Dear Roger:Scars and Marks That Are More Than Skin Deep

Well Fuckity,Fuck Fuck!(to quote some of my favorite people) I knew things were rocking along a little too smoothly, and just to remind me that life likes to give me a swift kick in the ass when I get a little too full of myself, I got some of the warning signs that my noggin is on the fritz again. I have tinnitus pretty much constantly, and while there are times its just an annoying little mosquito hum in one ear or the other, there have been times it seems to almost drown out everything else around me, including music. It has been pretty much constant over the past few days, and then something that has never really happened before struck me, I lost my ability to read red or green colored fonts on my computer! I could tell there was something there, but it was just like weird blurry mess that made my eyes hurt the harder I tried to puzzle out what it was. Yellows and light blues were equally difficult and I have to say, that freaked me the hell out! I often lose vision in my right eye when I have a real bitch of a migraine coming, and my eyes burn or water and stuff gets blurry, but I have never lost colors before. I haven't said anything to the kids or m family because I dont want them freaking out, but I have been dropping down the dosages on the Topamax in the hopes that I could go off of it altogether, but when I started smelling blood and feeling really queasy last night, I knew that I was going to have to go back up to the full dose again, and that really sucks! I hate taking that stuff, it makes it really hard to keep any weight on and it just fucks with me in all kinds of ways. Im trying to keep a positive outlook, and not let it get me too down, after all, my pot smoking, hippy neighbors have actually contributed to me having a little better appetite and probably not so many headaches due to all the fumes and blow by that I have inhaled since I have lived up here. Friends of mine have actually suggested that the reason my headaches have been gone is because my neighbors have been soo generously sharing though the walls, and I am more than a bit conflicted.I am a bit uptight when it comes to that, and due to the ex and his drug issues, it just kinda freaks me out that that one thing that might me the answer to my neuro problems is an illegal substance! But the truth is, my neighbors have been gone mostly over the past few days and that is when my headaches came back, so though I think the issue would need more study, my friends are more than a little convinced. I just have never seen myself as a stoner, in case you forgot, im all about power and control and that just doesn't really mesh with my image of what weed is about.

My other uncle has been on my mind the past couple of days, and I really dont know what has brought him to such vivid clarity in my minds eye, other than I was talking about Robert the other day and he was Roberts daddy. James Colwell, was the only other member of that part of the family I really ever bonded with. He was my Aunt Judys first husband and to call him a,'Character" was a vast understatement. I remember him being lanky and having dark curly hair with dimples and eyes that always laughed.I remember he always smelled like Old Spice, cigarettes, and what I now know was just a hint of whiskey. He was skinny and funny and he would get down on the floor and roll around with us kids and play when the other adults would ignore us or send us outside, and he always called me,'Little Sister" or "Sister", (probably why I call Stevie that today), he played harmonica and guitar and he used to sing old Hank Williams songs for me in my granny kitchen and laugh at me as I tried to sing along with,"Kawliga". I remember him wearing a white, snap button cowboy shirt the last time I saw him that had little bitty roses embroidered in it. He had a gift for the understatement and when he took me fishing once and I made a pet out of a minnow and named it,'George" he risked getting caught by the fish and game officer to rescue that silly thing after I dropped it in the bed of the truck in the rush to flee and then began crying.

When he first got sick, no one told me anything, I just knew that Uncle James was gone alot to the doctor and my aunt cried alot. My cousins started fighting all the time and my parents didn't talk very much. When we went over after he got out of the hospital, he called me over to the couch where he was laid up and I was soo happy to see him I wanted to give him a huge hug and just crawl up against him and make it all better, but my Aunt jerked me away and told me I had to stay off of him. I sat next to the couch for the longest time and counted the roses on his shirt and we watched cartoons and just hung out. He smelled like whiskey and band-aids at that point and his eyes didn't smile as much, but his dimples still shown for me. He died of cancer,(something with his kidneys and liver) two and a half weeks before my 5th birthday and there really is no way I should remember soo much about him, but someday s I can close my eyes and see him in my granny's kitchen with a short glass of whiskey next to him, his ratty old guitar and his smile, and he is laughing at me as I try and sing,'Kawliga". Besides the memories, the only thing that is left of him is the tattered funeral notice I rescued from the trash at my parents place, and I have visited his grave in West Texas a couple of times to just let him know that I miss him. Robert is next to him now, and my granny and pa are nearby. The rest of the family is scattered all over West Texas, and I often wonder where my folks will chose to end up, and while this is a pretty fucking morbid topic to be talking about on such a beautiful day, its one I have had to mull over more than once, especially with my weird neurological issues and the two cancer scares that I have had to contend with this past year.

I try not to be a fatalist about things, but with our family history, its a very real worry with me. I grew up in what is called,'Cancer Alley", and I lost both grandfathers, my granny, Uncle James, Aunt Judy, Uncle Runt, Uncle Charlie, and others and more than a few friends along the way and with Trina having to have that implant that measures the growth of that lump, it just seems pretty much a sure fire bet that one of these days my tab is gonna come due, because Lord knows I abused the hell out of my body when I was younger and that shit tends to leave a mark.

Chance got a good look at some of my marks just a bit ago when I was changing from one shirt to another and the knuckle head walked in without knocking. I had on a sports bra, (Thank God), but he was able to see the full array of scars that are typically covered by even a wife beater and he was a little freaked out,(really helpful for my self-confidence), and I could tell he wanted to ask about ten thousand questions, but most of the stories are best left for another day, when he is older and not so prone to calling me a hypocrite when I tell him he cant have a motorcycle or date a certain person or own a really sharp knife, or jump off the side of a bridge or own a shotgun.