The Broken

They stand alone

The Broken, The Bare.

Destructing

Impaired.

They break down

The Frightened. The Severe

Trembling

Feared.

They feel nothing

The Empty. The Solo

Silent

and Torn.

They fade away

The Distant. The Shattered

Beaten.

and Reborn.

Five years ago, I posted this to my Facebook page.

“Today…I will sit in a room with my fathers’ body for the very last time. Nothing could prepare my heart for the heaviness it feels right now. It’ll pass. Time heals. Yadda Yadda. But right now, in this moment….I’m a little boy learning to ride a bike again. A teenager learning how to shave. A toddler, saying my first word. A man, saying goodbye to the first role model he ever had. The first person he ever wanted to be like. The only father I will ever know. I bid him farewell, in hopes that we meet again someday. In another life. In another time. In another situation.”

In the five years that passed, I’ve grown exponentially. I’ve also regressed. I’ve lost ground. I’ve went backwards. I’ve fallen apart.

I’ve given up. Or wanted to. Or wanted to not want to give up.

I’ve moved on. Stood still. Walked in circles.

I’ve disappeared and come back.

Reading this post that I made five years ago, reminded me that I’ve lost someone that I can’t get back. A few someones. And I’ve been broken ever since. Not in every moment since, but at the end of every moment.

I’ve stayed in half.

And I can’t do that anymore. It’s too hard. It’s too hurtful. It’s too much.

This post reminded me that I have faced too much. I have fought too hard.

I have to stop fighting. I have to stop battling. I have to stop grieving.

I have to stop being broken.

Because being broken is breaking the rest of me. The rest of what I have.

But right now, In this moment, I am a toddler, learning to say I’ve fucked up. Alot.

A boy, gaining the courage to move on. From everyhing that needs to be moved on from.

A teenager, with the world and all its’ uncertainty at his fingertips.

Today, I am a man, learning to love himself again, even when I tell myself I’m unlovable.

Five years ago, was the end of the beginning of my severe depression. And lots of other things have contributed, but mostly, I’ve made it harder on myself by enabling myself to accept it. As how it is. As how it will be. As the only way it can be.

And today, I have to stop. Because if I don’t now, I won’t.

And then it will be too late.

It’s been five years, (eerily almost to the exact hour) since my beautiful baby sister, all of 22 years old, took her final breath on this Earth.

I’ve spent five years holding my breath on this day. Five years acknowledging that its approaching, while pretending to ignore that automatic dread that creeps up alongside it as it nears. I’ve spent five years on this date, writing about how much I regret, or how much I hurt. How much she’s missed, or how much better off she surely is.

William Shakespeare wrote, “Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o’er wrought heart and bids it break.”

I’ve spent five years giving sorrow words.

Five years trying to capture how I’m feeling and sharing it with others. For others. For myself. To look back on, or just remember or record. To warn, or encourage someone else to be more, to do more, reach out more. To LOVE more. More than you do. More than you think you can, or want to. Or wish for. Because once you’ve lost someone, you can’t do it over.

Every year I mention what I’ve learned, or what I’ve accepted. About the world, about life. Grief. Regret. Hurt. I try to speak to those that might be like me. Stubborn. Emotional. Fragile. Broken. Beautiful. Damaged. Depressed. To try to encourage them to love more, while they can, rather than to write about regretting it later.

And afterwards, I fold up my grief, put it away, and repeat the process whenever it finds itself randomly strewn across my lap.

Today, five years later…..

It doesn’t feel lighter. It feels further, but not lighter. It’s not less to carry, it’s just further away and therefore harder to reach. I don’t miss her less, or think of her less. I think of her like she’s a little further away. A little more over there. Or, there. Maybe a little more everywhere. Obviously, not where I wish she was….But somewhere out there, just out of reach, just out of view. Just over my shoulder. Not on it,but over it.

But, I’m doing okay with it. I think we all are. We’ve accepted it. We’ve moved on from it. I think we’ve stopped letting it hold us down, and are starting to reach that part where it’s starting to lift us up. To her, with her, for her. Something.

Its beautiful. But beauty is often littered with pain. And so we all hurt in our own ways. Our own moments.

Cuz, even though it’s been five years, and our lives have led us to wherever they have, you dont lose a sibling and just get over it. You carry it with you. You just do. You just fucking do. But, if you’re lucky, you’re able to use it all to motivate you. To propel you forward. Onward. Upward. Hell, backwards if that’s where you wanna go.

Over the last year, I’ve lost my way. I’ve stopped letting it propel me.

I’ve hit rock bottom. And most people don’t even know it. They don’t know how close I’ve been to bending so far I’ve broken. How close I’ve been to being too far to come back from.

I’m headed down the same self destructive road she was on. Not the exact same road, but one equally as dangerous. And it hit me like a ton of bricks today that five years after her death, my sister is still inspiring me. Today, I needed a kick in the ass. And, realizing what I’m doing to myself only came about, because of her.

I can’t say I’m in a good place today, But I know ill be in a better place tomorrow, because of thoughts inspired by her. By today. By this blog. By this moment.

And its so perfect, because I know she knows exactly what I mean, and that’s really all that this is about.

I love you little sister. Always.

I’m so sorry that noone else in the world will ever get to know your big,beautiful, stubborn ass heart.

But you have changed me, and mine. Thank you.

If I do a rewind inside my mind, I still find things aren’t how they were meant to be designed.

I change the pace and replace your face with an empty space.

Then I take your empty space, return you to your place, and plead my case to see your face.

I want you back here.

For a moment. For a minute. From outside. From in it.

Forever.

Forget it.

I imagine you’re here, and I’m there, and noone notices that noone’s not anywhere.

I’d be the same me, where all I do is react, But you’d act like I can’t tell the difference in what’s fake from what’s fact.

I still chase your approval though, Like I need your acceptance or your refusal.

I want you back here.

For a moment. For a minute. From outside. From in it.

Forever.

Forget it.

I’d still be me. And so would he. We’d be we. And we’d line up everyone else so they can see how we see. But you still probably wouldn’t see me for me.

Maybe we’d get through the shit. Over the hit. We’d seal the whole bit within your coffin and be done with it.

Then I can I go back out and walk in again, to end where we begin by going without from within.

I want you back here.

For a moment. For a minute. From outside. From in it.

Forever.

Forget it.

I walk a path combustible

The safety becomes the fright

The set in stone remains adjustable

The darkness can still be light

So I follow the leader

Right into the pit

The writer becomes the reader

To fight, the new submit.

I walk through ways unorthodox

The method is more than the means

The finished products become the building blocks

The men more the machines

So I follow the leader

Into a deep dark well

The writer becomes the reader

As heaven turns to hell.

I walk through each and every obstacle

The walls the only way out

The musts become the optional

The answers the only doubt

So I follow the leader

Back and forth and in again

The writer becomes the reader

The righteous into the sin.

I walk through vacant kingdom

Turn my nothing into a throne

The debts become the income

While the sticks turn to stone

So I follow the leader

Inside out and upside down

The writer becomes the reader

The king into the clown.

The first night my father took me with him on the streets, I was in 3rd grade. I was laying upstairs with my cousin Scott in his twin size bed and we could hear my dad and my Unce K downstairs screaming at one another. He was yelling at my dad for stealing some of his tools, and selling them for “drug money”.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but my dad had been on crack for about a year and a half. On again, off again, for his whole life, really. But, this time, it had started toward the beginning of my 2nd grade school year. He started just using it occasionally, but eventually it was every day. Every night. The gradual decline of having a home, though not in a good neighborhood, to having nothing, and moving in with my Uncle and two of my cousins, was a part of it that I wasn’t old enough to see at the time. I didn’t understand the struggle we were going through, or why.

My dad was so good at pretending that everything was okay. A trait I later picked up, and would pick up and throw away; on and off again, for the rest of my life. Everythings fine. Everythings okay.

LOOK OVER THERE.

He became so good at hiding his struggle, that it taught me to hide mine. Not even necessarily to hide it, but to disguise it.

We weren’t living with my uncle because my dad was a crackhead. We were living with my uncle so that I could be closer to my school.We didn’t only shop for clothes at the Salvation Army because he was on drugs and didn’t have the money left to buy things that I needed. All my clothes were from the Salvation Army because that’s the BEST store for cool T shirts. The BEST, he said. It wasn’t that my dad didn’t have friends because he was never taught how to, or because he was ashamed of the life he’d built for us. It was because he didn’t have time. He was just that busy.

I learned how to do this too.

I don’t push people away because I’ve never really had a real relationship with anyone in my whole childhood. I push them away cuz I just don’t like them. Or I just don’t like people getting too close.

I don’t struggle with making friends because I never had a stable enough life to have friends, but because I dont like bothering people. Or I just dont mesh well with them. It’s not me. It’s them. It’s not.

IT is.

I learned how to make excuses for my mistakes and my shortcomings. How to use them as a crutch to KEEP using them. It’s probably the only lesson he ever really taught me. How to be anything but yourself. Or myself, anyway.

As my cousin and I laid upstairs listening to my uncle tell him he had to leave, we found ways to drown the argument out. Mostly just by asking each other questions. I asked my cousin who he’d rather die first, my grandma or my grandpa. We both agreed grandpa. (and 4 years later, my grandma died first) and he asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up.

He wanted to be a professional football player, and I said, I want to be alive. He said, you will be.And I said, I don’t think so. If I live to be 30, I’ll be happy.

I was nine.

My dad didn’t encourage me to be anyone. Or anything. Not anything substantial. My dad didn’t really encourage me, period. Not because he didnt want me to be rich, or successful, or married to a nice woman. But, because he was always told he was a failure growing up. That’s all he ever expected to be. And, that’s all he knew how to be. At least for most of his life. And he didn’t know how to teach me to be anything else. He didn’t really know how to teach me anything.

I grew up not wanting to be anything, but knowing what I DIDNT want to be. Like him. Like anyone in my family. I didn’t have anyone to look up to, or model myself after, just relatives to hope I didn’t turn out like. How to model myself NOT to be like someone. Uncle D talks to himself. DONT wanna be like him. Aunt B can’t live without someone to support her, DONT wanna be like her. Uncle T is abusive, nope. Not him either.

My dad came upstairs, interupting our conversation and asked me if I wanted to stay at my uncles house, or come with him. But that if I stayed, He didn’t know how long it would be til I saw him again. As a nine year old, the choice was easy.

Sometime after 11pm, in late June, we left. We didn’t have a car. We didn’t have anywhere to go. And I didn’t ask as we were walking, where we were going, or how far away it was. Even then, I knew that he didn’t know.

We walked in the dark for what felt like hours, but I know it wasn’t.

I remember being so scared that I reached for his hand to hold onto, and instead he pulled it away. And moved ahead of me by about 8 feet. So I lurked behind him, in the darkness, trying to catch up, trying to feel safe, trying to stop crying.

I walked too slow, he’d later say during our time on the streets. I still walk too slow. And I absolutely hate it when someone I’m with walks ahead of me. But, I’ll do it to them without even noticing.

We eventually stopped at a park. It’s actually near where I live now. We slept on a bench there for a bit. Then we moved to the top level of this jungle gym type wooden structure, that had one open end of different sized logs made of wood that were used to climb to the top if you were a kid that liked climbing. In the middle of the night or very verye arly morning, I rolled off it in my sleep, hitting my back on every damn log on the way down. I was in pain for days. My back bruised terribly. But, I’d be alright he said. I needed to toughen up anyway.

I think a nearby neighbor must have heard me screaming from the pain, because a while later the cops came through the park with flashlights. My dad and I literally hid inside a random big bush to avoid being seen. And he hushed me repeatedly, demanding that I not make any noise, even though my back felt like it was broken.

And later, after the police search ended and they left, my dad told me no matter what I did, do not come out of that bush. If the cops found me in there, we’d go to jail. And he left me there.

I don’t know where he went for sure. I have no idea how long he was gone. But I cried the fear right out of myself.

Eventually he came back. Got me out of the bushes, and we walked further and further to an apartment complex off Alexis Road. It was on this walk that I noticed his demeanor was much different. Much more talkative. Much more paranoid. He was sweaty, and he stunk. He smelled like melted plastic mixed with burnt hair and car exhaust. A smell I’d grow quite used to. His eyes were wide as a motherfucker. And bloodshot. But, I didn’t really understand it all at the time. I could tell by the way he drug his tongue across his gumline over and over and over again, that he wanted something. Badly. But I was just too young to understand that he was craving another hit of his addiction.

We slept inside of an unlocked utility closet the rest of the wee hours. We shared space with a vacuum, a broom and dustpan, an old mop, and one of those industrial looking mop buckets on wheels that has that extra space for you to place the mop in, to squeeze the water out of it before using it. It was green. Maybe it was yellow. I’m colorblind. Fuck it.

We got busted in the early hours of the morning by the cleaning person, I think. Maybe it was a tenant. I’m not sure. They shoo’d us out of the closet, and if that isn’t a metaphor, or some foreshadowing for later in life, I don’t know what is.

That began our several days of homelessness, and several weeks of living with random people, in random places. Many things happened to me, and around me in this time. It truly changed my life. And not for the good.

It was a few years later, when I was finally able to answer the question, “what do you want to be when you grow up”.

I wanted to be a writer. Not because I read alot, or because I had a vivid imagination. But because I grew up knowing I was never going to be anyone. I was never going to go anywhere. So, if I could create my own world, I could be whatever I wanted. I could build a home for me and my father.

I could create a world where we had a perfect relationship. A perfect life. One where I didn’t have to wonder if I was loved, or even liked. One where we didn’t have to share a floor, let alone a bedroom, let alone a bed. One where we were safe. And happy. And most of all, where we didn’t have to pretend anymore. I could just make it up. And we could live there.

I could come up with it all, in my own little head, and help in my own little way. I could escape the nightmare I lived in, to a place where all my fears and all my issues that were popping up left and right, simply…did. not. exist.

It didn’t even have to be luxurious or lavish. Literally I just wanted to come up with a home. A place of ours. A place to belong to.

And sometimes looking back, I realize…

I spent too much time trying to create it in my head, that as an adult, I forgot to create it in real life. I grew up so used to trying to escape the terrible or traumatic things I was faced with, that I lived in whatever world I created for myself in my own mind.

I pretended, just like my dad pretended that things were better than they were. And I’ve been juggling that scenario of real life versus some sort of fantasy inspired safety net for my entire life since.

I look back at my life right now. And I wonder how much better off I’d have been if I’d have just stayed there, that first night. That first night that was the beginning of alot of the most traumatizing experiences in my life. (but, not all, or the worst!) And if I’d only been less afraid to be without my father, in that moment..It all might have been different.

I wonder if I’d not have wasted so much of my life trying to fix something inside myself, that I’m not responsible for breaking in the first place if maybe I wouldn’t feel like I’m 22. Maybe my mindset would be that of my actual age. Not the kid, just trying to find a make believe world to fit into.

Looking for someone to shelter my fears. Extinguish my insecurities. Calm my hysterics.

I search for that in every friendship and relationship that I value.

To trust in me, and understand why it’s so hard for me to trust in them. Because trust is a bridge that you build, to get you from one place to the next with another person. But, for so long I wasn’t in a place long enough to build anything. And when you’re only used to tearing down the remnants of an unfinished bridge as you move along, you never really get great building them in the first place, let alone maintaining them.

And now, in my adult life, I only gravitate towards those relationships (friend and otherwise) that can grab my hand, and lead me through the darkness.

To just.. walk with me, not ahead of me.

I speak of my own wisdom. My own solitude.

My own reinvention of the wheel.

I stand in my own prison. My own fortress.

My own Bastille.

I arm my own enemies. My own friends.

My own whatever is inbetween.

I’m the harbinger of my own maker. My own knight.

My own queen.

I rest in my own alcove. My own tower.

My own below.

I’m my own shadow. My own limelight.

My own show.

I’m my own stow away. My own give up some day.

My own appeal

I shutter my own darkness. My own brightness.

My own reveal.

I watch over my own shoulder. My own memories.

My own back.

I derail my own securities. My own accomplishments.

My own track.

I attack my own warriors. My own armaments.

My own war

I bleed on my own battlefield. My own throne.

My own floor.

I’m my own apology. My own sorrow.

My own gore.

I encourage my own downfall. My own destruction.

My own defeat.

I give myself my own run around. My own distance.

My own retreat.

I’m engulfed in my own creations. My own invention

My own concern.

I’m my own entrance. My own exit.

My own return

I surrender my own sanity. My own solace.

My own victory.

I fight my own Benedict. My own Brutus.

My own me.

I’m my own discomfort. My own contenment.

My own ideal.

I stand in my own prison. My own fortress.

My own Bastille.

As anyone reading this will know, This weekend the bar that I’ve worked at since 2006 will be closing its doors.

I wish I could tell you when it opened, how much money it’s made, (or lost lol) and fill this page with all these amazing stories of humanatarian causes that it’s helped. How much support it’s had over the years.

I can’t do that.

See, I’ve worked at a place that more often than not, has been frowned upon by the very community in which it serves. Unfairly, I’ll add. But, I’ll admit to being biased on that.

I wish I could tell you that it was all good times, that it was nothing but love and hard work.

I can’t do that either.

But, what I will tell you, is what this place has meant to me. Because, surely I could fill in some paragraphs about what it’s meant to others, and what it should mean, or could’ve meant. Blah blah blah. All I can really do is speak for me. And that’s what this is.

I started working at The Ripcord the last week of April in 2006. Exactly one week week before I turned 24 years old. I’d worked the five years prior to that at another gay bar right around the corner, called Caesars Showbar. And after my friendship with the manager deteriorated, I gathered the courage one night to say, “Enough”. And I quit. A week later the owner of Ripcord offered me a job. But, he didn’t have room for me. So, he decided to start opening on the morning shift. From 9 am, to 1pm. And since I needed a job, I agreed to work every single morning.

I did that for 5 weeks. And it was miserable. I hated getting up early, I hated being nice in the morning. I hated that the bar had rats, and with not enough people in at 9 am, the rats were like Girls Gone Wild in that piece. But, I did it. And I was ….popular. Especially at first.

I was younger than everyone else that worked there. I was decently attractive, made a good drink, knew how to have a good time, and didn’t take shit from anyone. And after those five weeks, I eventually got afternoon shifts. And those turned into night shifts. And that turned into more popularity.

I was good at my job. But, I had a sharp ass tongue. So people either loved me or hated me. A sentiment that’s always kind of stuck with me, and always will.

Everyone saw my hardwork at the bar. Everyone saw me happy. Or whatever my version of that was. But I wasn’t happy.

I was in turmoil. I battled with my self worth, my self respect. I was lonely, and empty. I felt weak, and not good enough.

I had zero relationships with anyone in my family. I had few friends. (But made up for quantity with quality) and, I didn’t have alot to really give a shit about.

Somewhere, along the way, I grew into someone that wasn’t that way.

The place gave me firm ground to stand on. A support system of customers who often became my closest friends. People that I loved dearly. People that I couldn’t understand how I lived without.

Sure, it also gave me alot of enemies, alot of haters, and a whole different set of issues and complexes. But, it gave me a place in the world. As miniscule as that may seem now, at the time…it was everything. The place gave me an adventure to escape to. A home to belong to. A family to be a part of.

And I absolutely fell in love with that.

A few years into it, the space next door that used to be Hooterville (another bar I worked at while working at Caesars) got turned into The Warehouse. Then it changed identities to a drag bar, and I picked the name.

Blush.

Blush became my bar. It was only open on the weekends. And I was the only bartender. Sometimes someone filled in for me, but it was pretty much me. IT was mine. It was a bar that featured drag, and I became a very prominent figure. But it struggled. It always struggled.

It had to fight the owners alcoholism and general lack of a business sense, a bad manager,(a string of them, if I’m being honest, but, most of them were people I cared about..)

It had to fight the community. Always looking at it as a dirty bar, a sleazy bar. A shithole. An old men’s bar. A place that never got support of the younger crowd, and while it sucked that it didn’t, I understood why.

Eventually, Blush and Ripcord were purchased by some guys. And Legends Showclub and Mojos was born.

The owners were gonna fix it up, turn it into a bar to be proud of. And they did. They tried.

But, it didn’t matter. I didnt need a palce to be proud of. I was already proud of the place. I just needed other people to be proud of it too.

And so, I set out to make sure that everyone that worked at Legends Showclub cared for it as much as I did. Or close. If someone didn’t, I used whatever I could to get rid of them. A tactic I have used since. Because, it isn’t just a bar for me. It was my baby. It was my Home.

And so it became that to everyone. We fought the communities opinions of it, we fought our own manager and the staff of Mojos too, whom always seem to want to close it, or sabotage it. Not because it wasn’t a good place, but because it was the busy side. Because we were taking the people from their side, and piling them in ours. We became like family too. But a much stronger connection.

And while it always had it’s share of drama, I always made sure it survived it.

I attacked anyone who tried to come for it. And shut that shit down. I worked to make it’s reputation something that people hated to love. Sure, not all people…and as the years went by, the struggles mounted. My frustration and anger with the bad rap it always got, and the drama that encircles it got the better of me. And my attitude got worse and worse.

The years added up. My roles changed. My position turned into not just a bartender. But a show director, and a confidant. Someone the owner could trust, because he knew that I would *ALWAYS* do my best to make sure it was taken care of. To make sure that we were making the right moves, the right decisions, the right hires. I gained a position of respect from how long I’d been there, and the lengths in which I’d go to keep it going as best I could.

And I did. I did everything I could. Everything I had to.

And it wasn’t always easy. It meant breaking the hearts of people I cared about. It meant lashing out at friends, or non friends. It meant drinking when I didnt want to, just to make it more money. It meant taking on the community favorites. It meant alienating my coworkers becasue they weren’t right for it. They weren’t good for it.

It meant I was the bad guy. Maybe I didn’t need to be, but its kind of what happened. And I sacrificed the better parts of myself, unrealizingly, to make the decisions that needed to be made. Sometimes I had a personal agenda behind it too, but most of the time, everything I did, ws to help it. To make it bigger, better, more successful, more reputable. More…everything. More than it was. More than it should have been.

And noone did that like I did. Noone could have. And noone would have. It was never as important to others as it was to me. And maybe part of that reason is because I grasped onto it so tightly that noone else COULD.

My good hearted, caring and sarcastically playful personality turned bitchier and bitchier, and part of that was me, part of that was the place and the situations it always found tiself in. The poor decisions. The, everything.

In December, the owner that I’d built a pretty solid relationship with, went to jail. And since then, the dominoes have fallen one by one.

A few weeks ago, I learned that the bar will be closing. A slew of bad situations and unfortunate events meant not only was one side getting the boot, but the other side was sold from underneath our nose.

Our owner swears to me; to all of us, that he’s going to relocate it. And I hope that is true. I think that is true, but…I also know the history of the place. The bad luck it’s always carried, the bad juju that’s always followed it. The part of me that knows how much it’s always struggled wonders why anyone would want to invest money into a place, or an idea, or a family such as our little dysfunctional one. And, to most, it doesn’t make sense.

Why would anyone want the struggle of it all?

But, it does make sense to me. Because it means something to me. And I know it means something to most of the amazing team that works there now. A team I can’t take full credit for, but one I can take alot of credit for. A team I’ve been so honored to get to know, and enjoy, and love.

But, that’s easy for me to say. I mean, it isn’t my hundreds of thousands of dollars. It isn’t my families fortune at risk.

I see the potential in it, just like I always have. But, I can’t pretend to guess what potential someone else sees in it, and if they’d be willing to put their life on the line for it like I have. I can only hope.

I hope for a future for what this bar could have been. For what it can still be, just somewhere else.

I see what it means to some of the people that come there, some of the people that work there. What it means to me.

I see hope in that. I see love in that. I feel love, in…that.

But, my heart also breaks that after this weekend, the 14 years of memories I have there….are over.

But, what gives me solace is that, while it may be over it’s not gone.

For so long I’ve held onto the place. I’ve held onto the dreams I’ve had, to run it. The dreams I’ve had, to see it succeed. The dreams Iv’e had, to finally see a community embrace it, like it embraced me.

For so long I said, that place needs me. What will it do without me?

The year I left was honestly, the worst year the bar had had. But, im smart enough to know that that was much more than just me. Much, much more.

The bar can survive without me, cuz it has an amazing team of people that care about it like I did. Not like I do, because…theres just no way they can compare to the time and tears I’ve put into the place. But, like I did, while I was getting to this place.

For so long I said that place needs me. But I learned, that I needed it.

I needed it for myself. For my ego, for my lonliness, for my depression, for my alcoholism. For my personality. For my social awkwardness.

I needed it, for me.

And, as I told a friend….I don’t need it anymore.

It was literally my own little Yellow Brick Road. And I followed it, all the way to my own little Emerald city. And my own little wizard that bestowed upon me the gifts that I so desperately needed.

A brain. To teach me that isn’t about being the smartest, but using the intellect and street smarts that you posses, combined… to make the wisest, most logical and intelligent decisions in whatever scenario you find yourself in.

Courage. To embolden me to not only speak up for myself, but others too. To stand up for what’s right, even when it’s not popular. And to be the person that people can come to, to get what needs to be done, done. No matter how difficult or unpopular it might be.

A heart. To give me the ability to love myself, and to love others. To love a place and a group of people that would probably not even speak to me,if it weren’t for the place. And to not be afraid of or ashamed to express those feelings. Not to friends, not to my partner, and not to myself.

A home. A home to remember. To cherish. To treasure. To literally, go back to at any time. Whether in a new location, or just in my memories.

It has literally changed me. It’s made me a better person, a stronger person. A smarter person.

A fucking kinder person.

And I’m so eternally grateful for all the time Ive spent there. All the friends I’ve made. All the enemies too! (lol) All the moments I’ve shared. All the burdens I’ve buried.

It has sculpted my life. It has made me more than I was before. And I certainly wasn’t expecting that when I first started.

I say goodbye this weekend with love in my heart, hope for the future, and contentment. Contentment that I did everything I could.

And I’d do it again, and again, and again.

Whether it was called Hooterville, or Ripcord. The Warehouse or Blush. Mojos or Legends….it has left me a better person for reasons that even I cant exactly understand. And my heart is so full of love, respect, and fond memories in those buildings… that can never be taken away, erased or replaced.

And if it made anyone else feel remotely close to any of that….I’m so honored to have played a role in it for them.
And, if I played a role in a negative feeling that you have or had about it, I’m honored to have been the villain that you needed to be angry with too.

I hope that my legacy in the community doesn’t end here. I hope that I can continue to show a different side of me. A better side of me. The real..side of me.

The side that isn’t wrapped up in the drama and the competitiveness. The hate, and the divisiveness. The shade and the tea.

(but I also wont fail to acknowledge that some of that IS me.)

The side that the bar helped nurture, but that I chose to withhold because I just didn’t know how to be anything else.

I, along with a slew of very important people to me, will say goodbye this weekend. We say goodbye, not truly knowing if its for now, for good, or just for this part of things.

But we will say goodbye the best way we know how.

By being. Fucking. Legendary.

In the months leading up to the 2016 election I, like most everyone else, didnt look at Donald Trump as a viable option. I thought the notion of him being president was so ridiculous that literally anyone could run against him and win.

Why?

I mean…because he’s Donald Trump.

While I’d never hated Trump before, he was never someone I was like Oh. YAY. LOVE HIM.

He was the host of the Apprentice. Thats all he was to me. That’s all he should have been.

As the election approached, and now as its long over with, he became something more than that.

Now, I fucking despise him with my entire being.

Hes crazy. He’s a sociopath. Mentally unstable. Professionally unstable. Emotionally fucking unstable.

He’s embraced  and enhanced this idea that America does not need to be united. He’s put forth this message that anyone who doesn’t agree with him, anyone who doesn’t believe as he believes is wrong. Or bad. Or evil.

Most of his followers are uneducated and naive, so they sop up his crazy talk with a spoon. And, as someone who sits on the opposite side of his beliefs…(or, his political party anyway.  I do not believe he believes in the Republican values. Simply that he knew the Republican base would elect him.)

It’s sick. It’s sad. But mostly, its fucking depressing that a racist, misogynistic, pedophile supporter can become president of the greatest country in history.

I’m not sure what happened. How we got here.

But I know it starts with old, white men. And their fears of a black man being president, and the majority population slipping from white to other.

Instead of finding an upstanding guy, who can try to bring us together like Obama did (however failed, because…See Above) they found the worst possible guy.  And in his imperfection, it’s allowed others who possess his same qualities and beliefs to speak their mind.

Our nation is no longer one of  liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but  of segregation and the idea that anyone different, or anyone willing to stand up to the cookie cutter notions of how our country should be run should be ostracized and attacked.

I truly fear the future.

His followers are so nasty, so in your face with insults and dialogue that pits us against one another.

Everyone is like. YAY LETS WIN the midterms and impeach him. And im like…ummm…is that a good idea?

His people are batshit crazy. They want to spit and fight and point out the things about you that they don’t approve of, or that “god doesnt approve of”. It’s a mob mentality.

Its  a time with racial tensions so high that white people are calling the cops on black people because they see them with two children and think they are kidnappers.  Where black men are shot in their homes for no reason other than a white woman went into the wrong apartment and got scared thinking a black man was in her home.

As a white person, as just a fucking person…. im ashamed. but, I’m also afraid.

Afraid of whats gonna be left of our country when this regime is finished.

Afraid of what will be left to bridge together, after 4 (or god forbid 8) years of this downward slope of hating each other for what they aren’t, rather than loving them for what they are.

I cant say that I’m innocent. Or that my side is either. We’re guilty too. Not to the same degree, but  close. The difference is our attacks are based on not understanding how the other can be so hateful and divisive. Or how the other side can just accept pussy grabbing, sexual assault,  mocking disabilities, taking away peoples rights, trying to destroy health care and medicare. Or seperating illegal or legal immigrants from their families, and giving away their children to Americans as if its okay because “they don’t belong here.” How family and friends can vote for someone who stands against everything you are, or everything that’s right. (granted, “right” is subjective) Decency is right. Acceptance is right. Love is right. Compassion, Understanding. They’re right. Whatever this has all become wrong.

And the the truth is, none of us fucking belong here.

We’ve ruined what was supposed to be  new world. A place to welcome everyone. A melting pot. And now it’s this place of me versus you. Left versus Right. Blue versus Red. White versus black. Men versus women.

Its not all Donalds fault. He didnt make his people who they are. He’s just given them the ability to speak on it. He’s given them the platform. the free pass. And in the process decredited anyone who tries to challenge him.  The media. Hollywood. Foreign leaders.He attacks his opponents. and, (alleged) sexual assault survivors.

And then we all watch as the citizens on his side attack those same people. And we’ve no choice but to sit back and watch.  To stand and  listen to these hateful fucks talk about making America Great Again.

America has always been great. Flawed, but great.

However the stain over our nation, and our history due to this presidency will be felt for years. We will have to make it great again.

But it wont be happening while Trump is president. And, thats just the truth. Right wingers will never admit it, at least not anytime soon. However, I do believe that History will show that these moments now were the worst time for modern day America.

I sincerely hope theres a great man, somewhere, inspired by the hatred and anger of this regime, who will take over this great land, and return it to dignity. Return it to respect, and love, and freedom  and liberty FOR ALL.

I hope that my old ass is around for that America. Because the politics of the one we are in now, is so shady, and screwed up, that it’s going to take a hell of a lot of revamping to make it work again.

My early vote? Joseph Kennedy III. That man speaks with passion, and love. and inclusion. I really hope I have the honor of voting for him one day., Because he is the type of leader we need.

Not this roley-poley motherfucker these redneck racists (and russians!) elected.

Our politics were once cutting edge. The type of government people in other nations would give their lives to be a citizen of.

Now,  we all desire to be a part of that again.

And, while i do think we will get back there. Watching us walk away from it in the first place is  devastatingly heartbreaking.

Fuck. Donald. Trump.

 

 

 

 

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Another lock me up and throw away the key.

A bitchslap, a pimpsmack, a “what in the fuck did you just do?”

A heartbreak, a pindrop, a “fuck  me and a fuck you too.”

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Another get what you put in.

The final line, the one more time,  a “well at least I’m not the only one.”

The end of an era, the means to an end, a”well thats finally fucking done.”

 

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Another silence I never achieve.

A purposeful mistake, a “whoopsie!”, a “no way thats getting in”

A “been there!”,  A  “done that!”, a “never going back again!”

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Another “go to fucking hell.”

 

The moment of doubt, the piece of your mind,  a “well…I dont fucking  care”

The other side, the inbetween,  A part of you left bare.

 

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Another “you’re full of fucking shit.”

A  uh huh, a yeah, yeah, yeah, a I’ve heard this all before.

A drip drip drip, a tweet tweet tweet, a “kiss my ass!” and slam the door.

 

Life always seems to silence me.

Until it fucking doesn’t.