me, but i am not aware of any other abuse, sexually. that doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but it means i won't condemn a person for something that my mind can't recall. but emotionally? he treated me like shit often because i was fat. his determination seemed to be that my fat was my failure, though i wasn't failing until i decided i'd had enough of feeling like shit for everyone's obsession with my weight and discovered that weed and alcohol numbed most of that out. he was a sports hero, and i know i was jealous of him in a lot of ways. i also know i wanted to be like him in a lot of ways. he was a receiver on his football team and i wanted to play receiver. always thought it was Lynn Swann and John Stallworth until this very day, but i see now that it had a lot more to do with my eldest brother. his name is Rick, by the way. named after my oldest uncle. hmmm.
yeah, anyway, basketball star, so i wanted to play basketball. i got good at street ball, but i never was on his level and he never let me forget it. he had the whole attic to himself while Jerry, Rob and I were cramped into one bedroom. eventually we would claim areas of the house, like the basement and the attic once Rick was gone, but in the beginning, he was the king of the kids. so there's a lot of resentment that i need to own there. self-esteem issues, self-worth, some fear generated, socially less than and never being able to measure up. plus the sexual inappropriate actions that i can remember, creating a sense of unease about myself. i never stopped loving my oldest brother, but i stopped wanting to be associated with him by the time i was done with high school. his disdain for me was such that when i asked him for cash assistance to take a girl on a field trip that i wanted to go on (being very insecure about myself and feeling, at that time, that i had to buy affection), he made his refusal a morality lesson about the wrong that my mother said i was doing, rather than asking how i was, or how i was feeling, or anything else. the last straw between us was him coming to columbus when i was still living there, visiting our uncle Howard and not contacting me at all. after that i gave up on him. nothing more to say. i will have to put some prayer in that one, because i am going to have to make an amend and i still won't want to be bothered with him. but we'll see what God has to say when the time comes.
fat kid. uncles and grandparents and parents all hung up on my weight. mother gave me speed laced candy called AYDS diet candy to curb my appetite. mother was also the one who would feed me the most. i think she thought she was a bad mother and was trying to learn, on the fly, how to be a good mother. i believe that sincerely because i know today she mostly thinks she failed. nothing could be further from the truth. we all fail, and we all succeed, and that's called learning. but with nothing as a comparison, how do you know those things? my mother was about surface things early. things had to look right. things had to appear right in the eyes of anyone who might be looking on. again, had a lot to do with her seeming to be a success at being a mother. she's very intelligent, in a native and intuitive way. but if you stepped out of line of being perfect in the eyes of a beholder you were apt to be beaten with a Hot Wheel track. left welts. very precise, intelligent instrument of punishment. my mother forced us to the Kingdom Hall, and as a grown man i realize most of it was just to keep my dad from taking us to his Baptist church. because when the opportunity presented her an out, she no longer forced us to go. and of course my oldest brother was never required to go. my mother poisoned us against our father. in dozens of little ways, she set us against him to aid her in her war against him. the only thing i've never really been able to get my mind around is why, with so much disdain and disgust, did she marry him? and i don't think he's a bad guy; i've never consciously seen my father drunk. but i do know that they've been fighting through forty seven years of my memories. that's a lot of fighting. my mom also kind of tried to poison us against my dad's family. which is strange, as i discover lately that my mom and my dad's sister were good friends at one point. there is an untold story, one that is growing in its need to be heard by me in my head. but that's a different time, and a different blog entry. my mom was very needy and very bitter, but she was a fun person often. she would take us to drive-ins, she would experiment with different foods before she gave up on cooking, and she would take us down to Mill Creek to play. she used to draw, and she was kind to all sorts of different people. but she also did not let us see Roots, or King Kong, because of how she interpreted her religious teachings. she would disapprove certain music for the same reasons. and later in life, she embraced many of the things she made off-limits for us, though she's still a member of Jehova's Witnesses. so there were self-esteem and self-worth issues, social issues, fear and disapproval, and shame and the seeds of my drug addiction sown into the earth with my already budding food fiending.
my dad, he was absent, and he was always there. i have a great understanding of that now, but i didn't when i was a child, because i couldn't. my dad worked. he worked a lot of hours, because alcoholics accumulate debt and he had children to take care of. my dad was one of very few blacks in recovery at that time. he did a lot in the program, he did a lot for a lot of people. but i didn't know him then. he'd be on a local television show, Expressions, with Sophia Brooks, i believe. in school they'd say they saw my dad on television, but i would say that guy wasn't my dad. i may have gotten that from my mom, i am not sure right now. but there was some validity in it. the guy on tv was smiling, joking, personable, friendly. my dad was none of those things. my dad dealt with problems with beatings and intimidation. my dad was a pair of hands wrapped around a newspaper in the living room. i remember my brother Jerry and i would run up to him and hit the newspaper, just to get his attention. it would make him mad, but at least he was acknowledging us. it was an interesting trap. my dad was thrifty, but my mom said he was cheap. my mom was spoiled and contrary, and my dad never said an unkind thing about her that i heard, consciously. but i know he used to beat her when he was drinking. my dad was a beating man. not betting, beating. slightest infraction, as i said earlier. it was sometimes impossible to not get a beating. and he would act as if it hadn't happened when he was done, which made the beating worse somehow. however...i don't ever recall my dad being overbearing about my weight. my dad forced us to do the things he wanted us to do. my mom gave us choices in most things. my dad tried to trick me into getting baptized in his church. ammunition in the gun in the war between my folks. my dad would throw amazing tantrums at the holidays when he and my mom would fight about whether we were going with him for Christmas or Thanksgiving or not. she would cook so we could stay home. my dad would throw the food on the floor, turn over the table. its funny, how neither parent seems especially bad in light of what passes for parenting today. all of us, all their black children, are still alive, in a land that murders black people without hesitation. there's something to be said for that.
i have flocks of mosquitoes, apparently, in my apartment, because i'm getting bit the fuck up. i did get to see my sponsor, he was doing better, looking much healthier and that made me happy. i had a chicken sandwich and soup for lunch, i had salmon croquettes and california blend veggies and rice for dinner. i've done the dishes, spoken to my mother, written over five thousand words today in Mechanical Jesus and i'm tired. i've got the rest of the week for system's check, so i'm going to call it a night. brain is weary now.
my dad, he was absent, and he was always there. i have a great understanding of that now, but i didn't when i was a child, because i couldn't. my dad worked. he worked a lot of hours, because alcoholics accumulate debt and he had children to take care of. my dad was one of very few blacks in recovery at that time. he did a lot in the program, he did a lot for a lot of people. but i didn't know him then. he'd be on a local television show, Expressions, with Sophia Brooks, i believe. in school they'd say they saw my dad on television, but i would say that guy wasn't my dad. i may have gotten that from my mom, i am not sure right now. but there was some validity in it. the guy on tv was smiling, joking, personable, friendly. my dad was none of those things. my dad dealt with problems with beatings and intimidation. my dad was a pair of hands wrapped around a newspaper in the living room. i remember my brother Jerry and i would run up to him and hit the newspaper, just to get his attention. it would make him mad, but at least he was acknowledging us. it was an interesting trap. my dad was thrifty, but my mom said he was cheap. my mom was spoiled and contrary, and my dad never said an unkind thing about her that i heard, consciously. but i know he used to beat her when he was drinking. my dad was a beating man. not betting, beating. slightest infraction, as i said earlier. it was sometimes impossible to not get a beating. and he would act as if it hadn't happened when he was done, which made the beating worse somehow. however...i don't ever recall my dad being overbearing about my weight. my dad forced us to do the things he wanted us to do. my mom gave us choices in most things. my dad tried to trick me into getting baptized in his church. ammunition in the gun in the war between my folks. my dad would throw amazing tantrums at the holidays when he and my mom would fight about whether we were going with him for Christmas or Thanksgiving or not. she would cook so we could stay home. my dad would throw the food on the floor, turn over the table. its funny, how neither parent seems especially bad in light of what passes for parenting today. all of us, all their black children, are still alive, in a land that murders black people without hesitation. there's something to be said for that.
i have flocks of mosquitoes, apparently, in my apartment, because i'm getting bit the fuck up. i did get to see my sponsor, he was doing better, looking much healthier and that made me happy. i had a chicken sandwich and soup for lunch, i had salmon croquettes and california blend veggies and rice for dinner. i've done the dishes, spoken to my mother, written over five thousand words today in Mechanical Jesus and i'm tired. i've got the rest of the week for system's check, so i'm going to call it a night. brain is weary now.
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