Dear Roger: Its All In Your Head?

Being stalked is a horrible thing to experience, I should know, I have experienced it. My stalker was relentless and intelligent and he had help. He was also handsome and charming and well educated in the vernacular of law enforcement and he had friends who were manipulated into helping him continue stalking me for over a year. We had dated and it was a tumultuous relationship, he was and still is what is known as a psychopath and if you ever have the opportunity to read  Dr. Hares book "Without Conscience-The Disturbing World Of the Psychopath Among Us", You will find something called the "Psychopathy checklist", it is a screening tool for profilers looking for serial killers and the like. My stalker met 13 out of the 21 markers.
Back in 1994/95 the stalking laws were not as strict as they are now, though they did gain some teeth after the Rebecca Shaffer incident along with several other high profile stalker/murder cases, but proving you are being stalked is very hard.
I let people know I was no longer seeing him, I told him very clearly in front of people to leave me alone, and yet he would show up and demand to talk to me. He would treat me as if I was confused and he would show up at my work and act like I had called him for a lunch date and then become enraged when I would refuse to leave with him.
We worked with each other until he was advised to resign, and he made my life a living hell. He injured me several times, but they were all,"Accidental" including a broken tailbone, a severely dislocated shoulder, and multiple bruises and contusions.
I would get texts late at night when I was off duty,(before the days of good cell phones mind you) that were police code telling me that the man I was seeing had been shot in the line of duty. I was terrorized for months, followed and even though I was pregnant, he continued with the abuse and threats and assaults...yes, the assaults.
I moved. He found me. I changed phone numbers, he had it in days. I moved again, he found me again and left notes on my car. He denied the baby,(thank God), and threatened me and the child with death repeatedly, and then left flowers hanging on my door.
I moved to a security complex and things settled for a little bit. I had to hide from everyone. I had to cut of almost all contact with all friends, including the department I had started off with and I had to skulk into my own grandmothers house like a thief in the night.
I lost work, I tried restraining orders, protective orders, police escorts and when he tried to grab me at a college campus one night, coming out of the dark all clad in black with no warning, my shriek of terror had him surrounded by 10 very large and angry Tucson Fire Fighters who had been in the class with me and who already knew him from his past reputation, but it was the death knell of my career. I had to hide, so hide I did. I had my son very quietly with no fanfare or announcements and we moved to a place where we had over 150 very large and protective and armed brothers and sisters and for over 5 years we were safe. The state notified him about the birth he denied it, the state determined he was a very credible threat to our very lives and told me that no support or father would be forthcoming for my son, ever.
Before we moved to the far away place, he had tried to break into my apartment. He pointed a gun a me, he was a fan of the knife and razor as well, and the things he did to small creatures he caught on his property still leave me shuddering, so I count us lucky.
My stalker was very charming, he would tell me I didn't know what I needed, that I was,"Confused" and that he would take care of things.  He could be pleasant and fun to be around until that switch turned and then he was the most terrifying thing on the planet. His best friend was a Tucson PD officer who was giving him my personal information every time I updated my DMV records as required for my EMT license, so in essence, I was giving him my address each and every time. When that was discovered the officer was demoted and suspended, but I wish he had been fired because he cost me my credit, due to all the moves,(no allowance for that in most leases back then), and my career. There were days I literally thought I was going crazy and that maybe he was right, maybe I was imaging things, but then when he came to my door and tried to break in when my sister was there, I knew I wasn't and he would not stop until he was stopped or he killed me.
To this day I still twitch a little when I see a blue Toyota pickup truck or my son gives me an expression that looks just like him.
When I became a cop and focused my studies in Criminal Justice, I narrowed my focus to Serialized crimes and Sexually Motivated Homicides because I think I may have a very unique understanding of that line of insanity.
The state investigator who had questioned him and then later came out and spoke to me very candidly said that he was, in fact, quite clearly a psychopath and that I was probably very lucky to be alive and not dumped down some abandoned mine out in the west side of Pima County.
I've gotten pretty good at spotting folks like him and it worries me when I see they have resources like the internet to aide their insanity. I shudder to think what would have happened had my stalker had the net or phones with trackable Gps, or even worse, Google maps and public records databases on the web like those I have observed have to utilize at their fingertips.
I have advice for those being stalked, do not take it lightly, its a very serious matter. If a person has been by your house, that is a credible threat and you are in very real danger and if its happened more than once, they have met the California penal code requirements for Stalking (646.9) and if they have made threats, via electronic media, that is Criminal Threats  (422pc) and is a FELONY and they can go to prison for it and they SHOULD.
I quit worrying about what people thought about me when my kids safety came into play and I lived like a scrub for many years to keep him safe, 16 years later I have a healthy, happy and gifted son who knows what I went through and my stalker is a lonely and bitter man who is still just as scary.
The mental illness behind stalking is quite often Borderline Personality with Narcissistic tendencies, though I have seen what can only be some pretty significant schizo-affective disorder in those that I have observed of late. The interwebz is a scary place, and people send me the stuff of nightmares in what used to be a place of sunshine. God, I hope someone is paying attention.

Dear Roger: Miles To Go

Some times I get a reminder that I still have things to deal with, and I guess with all the stress and things I have been dealing with over the past few days, I was due a good one.
Nobody got hurt, but it took me a while to calm down and the person who was involved in the situation ended up standing on the sidewalk with me having to reassure himself that all was well.
Stevie and I took advantage of a break in the rain to walk to the market to get some milk and bread, as well as to just get the hell out of the apartment. I needed to walk off some of my frustration and work over some of my story idea. I had been talking to a friend on twitter, so I wasn't really paying close attention to things,(my bad), and I had Stevie talking to me and distracting me as we walked down the sidewalk.
I was comfortable, not too worried, a lot on my mind and not paying attention. A tweet came in and I slowed to look at my screen because its hard for me to read being its so small. All of the sudden a male voice said in my ear as they touched my shoulder, "Excuse me".
I yelled, shoved Stevie out of the way and turned to fight. Mind you, we were in an area that is where transients congregate for meal handouts, no one had been behind a few minutes prior and he startled the hell out of me.
He jumped back and immediately began apologizing. Stevie began laughing,(she wasn't hurt or even scared), it was an older man we see all the time walking the sidewalk with his wife.
He apologized and said,"I'm sorry, I was in Nam, I learned to walk light. I didn't mean to scare you, are you a Vet? You act like a Vet."
We stood on the sidewalk a few minutes, squared off while I calmed down, him reassuring me he meant no harm he was just trying to go around me, me apologizing for not paying better attention. We eventually nodded at each other and even fist bumped, and then he turned around and said,"It will get better, just give yourself time." Holy hell! I hope so.
Stevie is taking over some of the more stressful parts of getting my books out to the public eye. She is just more people friendly, and more pushy. She will tell people about my book and try to get them to at least give it a shot when I just want to write.
I am submitting my book to a few kickstarter style projects for authors to see if I can get any attention that way, and I'm trying to get the attention of some agents so maybe I can get it in the hands of someone who could do something with it. The less hollyweird set might see purity of the story so I am edging my way back into Cowboy Poetry and even dusting off some of my old works from those days.
I dont know if I will do a full-length audio recording of it, but Stevie sure wants it and she usually gets what she wants and I have no problem telling a story out loud that comes from my heart.

Dear Roger;Vacation? Riiight!

Its two weeks until the end of school. Oh God....Its TWO WEEKS UNTIL THE END OF SCHOOL! I am not particularly looking forward to this time. Yeah, if we had a way to get out and go do stuff, maybe, but with one kid that meanders, ambles and wanders more than he walks, another who has his own agenda that involves getting as far away from his,"Embarrassing" siblings as possible, and limited resources, I have a feeling its going to be a special kind of hell. I figure the eldest with stay gone as much as possible with his friends, returning home only to eat when we have a fully stocked larder, hit me up for cash, and clean laundry. The other two boys will complain constantly about having nothing to do. Walking to the park with them will result in complaints that its hot and there is still nothing to do.
Daughter will be gone for a week in July to church camp, I guess I am okay with that. last year it was only 3 days and I had a really hard time with it. This year its an entire week. I don't know. Her and one of her little church companions have been having issues and its going to reach a boiling point soon. She came home last night so angry that she kicked a chair and ranted about her for a good 5 minutes. Apparently the other little girl is a snobby little thing who likes to rub what she has in my daughters face and make fun of the fact we don't have much. Shes probably about to get popped in the nose. I've tried talking to Stevie, told her about how some people have to make up for a lack of everything else by showing off material things, and telling her to ignore the brat, but apparently the kid likes to follow Stevie around and get in her face about it.
Little girls are mean bitches. My daughter is a lot like me. If she pops the kid in the nose,(and I have told her violence is not the key), then she probably wont be going to church camp. If she doesn't go,ill have to find a way to keep her busy because when she isn't occupied, all hell breaks loose.
My stress stash is gone. A small bag of chocolates,a pack of cigaretts and 20 bucks, gone. I kept it hidden in the cabinet for those times when I was at the point where the amount of stress in my life had given me a case of  the twitches.The chocolate is self-explanatory, the smokes are a throwback to an old habit I had when I was a cop and I didn't smoke often or much, but it was a calming thing that also got the odor of human decomp out of your sinuses pretty effectively. The 20 was for a nice quality beer,(change to be had, of course), most likely a Guinness Stout. But the thing is, I can only indulge in my stress relief when kids are gone and I have the stash.
I have been really stressed out the past couple of days, its been one of those waiting game, gorilla in the room kind of things.
My book is out there, people have read it and no reviews have posted. The books in L.A. are missing or an unknown quantity. I am an obsessive compulsive personality with severe control freak tendencies. So I am in hell. I had planned to indulge in a bit of stress relief last night, I was going to send all the kids to church, and after munching on chocolate all day long, I was going to wait until they left then hot foot it down to the local market, buy my beer and then sit on my back porch, drink a beer and smoke until I either relaxed or my heart exploded.
Everything went pear shaped the moment I climbed up on top of the fridge. I found a trail of chocolate wrappers leading to the stash spot, they were cast about with an air of disdain as if to say,"Amateur". Reaching the stash spot, I prized it open to find not only the money gone, but the smokes gone as well. BUSTED.
My kids are all rabidly anti-tobacco. They wont care that they were expensive and hadn't even been opened, they probably did horrible things to them and then threw them in the trash or the commode as if they had found a junkies stash.
The 20? Yeah...it was gone too. I could ask about it, but we al know the truth, the little one who smiled at me soo innocently and said,"I don't know what you are talking about" that very morning probably didn't get to keep it and if I say anything to the big brother, then there will be the days long lecture about the evils of smoking.
I think I am just going to cut my losses, pretend it didn't happen and try to just distract myself with other things until all this passes. Its only the whole summer.

Dear Roger: Fearless

I have no thumbnails anymore. I have chewed them to the quick. Grandma would be so aggravated at me again,after all, she was the one who broke me of that habit when I was a kid and kept my nails chewed down to bloody nubs. Granted, her method of smacking me each time she caught me with my hands in my mouth would be seen as a bit harsh nowadays, it was effective at stopping it and a lot kinder than my moms answer of cutting all my nails down to the quick so there was nothing to chew! A few of my nervous tics have resurfaced and im working hard to control them, but of course my teen son has decided to be a full on jerk to me, stressing me as much as possible, so as if I didn't have enough on my plate with the end of the school year wrapping up, financials in crisis, books I am trying to promote, and let me tell you, as a NOBODY, that is hard as hell!
I am Southern, and as a Southerner, I don't like to impose on people, I don't like to keep nudging my way in front of people and begging them to notice me, but luckily I have friends who have been trying to help me get over that. Im working on trying to get my books to a larger audience, but its hard! Im not a well known person even in my own little social circles so just getting attention among them is not easy.
I am good at talking about other peoples stuff, heck, you ask me about those boys and their doings and you better pack a lunch and be prepared to sit a spell and listen, because I can tell you pretty much everything you want to know and then I will twist your arm,(maybe even literally), until you buy some of their stuff, but when it comes to my writing, I just stress and worry and think its never good enough. I sent those books out with delivery confirmations on them and I don't know why the hell I did that other than I must have a masochistic streak a mile wide. After I got notice that a couple of them had been delivered, I threw my guts up.
The two that went to L.A. are still in the wind and haven't been received according to the postal website,(not that I have chronically been twitching every time I get an "New Email" alert), so the rest of my fingernails have remained intact so far, but my daughter has been looking at me funny all morning. "You didn't sleep good last night at all. You are grumpy and jumpy today. Its going to be okay, your book is really cool! I love it, isn't that enough?"
It should be, it really should be, but I want to do well for her and the rest of my kids. I want to be able to give them a better life and maybe some kind of affirmation from somewhere would soothe my soul, but I know that's not coming from my parents, and there have been absolutely no reviews posted on the Kindle site though folks have been kind enough to tweet me some really good ones.
I built an authors page on Facebook last night, and I'm going to film the commercial that my little girl has come up with because its pretty damn funny if nothing else, and I always think that that world could use more funny.
I don't know what to do, Rog. I am no good at this stuff. I'm used to rejection and criticism and I should be fine with dealing with it, but until it comes, its like standing at waiting for that first punch to land, you just know its gonna sting and take your breath away and most likely make me want to do like I did with my art and photography, burn it all and just hide for the next 20 years, but I really cant afford to do that. I have kids depending on me now, and watching me, and I have to lead by example, even when its hard.
I'm going to let my little girl lead the way with most of the talking and the promotion of my writing and such, because for some reason, she believes in me and its so weird to be out in public to have someone walk up to people and say,"Hey! did you know my mom is a writer?! Shes really GOOD! You should buy her books!"  I love my kid, I don't know what I did to deserve her, and I hope I don't let her down.

Dear Roger:Talking To Myself In The Wee Hours

So I finally went and did it, I did the vlog thingy to talk about my writing and what motivates me and what not. I think I look like I need a couple good nights sleep, but considering it was recorded at 1130 at night after a long day of chasing kids around, my options were kind of limited.
I don't get a lot of quiet time in my house for doing things like that, I have either kids making all kinds of racket, a dog scratching his bits and ratting his crate or his collar or jingling the bells on the back door wanting out, or the dryer is running, the dishwasher, or I have a kid needing to ask me a question or even better, I have to referee a fight.
At night, if I am lucky, its fairly quiet. Most of the kids settle pretty quick and I can actually sneak in a little writing without my train of thought getting interrupted, but if I say an idea out loud,(as I tend to do in order to test out how it really sounds), then i often end up with Sticky coming out to see who I am talking to.
I end up falling asleep on the couch most nights and that's not a good thing. Our couch is not the most comfortable, its horrible for my back, and ive come close to dropping my laptop off my lap more than once. My daughter has become pretty insistent lately that I go to my actual bed at a reasonable hour, and she will come and stand in front of me with her ratty monkey and give me the,"Look" until I acknowledge her and say,"Yes daughter, Ill go to bed soon." Shes usually unhappy with my response, but when I have an idea working, its hard to stop it.
Promoting my books has been nerve wracking. A friend of mine said its like having children out there that you want people to love like you do, and she was exactly right, my books are like my children.
My daughter is going to make a commercial for them for me. She has been my biggest cheerleader in the entire family, hugging me almost daily and telling me how proud she is of me, and she brags about me to everyone! Its funny at times to hear her. She was even telling off the ex last night, "Did you buy moms book?" He told her that he had not, and she said,"Well why haven't you? She did a really great job and she has been working hard and I am very proud of her! You should be supporting her!" I was quietly doing a fist pump as he apologized and said that he would order one right away.
She wants to read my books and I have had a hard time keeping them out of her hands. While they are not ADULT content, they do have some adult content that I don't think she is ready to read, even if she has read the Harry Potter books. The kids did harass me into reading them a few chapters of 'Face in the Rear View Mirror" the other night and the laughter that echoed in the living room was infectious and we started telling and remembering other family stories that made us all happy.
The poop in the heater vent is a classic that will remain in family lore for decades, as will the monkey flying out the car window at 85 mph, along with the countless others that didn't make it into the novel.
I read the last chapter aloud to my daughter and she lunged at me and hugged me tightly and said,"That was soo cool! Thank you! When will you write the next book?" I just laughed and told her that it was her tale to tell from here on out.

Dear Roger: A Small Immortality

Last night was interesting around here, even more so than usual in that I actually read to the kids some of the more kid friendly chapters of my book,"Face In The Rear View Mirror". At first the only one really paying attention was Stevie, because she knew right off which character was based on her, and she was laughing and alternately cringing as she realized her antics had been shared with the world at large, but then her brothers started listening as well and there was laughter and lots of ,"Oh, and remember when..."
My kids were shocked that I had actually written something that in a way, included them and told some of their stories and Stevie was oddly touched. She hugged me and said,"I really liked the last chapter, being a writer must be the best job in the world if you can do stuff like that."
She has decided that she wants to help promote my book, and in order to do that, she thinks a commercial is the way to go so she has started planning for this commercial, including casting and planning for who was supposed to handle what, like her brother Stubby is supposed to be in charge of,"Lighting, props, and Sticky wrangling so there isn't and accidental nakedness in the shots." She is busily trying to think of everything as well as even write a jingle for it! I think its a much better idea than leaving me in charge of it, because I am not particularly adept at promotion, Im just the writer.
Writing some of the characters in my stories were hard, some were easy. They were mostly based off of encounters I have had with people, and people I have known and a couple of them are amalgamations of a couple people put together. I developed a few of them from kids I knew who never grew up, and those were the tough ones, but that is the thing about being a writer, you can give people life and imagine who they would have grown to be and that is a blessing and a curse. I think many writers do this, childhood friends and family who left too soon or invisible friends are given new life and allowed to thrive in the pages of books, freeing the writer to be able to visit them and imagine them somewhere happy and vibrant. Even a giant, slobbery dog that often peeled the paint off the walls with his farts, gains immortality in the pages of a book and hes remembered once again.
My kids laughed the most at the,"Poop in the heater vent" chapter, and yes, that did actually happen, and Sticky still laughs about it to this day, so if nothing else I created something that has immortalized family chaos and mythology in a way that will be a cautionary tale for future generations.

Dear Roger: Performance Anxiety

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0084HETDA
  So yesterday was a day I took a pretty big gamble, I put my new novel out on the Amazon website on a free promotion day and then I actually mailed copies of it to the people I dedicated it to.
If you know anything about me, you know how hard that was for me to do, in fact, at the post office, my hands were shaking so hard as I tried to pay for the shipping, the clerk had to swipe my card for me. Even after it was all said and done, I still, for one mad moment, debated grabbing the packages back and running, but I had my kids with me and Sticky is notoriously slow, so it would have been an ordeal and I would have been easily apprehended and probably tazed as insane.
I didn't have as much of an issue dropping off copies at the local store that wanted them, I don't know why, I mean, after all, these are people I see pretty much every week when we need food or whatever, but mailing them out to people I dedicated it to? That left me in what was pretty close to  a full blown panic attack.
The fact that one of them, who I really respect and admire, kept giving me shout outs, had me in fits all evening. I watched the numbers for downloads climb until 0130 in the morning until I finally passed out on the couch with my computer on my lap.
Its terrifying being out there with my writing, blogging and writing little fic's is one thing, but actually trying to get recognized as a serious, legitimate author is something that, at my age, is like trying to jump into the rapids of a raging river in the middle of winter.
I'm not good at the whole,"Promotion" thing. I can talk to people, but I am good at talking about other people stuff that I love and enjoy. Ask me about music and Ill talk your ear off about what is good and what I like, ask me about other people writing and you better be prepared to sit a spell and have a long palaver about things because I am Southern and prone to being a bit on the chatty side, but ask me about my writing and that sound the needle makes when drawn sharply across a record , you know, the one that makes you cringe? That is what you hear.
My son is trying to get me to make a video blog about my writing, one of those things where I talk about what inspired me and my motivations. I made a recording last night and when he gets home from his beach adventures with his buddies, Ill let him play with it and maybe upload it, but I dont know. I recorded it and re-recorded it half a dozen times and I realized that, HOLY HELL! IM OLD! but, you know, for once, as scary and as naked feeling as it is, I am doing something I love, and every single time that number goes up, and every time a review comes in, I feel like I am a little further down that road.