Spinning in the Abyss

He needs to leave. He's been down this path before so many times and knows the outcome if he stays. If he stays he gets to go through the ritualistic process of self loathing, of panic, of helplessness. He tries to bring those past emotions and thoughts to the forefront of his mind now. "Just continue to think and walk...and breathe", he tells himself. He believes he is logical, that he is rational and responsible. He believes he can use this logic to overcome his addiction; his responsibility will ultimately balance out his impulse.

He is walking now, but he doesn't know where to. His steps are purposeful and ones conditioned out of routine, his feet know where to take him. His mind is on auto pilot now, perfectly aligned with his steps; they never let him down. They know what it is that he needs.

He's there, standing in front of it and laughing on the inside how could he ever fear something so trivial? He is in front of the roulette wheel, where he needed yo be. Why would he he ever want to walk past it and deny himself the emotional ecstasy? He is self assured, he is on top of the world and feels at home; he is high. His feet never let him down.

As soon as he takes his seat the feeling of anticipation and adrenaline wash over him. It's cleansing and powerful. His senses are elevated, heightened in a way he imagines a predatory animal is before the hunt. He takes out his money and places itin front of the attendant. As she reaches for it, he flashes her a smile and asks for nickels. He is happy because iswhere he needs to be, he knows the terminology and etiquette so that nothing feels or looks out of place. He is elated, happier than he has been in days and overwhelmed with purpose.

Placing his bets on the table he is focused and deliberate. The call for final bets is ushered out by the croupier and the tiny polished ball is released in a vicious spin as it orbits the wheel in spectacular fashion. The fifteen seconds it takes the ball to finally lose momentum and fall into one of the thirty-eight possible spaces feels feel like fifteen hours. His heartbeat is racing, he doesn't even breathe. He just needs to watch it spin with a singular focus, trying to will it to stop in one of "his" spaces. It taunts him and evades the spots he had so carefully bet on. He hates this wheel, this game, these people that suffocate him and his purpose, but he stays because, after all, it's only a matter of time before he scores a huge winning hit.

Reaching into his wallet seems effortless and automated and more money is converted into clay currency. Just rinse and repeat, another loss and another loss. He needs to bet bigger, surely the next spin will be the winner; he has to win it back.

Everything is blurry and out of focus and individual actions go unnoticed, he can only recognize the ball spinning, and with its spinning it carries his very purpose. How long has he been holding his breath? Twenty seconds? A minute? Three? His chest hurts but maybe it's the adrenaline. Everyone must be able to hear his heart pumping in his chest.  His demeanor has changed. His look is stern, his posture aggressive. The glimmer in his eye replaced with a look of malice, and as the ball finally comes to stop in one of his spaces, he barely recognizes it or cares. There is no rush of excitement or celebration for winning his money back. He deserved to win the entire time; the fact it has taken so long is an annoyance. "Keep betting, win more." He thinks because the game owes him that much. He can't be content with this win when there are several more to come. It would be a disservice to himself if he left now.

Each bet is bigger than the last and each spin brings the familar result of losing. He continues to reach in his wallet for more so long as there is more to supply him. His mind is shut off now. He can't compute. He can't think. He doesn't want to feel. More than anything he wants to be left without feeling. Feeling hurts too much.

Deep down, part of him knows the truth: that staying was never about winning more, that it was about losing it all. He needs to lose it all because it's the only thing more powerful than winning. Only when he has lost it all can he be free from everything that binds and restricts him. Winning means progress and it means continuing with the plan he set out for. Winning means more thinking and saving and responsibility and change. He can continue to work towards starting over.

Losing is what he wanted all along. It's safe and familiar. Then there is nothing to work towards, nothing to save for, no stress, no pain, just nothing. He wants to be free. When there is nothing left in his wallet and no chips in front of him he knows he has accomplished what he set out for. He is completely numb, he can't feel, he can't think, there is nothing.

Prestige Worldwide Presents: In Loving Memory

What's the expression? "Bad press is better than no press"? "Negative Attention is still attention"? "It's better to be memorable than forgettable"? Welcome to the world of Siobhan McDonough Chrisos, because any combination of those would be more than adequate in describing the attitude and attributes of my late mother. It's pretty well documented I can't spell and leave countless typos; however, the spelling of my mother's name is actually right. I can't count the number of times I picked up the home phone in my youth while someone asked to speak to "Sio-Ba-han" or "Sio-Ban" or even the very popular "Su-Hoban". You would have thought my mother was the descendant of Ghengis Khan from the way people butchered her name. So, for educational purposes, it's pronounced "Sha-Von".

I miss my mom, I really do. I have a strange way of showing it considering I never write about her and hardly ever talk about her, but it's hard for me to describe someone with a personality as complex as hers. The phrase, "Just try your best" is normally reserved for seven year old kids who suck at soccer but need some encouragement along the way. Normally, successful parenting requires more than trying, executing is preferred, but most of my mother's parenting approach was trial and error. Giving sound counsel, instruction, discipline, etc requires an organized mind, a systematic long term approach and clarity. Those weren't things my mom possessed in large quantities. Instead, she was manic and fragile, unabashed and brazen. She was funny yet chaotic, loving yet fiercely dependent. She was overwhelmed and under prepared for what it took to be a functional mom, but looking back I truly do see she "tried her best" whatever capacity that may have been in.

It's strange to me that in less than two years, I will have gone a third of my life without her. It will be even stranger when the day arises in which I've lived the majority of my life with her gone. I don't know what the nature of my relationship with her would be now if she was still here, yet I don't really dwell on it or speculate about it much. What I do have is an abundance of memories of her. These are some of those memories, they may come across as if I am painting a negative picture of her, and hell, maybe I am. But to me, these memories make me smile. They are just "Siobhan" in all her glory.

1. I once had a beetle crawl out from the inner cannals of my ear. That sucked. My mom didn't place it in there though; however, that was probably the second most traumatizing event as it relates to my ear. When I was six years old I was getting a haircut from some haircutting chain and as they were trimming around my ear the woman (God bless her) accidently cut my ear with the trimmer. She did not cut my ear off, nor did she perform a "Mike Tyson" and get the urge to bite my ear off. She probably doesn't like the taste or texture of cartilage. She simply nicked my ear a little. At the time it was 1994 and apparently my mother thought AIDS was rampant in inner Boston and that I would contract it from the equipment. Understandable if I was getting my haircut in Nigeria, not so much in the coastal US. When she noticed my ear was cut, she starting screaming "you nicked him! you nicked him!". So, she did what any nurturing and rational mom would do....she pulled me out of the chair, left the haircutting place, dragged me into the local grocery store walked right into the chemical aisle and poured bleach directly into my wound as well as in my ear. Just walked right in, opened a thing of bleach and in my ear it went. If you've never had bleach poured in or around your ear consider yourself lucky. May have been a tad overkill, but damnit I was sanitized. Naturally I use bleach alternative detergent now.

2. My mother loved thunderstorms. I know a lot of people that really feel at ease in the midst of a storm. The rain is soothing to them and provides a calming effect. Other people consider it a form of controlled chaos and relish in that. I remember a few different occassions when it would storm being home with my mom and sister. Looking at the rain is cool. Listening to it is even cooler. Opening up every window in the house, the door and shouting that Jesus is coming back...traumatizing. The left behind books weren't out yet. I didn't know the signs. I thought my mom was a meteorologist prophet. She would just stare outside as the rain came pouring in saying it was the Rapture. Really, because it just looked overcast to me. I just wanted to cover up my Sega Genesis so it didnt get wet. I always wonder if she was disappointed when the storm subsided and Jesus didn't appear in our front yard holding an umbrella.

3. Speaking of rain....one of the fundamental lessons of my youth was "to always wear a raincoat". I think I heard this expression in excess of three hundred times from the time I was seven till I was fifteen. You'd think my mom was really concerned about me getting wet and catching a fever, but this actually was a sweet 90's reference for using a condom. "Make sure you always wear a raincoat!" I think I learned about sex before I learned addition and subtraction. I certainly learned about contraceptives. Hell yeah my mom was about safe sex, but at eight years old I didn't necessarily understand the significance of wrapping my penis in a neon water protectant layer. Even when I was old enough to grasp it fully, she would still urge me on with raincoat references. If I'm ever having sex in a flood I think I will finally appreciate the reference.

4. Some of my favorite memories of my mom are ones where I think of when I saw her happy. Too often she was somber, locked away in her room for hours sleeping and fighting the battle of depression. If she was up she was often glossy eyed, sipping on some boxed wine or drinking beer, closed off from the world and her children. But there were times she was free spirited and sober, energetic and glowing. I might come downstairs to witness her dancing away in the kitchen, the sounds of the Temptations or Marvin Gay literally blasting away in the background as she stood smiling encouraging me to join in. She would leave me cards randomly on my bed apologizing for her mistakes, promising to get better and calling me "her knight in shining armor".  We bonded and connected over TV soap operas and American Idol, cups of strong coffee and conversations about hats as the best accessories. Hats were to my mother what clocks are to Flavor Flav. She had one for every occasion. Cowboy hats? Check. Baseball hats? Check. Dude hats? Check. Wait, what is a dude hat? http://uncrate.com/stuff/kangol-herringbone-cap/ That is a picture of a gay man wearing a "dude hat". That's the name dubbed by my mother, don't you dare tell me that, is not in fact, comonly referred to as a "dude hat". She wore bandanas, big poofy hats, pointy hats. Fuck, my mom had more hats than the Cat in the Hat. It was the simplest of things that are the fondest of memories.

5. My mother had an innate fear of technology. As a result, she didn't get on the whole technology bandwagon. As a result, she had no idea how to work a modern computer. I think she got a sense of pride out of telling everyone she knew that she was "computer illiterate". She always told me that at some point I would have to teach her how to use one. "Well, the first step is you plug it in. The second step is that you turn this thingy on. You see this here? It's called a mouse. No, it's not a real mouse, you use it to navigate the screen." I didn't know how to teach anyone anything because to me it was so simple. But she was persistent and claimed I was the only one with the patience to teach her, we made tenative plans on a number of occassions but never went through with it. To this day, it actually makes me sad to think I never got to teach her to use one before she died.

6. I think it really pleased my mom when I got my first girlfriend, but mostly because it put her at ease that I wasn't, in fact, gay. It wasn't uncommon that my mom would confide in my sister that she thought I was gay. So seeing me with a girl really probably put her mind at ease. Or maybe she was disappointed, who knows. She certainly was no stranger to having gay friends, and wasn't one to judge their lifestyle at all. She was the type of person a gay man loves having as a best friend to go shopping with or gossip to. I think she just always wanted to be the really cool mom of the boyfriend to whoever I was dating. The hip and young mom who could be easily befriended and trusted. She would talk to me late at night asking about my relationship, giving me pointers on the female perspective and always seemingly genuinely interested in what was happening. Going back to the gay thing....I mean, I think I'm just going to have to deal with the fact that I'm one of those guys that people might assume is gay at certain points. I dress nice, work out a lot, spend a lot of time with guys that also do these things, I take a certain pride in personal hygiene. I've kind of just accepted this, but my mom also had some other weird ideas about activities I was involved in. I remember being thirteen and her just telling me I also smelled like pot or her telling my sister she thought I was smoking weed. I thought I smelled of axe deodorant body spray, I certainly had the entire lineup. Maybe I smelled like Tide Fresh Meadows laundry detergent or the smell of thirteen year old boy, but marijuana????? I had a lot of mechanical pencils in my pockets, not joints. I'm in my room playing video games, not packing a bowl. Oh well.....perception sometimes alluded her, or she just assumed the worst.

When I think of her, truly sit and think of her there are so many things that come to mind that I could fill countless pages with. Maybe I will one day, but these are just some. Despite her flaws and quirks, she loved me. Maybe she confided in me too much, relied on me in roles I shouldn't have had as a young boy, but she loved me whole heartedly. It's scary living a life with one parent. Always living in anxiety of losing the other and remembering the one that was lost. I don't know what it means to live a life that would make her proud, but she inspires me. She inspires me to love, and to smile, and to let loose and be free. She inspires me to live up to my potential like she wanted me to and to achieve things she couldn't do, and do it all in loving memory of her.

Prestige Worldwide Presents: How to Hang with a Leprechaun

Is it still St Patricks day? I can't entirely remember. I normally go about my life in a manner that would make the people close to me proud of my actions. I can't say I always accomplish this, but I try to live a pretty respectable life for the most part. People definitely think I engage in wild and frenzied drinking festivities more than I do. But when it comes to St Patricks day I go about my day in a manner that would make my Irish heritage proud. It's not that I enjoy getting wasted, but it's certainly my responsibility to uphold.

The first time I decided to really "give it a go" on St Patricks was two years ago. The thought of drinking anything that doesn't end in juice before 10am really upsets me. It was definitely a first chugging some ales and stouts on a train headed to the city at nine in the morning. Without going into too much detail, the quality of the day can be summised by letting everyone know that night I ended up sleeping on the top of a building in Chicago. Normally the tops of buildings aren't indoors. This was no exception. Normally March in Chicago was cold..this was colder. Normally people don't step on you while you are attempting to sleep, unfortunately people thought I was some type of blanket covered step...oh wait, I didn't have a blanket.

For St Patricks day this year, I wanted to take it to a whole different level. I wasn't sure of the events that would take place during the day, only that I wanted the night to end with me alone and naked in a field huddled next to a dog of some type. I wanted to pass out and awaken in my store the following morning, wearing a freshly pressed and tailored suit with a small note in the pocket simply reading: "You're welcome." So I was aiming high, but I've never been one to set an unreasonable goal.

As a side note really quick....I'm certain I've had alcohol poisoning before. Some times people tell me they've had alcohol poisoning and I was with them the entire night and they had 6 drinks. Nope, you actually have "inability to hold your liquor poisoning". One of the first times I drank I was 17, maybe 18 and pretty dumb (so you can see not much has changed except my age). And on this lovely evening, me and the girlfriend at the time thought it would be an excellent decision to get drunk together at her friends apartment. My friend bought me a handle of vodka, I, of course, supplied the lemonade and cranberry juice because I'm classy, and someone provided the cups. After 18 vodka lemonades its hard to remember much, and even harder to stand, but needless to say I alone accounted for over half the handle in roughly 2 hours. I woke up naked....wait for it....(not in a field sadly) but in my girlfriend's friend's apartment bathroom covered in throw up and surrounded by towels. To say I felt like death would make dying sound too easy and painless. I was beyond sick for like 2 days. I actually came home, and my father (who didn't know I had been out drinking...hi dad) asked me to mow the yard. I don't think that is anything in the world I would have dreaded to do more at that point then push a device with blades through my backyard in 95 degree heat. My body wasn't producing sweat. I was sweating vodka lemonades, which might have been refreshing it someone wanted to lick me, but I smelled like a shot of Pinesol. I ended up sleeping for two days straight and dry heaving countless times.

Side note #2: The actual St Patrick was not Irish, but rather, English. That is beyond frustrating.

The reason I referenced side note #1 is that for St Patricks day this year I wanted get as close to that point as possible without dying or ending up in jail. Here is a recap of the day.

Side note #3: the day before I was at the gym and didn't go to bed till 6am. Win!!

9:00am- Rise and Shine. Take a green shower. Scrub body with Leprechaun blood. (0% drunk)

10:00am- Drive around for 30 minutes trying to find Toyota of Naperville because there is nothing more traditionally Irish then getting a free oil change. (0% drunk)

11:00am- At the mall with Greg searching for some green attire to wear. Try to buy 10 loaves of Irish soda bread at Panera, settle for two muffins and a green shirt from Express. (0% drunk)

11:30am- Driving to pick up Gary. Stop off at liquor store to purchase a fifth of Jameson and a fifth of the least Irish drink I could think of..pirate rum: Captain Morgan. Apparently Jack Sparrow is joining us today. (0% drunk)

12:30pm- We have picked up Greg, secured the cargo and are sitting across the street from Bally Doyle in the Hollywood Casino parking lot. Start pregaming with the two bottles (5% drunk)

1-5pm- Rotating between Bally Doyle and the parking garage consuming Irish car bombs, Guinness stout, Miller alluminum pints, and Jameson and Pirate Rum. The following events take place within this time frame:

A) old couple drive through parking garage horrified that one of us is peeing in a corner.
B) somewhat attractive woman gets very angry when I ask her to take a picture of me and my friends
C) people wearing suits (and they weren't green mind you) start discussing their portfolios, horse racing, and playing polo. They also try to make fun at us. I say try because you can't discuss polo and make fun of someone successfully.
D) Greg is nearly abducted by a very large and frightening woman. Difficult to say whether she wanted to keep him as food or a sex slave.
E) Some man is wearing the same shirt as me and starring at me angrily as if now I have ruined his chances at picking up women.
(45% drunk)

5:00pm- We get kicked out of the parking garage and our remaning pirate rum is taken.

5:30pm- Get picked up by someone sober (although I'm still sober, the law would argue otherwise) and head to St Charles.

6:00pm- My companions are pretty well maxed out; I don't blame they, they simply aren't Irish and didn't start the morning ritual of Leprechaun blood. I however, think I will order some car bombs and a pitcher of green beer. (80% drunk)

8:00pm- We arrive back to my apartment. Gary is passed out or dead. Either way he is better off on Greg's bed and if need be we will worry about the body later. I realize despite the amount of liquor I have consumed, I have been pacing myself too much. Starting to realize the night will not end in a field. I am sobering up (65% drunk -15%)

8:30pm- Go back to Ballydoyle to meet up with Javy. (60% drunk -5%)

side note #4: Gary told Javy to meet us at Ballydoyle at like 5. He never told him we left. Javy has been waiting and is angry face. I am sober and sober face.

9:00pm- Us three head over to the Roundhouse for some more drinks and annoying music. I may possibly change into a kilt. I order a water. Greg and I get into a fight as he claims no one has purchased him drinks today...everyone has purchased him drinks. (50% drunk. 100% frustrated)

10pm- Greg and I head to Fox and Hound to meet up with two friends who happen to be women. I drink lightly as I have given up on my night and failed my Irish heritage. (60% drunk)

1130pm- I am home and in bed sooner than I expected. I substitute my pillow for cabbage; I don't deserve a pillow tonight. I am safe, fully clothed, and entirely disappointed.

Prestige Worldwide Presents: Das Blogging for Idiots

I haven't blogged in so long that I legitimately forgot my password. It just took me three hours to log in, and I even had to resort to the whole, "forgot my password" link on the homepage; the one where they realize I'm an idiot and have to email me a link to recover my precious passkey.  Why is it that blogger.com is more encrypted and has more security settings than my online banking website? Blogger.com does not, and I repeat, does not fuck around. God forbid someone hacked this thing and started blogging under the pretense that they were me. Then my blog might actually adhere to certain grammatical principles that I ignore...like punctuation. But seriously, I just went through a six sequence verification process to obtain my password.

Step 1: Email Address- check
Step 2: Security Question-   ...is it just me, or am I the only person who doesn't pay any attention to the security question at the initial set up of the account. Normally, there is a little drop down box where I can select one from a preset selection of four or five. I'm sorry, but I don't pay attention because none of them pertain to me. The question, "What was your first pet horse's name?" does not apply to me, sorry guys. And no, I didn't go with, "In which zip code territory did your first house reside in?" or the ever popular, "Who was your first grade teacher's name...and what was his/her sexual orientation?". I went to the first grade for one week, realized I was a shy 6 year old kid who could not handle a class of more than 5 children and my parents opted to put me in a class called "transitional". No one believes this story, but it is true. I technically am a grade behind. My transitional class was supposed to be a "transition" (go figure) between kindergarten and first grade. It consisted of like four of us in the class, and I have no idea what we did. I can't for the life of me think of any work that somehow would me more challenging for a kindergarten student yet too easy for a first grader. More or less, I think it just shaped us for social interaction. Needless to say, the security question phase is always a challenge. Ten minutes later, and something to do with the grocery store aisle my dad was born in, I'm on to step 3.

Step 3: Password-  So blogger.com, what you're saying is that in the process of trying to obtain my password, I need to tell you my password. Mind you, it wasn't asking for a new password. It was asking for THE password. ....is it the word password? Otherwise, I don't know. It took me ten minutes to figure out there was small font at the bottom of the screen explaining I had initially selected the "forgot user name" option rather than "forgot password". Actually it looks like: "forgot password?" There is always that obnoxious question mark at the end taunting you a little bit for forgetting it. I always read it out loud and emphasize a very snotty tone at the end where the huge question mark is. This question mark immediately puts me in a bad mood. Normally, I would have given up here. No blog is worth going through that security question section again, but it's times like these I think of my fans. My fans are a lot like the fans of the character "Bad Blake" in the movie "Crazy Heart". They don't have a lot of teeth and they can be accounted for using one hand to count them. Rather than demanding drunkenly slurred country lyrics such as "funny how falling feels like flying...at least for a little while." they demand my incoherent words on their high resolution screens. So with the fans in mind ;) I had to press on and after answering some question about the anatomy of a squirrel fetus, I advance to step 4.

Step 4: IQ test- I immediately wonder if this is being graded on a curve. Is there a certain score I need to achieve to continue and get my password? They don't really say; it's incredibly cryptic. I don't remember taking an IQ test at the set up of the account, but after hosting several of my blogs, I'm sure the website simply understands I'm stupid and formulates it's own score. I figure if I score higher than 78 I'm probably good to go. If I need to score higher than the website itself, I'm probably screwed. Kind of like playing chess against the super computers who were specifically designed to play chess. I never understood that. They take the world champion grandmaster chess player and have him play the computer program that was designed to be better than him. The chess player had learned to play the game through repetition, studying, theory, and innate ability and uncanny ability to think several moves ahead. The computer was programmed to do this instantly and can...compute infinite moves ahead. (that's called a random rant...enjoy). After a few questions into the test, I feel very confident. So far the most challenging question has been something along the lines of, "Which of the following does not belong in the group below?" My four image choices are an adult man, an adult woman, a small child, and a dinosaur. I somewhat confidently select the small child. The dinosaur looked like an adult species, I figure evolutionists created the test and I am in line with their thinking on this one. I remember reading somewhere dinosaurs were the predecessors to adults and fish were the species most responsible for children...or they were delivered by storks. My results do not post in the form of a numerical score, but rather a large font display of, "Based on the submitted results, we cannot release the temporary hold on your account. Would you like to retake the questionnaire?". Arrogant bastards. Have the audacity to call it a questionnaire. I read up on the conception of children and choose to retake the "test". I either pass with flying colors, or the website doesn't have the heart to tell me I'm incredibly dumb and let's me continue out of sympathy.

Step 5:  Social Security Number- At least it's a question I know off hand. I've never been more excited to have someone steal my identity and open credit cards under my name.

Step 6: Select New Password- Could it be this easy? Do I pick something only I can remember, or should I just make it "password"....i go with that option.

At this point I think I am done. I am expecting to return to the home page and enter in my username  and my password of password and start blogging about Christmas, New Years, Father Daughter time, etc. I can't wait...I should have waited. There's a step 7.

Step 7: Word Verification Word Box Thing- This is easily the most frustrating thing on the internet. I cannot understand what it was intended for other than to make people scream and break their monitors. It is the section that we have all seen so many times where the website asks us to type in the two words that appear on the screen in the text box. Sounds easy enough, the issue is the two words aren't even words at all. They aren't decipherable anything. They are literally Egyptian symbols in the strangest font. They are always upside down and a mix of color, size, and variety. Sometimes there is just a picture of a chicken. I can't type that in; I don't have my keyboard calibrated for chicken. If I get it wrong then it presents me with two "words" exponentially more difficult to decipher. Sometimes it's Latin, sometimes its the writing they used in transformers, sometimes it's geometry shapes, but it's never two words. Is this part of the challenge...or rather.. a continuation of the IQ test? Does the creator of these things know the words cannot be accurately typed in or replicated and just test our will to continue? Maybe it's a lateral thinking exercise. I sit deep in thought about it for several minutes and finally decide to type "fuck you" into the boxes and press continue. It grants me my wish and I have now reset my password.

I conquered the unconquerable. I've expertly displayed mind over matter and passed the most difficult test I've had to date. I'm on the home page again ready to log in....wait, what's my user name again?

Prestige Worldwide Presents: Letters to John Doe (Part 1)

Dear Anonymous,

There isn't a person in my life who I love or respect more. Not unlike many people who know you intimately, I admire you so much. However, I feel like my admiration for you is deeper rooted than most. I've seen and shared in much of the adversity you have. It's the type of adversity and dysfunction that makes people question their very self worth. I saw you question many things for many years. I saw you struggle with inner demons and battles that would have broken most..that I thought had almost broken you. And while you would probably be the first to admit you don't have the answer to every question or the solution to every problem, the balance you have achieved now in your personal life is something so inspiring to see. It's always tough living in your shadow. We are so much alike, I often view you as a better version of me. One not so rough around the edges, a version able to adhere to basic principles I struggle with, issues of ego, morality, common sense. I've never really been worried with "letting people down" with the exception of you. I sometimes think the world is judging me through your very eyes. When I truly stop and think about it, I know it isn't judgment that resonates through your eyes, it's unconditional love. I love you. The greatest way I could thank you for all that you've done is simply to love in the same fashion. I do.

Dear Anonymous,

I can say without hesitation that the most impacting and lasting emotional experiences I have had to date are ones that include you at the center. I learned more about myself in the time I spent with you than at any other point in my life. You truly brought out the best and worst of me. For a long time, I thought I would never get over the pain you caused me. And while I may be dramatic and emotional, you still have no idea the extent of the damage you did to me, I still don't quite understand. I thought that your stamp would forever be imprinted on my life, that my ability to love would be distorted as a result of you. To some degree I still think all of these things. Every time I truly feel I am healed and have emotionally recovered, you have a way of creeping back into my mind or my life, as if planting a reminder that I will never escape the control you still hold over me in my mind and in my heart. I let you control and hold something that no other person in my life has had access to, my raw emotion. No matter how negative the circumstances were, and no matter what type of pain you caused me, I will always look back at those times as the best memories and experiences I had. I'd trade the 90% negative for the 10% positive, and I'm not sure why. Probably because deep inside myself I think you were justified to some degree. I know you think you were; you never took accountability. My prior mistakes gave you the trump card over every mistake and betrayal you would make. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I hurt you. I just want to let go of you. I want to understand that I was young, and that my youth should not forever define me as an adult. I'm okay without you; I truly am. I'm better without you, but I still love you. I hate feeling incomplete and vulnerable and crazy, yet those are the overwhelming feelings attached to your name. 

Dear Anonymous,

I miss you. I rarely admit it, and even rarely think it. Many days, it's not uncommon for you not to even enter into my mind. It's as if I live my life trying to forget you were once the biggest part of mine. And as cold as it makes me seem, I don't wish you were still here. I would only wish that if I thought you could be happy. But even when you were here, you weren't actually here. Your self struggles and dependency never allowed you to feel fulfilled with the things that should have made you feel complete. I still don't resent you for the decisions you made, no matter how selfish or poor they were. I think you knew the final decision you made in leaving would ultimately be the end for you. Maybe you didn't consciously set out for it, but I think you craved dysfunction, it was all you were used to and the only thing that filled your mind. I think you were okay leaving because, for whatever reason, you never really felt you were here to begin with. Did you really think your "home" held all the answers or any true significance? If "home" to you meant the things you valued most, then it's sad to think you didn't consider your home the place where we were. I'm not bitter, I'm really not. I never doubt you loved us all a great deal. I just know you loved yourself a little more, I can't necessarily blame you. I live vicariously though you more often than I should. You're a huge part of me, but you don't define me or what I will be. If people think I will turn out as your replica, they are wrong. I have your good qualities and probably even more of your less desirable ones, but I'm not you. I think for a long time you wanted me to be you. I think you wanted your flaws to resonate with me to make yourself feel less ostracized, more normal, a better person. But because you viewed your own self worth through me, I also saw how my successes were your successes. I saw how my good traits pleased because they were indirectly yours. I saw how you favored me as a result of these things, and I also saw how you took out your life's frustrations on your daughter, because to you, she was the personification of your husband and everything negative you had experienced as a young woman. No child should have to deal with that unfair and unwarranted stigma. We were only children but you perceived us as an outlet for your emotion and distress. I miss you. I wish you could have seen your granddaughter, and while I have no true basis for thinking this, I think she might have given you a reason to change even more so than your own children. Maybe you couldn't change. 

Part 2 Coming Soon.

Prestige Worldwide Presents: Bigger Biceps, Smaller Social Network

I've spent the last two months hibernating from society. That isn't altogether much different from my normal interaction with people, but the last two months have been a defining point for me in terms of seclusion. Bears look at me with envy knowing they can't even hibernate as long as I have. I look at them jealous of their fur coats, knowing that I can't grow a beard a 12 year old would be proud of. I seriously might write a blog in the near future solely devoted to my facial hair and the challenges it has presented me in my life. It's the number one reason my ethnicity and citizenship are questioned on a semi regular basis. However, in the last two months I have actually tried to blog several times. I know no one cares (except Ashley...you get a shout out), but while I was trying to literally hide my face from society, I still wanted to get my words and thoughts out there to and achieve some semblance of being normal and social. In the last two months, I have started four or five blogs, failing to complete any of them. I won't get into the various reasons why, but most of them involved the same topic of theme. And while I thought I was at a point where I could write about it, apparently I can't. Without divulging what I'm talking about, simply know it was the single most difficult thing I've had to write about. I was also trying to think of things to blog about other than that. I obviously didn't think of anything good. I've had a two month long case of "kind of a writer's block". I'm not a writer by definition, and the only true block I've been a part of in the last two months was being accused of being a "cock block" to a buddy. In all seriousness, besides the lack of talent I possess as a writer, I know writing could never be a vocation because I imagine every writer (male and female) at some point grows a huge beard. I imagine every writer at some point in their life holes up in some cabin for two and a half years working on that "project", whatever it might be. And they don't shave the entire time. I simply cannot be a writer because after three years locked up in a cabin, I would come out and people would ask me to wash the dirt off my upper lip. They would confuse my thin wispy mustache and beard for ants or something.

I posted something on facebook a week ago stating that I wanted to be more social. It wasn't the "I'm gay" announcement people have been expecting, but it's actually probably just as shocking. For some odd reason, people that don't really know me think I am this wild and crazy kid, partying into the night 7 days a week and living in a bachelor pad. I've possessed this weird quality all my life where in a social setting, I can be incredibly fun to be around. I hate using this term, but I can be "the life of the party". I can be a fun and likable person and genuinely have a good time. People often confuse me for being drunk when I've had little to nothing to drink simply because in that setting I change and become a different person. However, naturally, I'm a very shy and reserved person. I don't really enjoy the company of other people. I genuinely prefer doing things alone most of the time, it's just the way I'm wired I suppose. But it's also very somber and depressing. I have a great group of friends that I actually rarely socialize with or hang out in a social setting with. To almost all my friends, I'm the friend they would associate with responsibility and serious natured discussions. I'm not just "one of the guys". And I want to be, I wish I was. I almost wish people's opinions of me were held in a lower regard where people weren't constantly trying to meet a certain standard around me.


So, I have decided that I want to be more engaging. I want to be more social. I almost want to hire a coach and show me what this all entails. I don't quite know where to start. The two places I spend most of my time are my work and the gym. My work is the bane of all things social. It is solitary confinement with beds instead of guards and restraints. And while I actually have a great network of people I am "friends" with at the gym.....it's still the gym. They are mostly "gym friends". If the extent of my friendship is built around you spotting me lifting weight, it's probably not the deepest of friendships. What kind of gets me down and makes me want to abort the mission before I even start it is the thought that my schedule and life is not built around accommodating going out and being social and having fun. What time do I have? I work a job in which a 9 hour shift is considered a short work day, and where getting home by 9:30 is exciting to me because I still have my night free....to go to the gym. Most people build a solid network of friends through their workplace. I work by myself and in a company where, up until a year ago, I was the youngest employee in the company. The average employee here is 48 years old, overweight, a drug addict and a racist. If they only had 3 out of 4 of those qualities, we might be on to something, but all 4 is pushing it as a close buddy of mine.


What I have decided is that all the reasons I have to remain in my current situation are simply excuses to not change and to be complacent. I can change whatever aspects of my life that aren't pleasing to me. I don't know where to start, but I'll start all the same. Without this sounding like a poorly written inspiration speech from "The Patriot", I'll conclude by simply asking:


Who's Going Out Tonight?


(see you at the gym)

Prestige Worldwide Presents: Unprotected Sex Leads to Cute Faces

Every single parent has a few common traits that simply come with the territory and responsibility of being a parent. One of these is the genuine thought that their child is the best/coolest/smartest/cutest etc of all children. This cannot be helped. The reason I specified it as "genuine" is because people who aren't parents might wonder if parents are playing this reaction up to simply look or feel like a good and nurturing parent. Nope. We truly believe our kid is superior to every other kid in existence, even kids with super powers in comic books. Even terrible parents who do despicable things like throw their new born children in garbage cans think they have the cutest kid. It takes an amazing amount of unconditional love and euphoric thinking to look at an ugly child and truly think it beautiful. This may be the part where someone thinks "there are no ugly children!!!". Notice the heavy use of exclamation points. These people are yelling at me with their minds. But when Adam and Eve committed the first act of sin in the garden, two things happened. Being naked was no longer socially acceptable and children could be ugly. I swear, look it up....ya know...in the Bible? The unfortunate truth is that there are some ugly children. This makes sense, because there are also ugly adults. Beautiful children do not suddenly morph into hideous adults. It's okay though, I still love all children. It isn't their fault they weren't the beneficiary of great genes. They still have an abundance of great qualities and are still amazing kids. I think it's safe to assume everyone reading this has been around parents with their newborn child, meeting them for the first time and having no idea what to say. The normal response is, "Oh, look at *insert gender*! Isn't *insert gender* adorable?". But when the instance takes place in which you are standing next to the offspring of Alien Vs Predator, it is a natural reaction where your mind goes blank. You might say something along the lines of, "Oh! Isn't that something? It's blinking."  The point of this is not to bash children. As previously stated, I have an affinity for children. Not in the way the creepy guy with the mustache does driving the 1996 Chevy cargo van around parks. In a really genuine "I would fight anyone who tries to mess with a kid and I learn something every time I'm around a kid that makes me appreciate life" way. But in the aforementioned instance when you are around that ugly kid, knowing it's ugly yet trying to be polite, the parent looks upon that child with an entirely different and wonderful perspective.

Everything I just stated I read from a book. I wouldn't know. This is because, even though I am a parent and am wired to adhere to the biased parental tendencies, I simply do not have to. I am able to view my daughter from a third party perspective and observe her for what she truly is: The World's Coolest Person. Notice I didn't say "kid" or "child". Nope. Her level of coolness transcends children and runs over into the human race. If she wasn't would how I love or treat her every change in the slightest? No, it wouldn't. That love is unconditional in every sense of the word. But lucky for me, Aubrey is an amazing blessing who simply captures every amazing quality I would want in a daughter. I shied away from writing about her for a long time for a few reasons. Partially because to write about her is to face many self fears and doubts I have about myself as a father. The fact that I am not the prototypical dad is something that saddens me on a deep level. I sometimes don't even tell people I have a kid, not because I am ashamed or embarrassed. Quite the opposite. Talking about her reminds me of the fact that I am not there for her in the way I want to be. I know I am involved in the capacity I can, and that I know she knows me as her father and feels love and guidance from me, but seeing her so infrequently is one of the toughest things I have had to face in my life. Another reason I was hesitant to write about her was the feeling that my writing and words would be incapable of describing her adequately and would do her no justice. I'll go for it though....


I think the most amazing part about her is her uncanny ability to blend together so many characteristics in one three year old mind and body. I often spend time with her amazed she is only three. Not only because she is incredibly smart, but because she has the eyes, the thoughts, the mannerisms of someone much older and wiser. She is no doubt an old soul. Sometimes I'll look at her when she doesn't notice me and just observe her thinking. It doesn't look like a three year old thinking. It looks like Yoda does before he is about to battle with the force. Her eyes resonate with some type of wisdom, and sometimes when she looks at you she gives you an expression like she knows more than you ever could. But as much as a sage as she is, she is also very much a three year old girl. The ability to truly capture both elements is truly inspiring and amazing to watch.

Being a three year old must be exciting. She sure makes it desirable to want to be one again. Her sense of imagination and ability to create in her mind is remarkable to me. Yes, she is brilliantly smart, but she also loves to have tea parties. She loves pretending to make juice and tea and brownies, and any other food. And you know what? Every flavor is strawberry. Just deal with it, strawberry soup isn't nearly as bad once you have make believe tried it with her. She loves cartoons and pictures books, yet she will also sit with a book and fill its pages with her own story and words incredibly detailed. 

Although easier to say in hindsight, I am glad my first child was a girl. There is a bond between father and daughter that is different from any other type of bond one could experience. I love love love the fact that she is a girl in every definition of the word. She's a girls girl. Not that there is anything wrong with being  Tom Boy, I simply always wanted a girl who wanted to be a princess (which is her future vocation if you ask her). Girls that like to hike and wrestle alligators just kind of frighten me. I can barely climb a tree, I don't need some 10 year old girl with a bandanna showing me up, thanks. I was parked by a Citgo gas station earlier today and saw what I previously only thought possible in the South. I saw a group of umm...let's call them "white trash folk" having a tailgate party....in the gas station parking lot. It was exactly how you would imagine. A group of 4 or 5 guys wearing overalls, confederate flag shirts, grilling out of the back of their pickup trucks hooting and hollering singing "Dixie" This isn't exaggerrated at all. They had small 8 inch televisions with kickstands, probably black and white, I don't know. They were in a gas station parking lot, I'll never get over that. Their trailer probably didn't have reception for the tvs. Knowing I have a girly little girl means I'll only have to worry that she might date one of these folks in the future, not the possibility she might join them for a tailgate, for a deer hunting trip, or dating.Aubrey loves to play dollhouse, play dress up, have tea parties, sing and dance and conduct herself like a princess. That's fine by me.


Yet as much as she is a girly girl, she is also incredibly independent. She will ask incredibly inquisitive questions without any prompt from me, as if she has been thinking of the answers for days on end waiting for an opportunity. She will go off and interact with people that she has never met before, introducing herself with great tact and maturity and start engaging in a conversation with them. She will think of her own things to do, ask for company when she wants it and ask to do things by herself when she deems it necessary. I am the over protective father extraordinaire and often stand right by her side while she performs any task that might be considered slightly dangerous or new to her. Many times she will just look at me then remind me she is big enough or smart enough or strong enough or a good enough climber to do whatever she is doing without me at her hip. She will politely ask me to give her space and attempt to be a kid on her own. As adventurous and independent as she is, there are also many times she crawls into my arms looking for protection and comfort. While we play games, often times she will take on the role of helpless vixen, as she calls me to be her protector and save her from the invisible foes that try to capture her. She loves cuddling with her daddy when she longs for affection and looks for opportunities to smother me with hugs and kisses. 



I could go on and on about her and fill pages and pages. Her personality is so complex it almost scares me, in a good way, but nonetheless can be unnerving. I wonder if she possesses not only my good qualities, but also my darker and less desirable ones. But If being with her has taught me one thing, it is that she is her own person, even at three years old. I can already see her potential far outshines my own and that she will be as wonderful an adolescent and adult as she is young child.


She is inspiring.
She is creative.
She is smart and sassy
She is incredibly beautiful and freckled.
She is three.
She loves strawberries.
She is my daughter.
I love her.