Dear Roger:I Tend To Wander On The Low SIde Of The Road

Wow,its been awhile hasn't it?I guess I wish I could say there has been a lot going on, but there hasn't been. I have just been fucking depressed and haven't really felt like writing as much. I get that way sometimes and I wallow in my misery by sitting out under the trees off my back deck, staring at the cars driving by on the road,smoking cigarretts until one of the kids demands I come in and pay attention to them.

I dont know why things started bugging me, perhaps it was all the horror movies,perhaps it was just too much time on my hands to think about all the things that I have done, the past and all the things that I have seen, but I started considering the fact that I have seen and handled horrors that most normal people cannot begin to comprehend. I am not normal, not by a long shot. I never have been. I have always been drawn to the dark and the grotesque, the freak shows and horror movies and things that would send normal people scurrying away in terror. I sought out and read dark things, hell, I have even written them.

I know things that most people do not know,like what a decomposed body really smells like, the sound a bloated body makes when it hits the ground after you cut it out of a tree, the feel of brains under your fingers, or how much pressure you have to use to puncture the vitreous humor of an eye to get the fluid.I have seen death in so many forms...accidental,planned,intentional,murder,natural and the looks on the faces of each and every one of the dead is still with me, especially the children. I cannot close my eyes at night without seeing each and every child I have ever picked up off the side of the road or out of their parents arms or off of some filthy floor. I can still feel the weight of their small bodies against me as I carried them to the body bags.

It bothers me that these memories stick with me clearer than some of my memories that I know would be happier. I have a hard time remembering many of the trips with my grandparents.Those were so long ago, but they were the bright spots of my youth. The one memory of a trip with them that does stand out is being in Whiteriver and seeing a native man fall out in front of a truck,that is very vivid in my mind.

I remember my father coming in and telling me that my very first crush had just been killed by a drunk driver.I even remember the smell on his clothes and how the house looked, where I was standing and how dark it was outside and that it rained for the entire next week. That memory is so strong it often haunts me at night, while the memory of his face and the times he spoke to me or I actually got to interact with him, are fading.

It seems that the memory of horror and fear has a very strong power to erase any of the happy memories that you might have. I know that I had some happy times with my eldest sons father, in fact the time we spent in L.A. was some of the happiest time in my life and I know that it must have been like a dream come true for me to have actually made it out there with a man who had actually been in movies and who knew his way around all the cool places I had only seen on tv,but almost all those memories were erased by the things he did to me later. All I remember when I see him in my memory is the shark like blank stare,the scalpel, the gun,his handcuffs, and that isolated little house he kept on the West Side with the deep hole in the back yard and the feel of his hands on my face. I still feel lucky to have escaped with my life and the scars and little glitches in my personality are a small price to pay.

The memories of my ex-husband are mostly of him with the straight razor to my throat and the look that was in his eyes...10 years and that is what I take away with me, the feel of a straight razor to my throat and the look of want in his eyes while my kids cried next to me on the bed. Fuuuck! is it any shock I have my days of down time?

I have been writing again, working on a novel for the Nainomo writing thingy and so far its progressing okay. I have also written a couple of songs, so I guess I am snapping out of it. A job change is in the works, the pet place is just not going to work out at all. Im tired of walking the 2.5 miles there only to be sent home because they cant find their asses with both hands and get me something to do.

You , Rog, are always strong in my memories...but the day you came to grandmas looking so tired and laid your head on her kitchen table and fell asleep is strongest in my memories because that is the day I knew our time was short. I miss you , I miss you soo much.