Behind everyone’s life is a mind altering journey, a motivational experience and a physical adventure. Everyone will experience all three. It shapes and defines us as it unfold. It reveals our personal history. It constitutes our obligation to share our gift and to fulfill our assignment. Every story has its task along with a purpose. I held on to this far too long. I have to release it in order to move on. Especially, before I close my eyes…
Guilty Confessions
We use our talent(s) and skillset to convey and articulate a particular message. At this point, I’d like to seize the opportunity to share with you a portion of weight I’ve been carrying for some of my childhood and all of my adult life. I pray you receive this in good spirit and in good faith. I share this with only my best intentions and possibly to save a life.
I’ve held on to this far too long. I have to turn the page and release it in order to move forward.
In no way, shape or form am I advocating a pity party. This is not my purpose nor my intention. People rarely are transformed. Many of us simply locate the light switch. Collectively speaking, once we step out of our comfort zone, dare to look into the mirror and see beyond “Skinner’s Box” we discover it allows us a chance to observe our surroundings, view ourselves, along with the world and the people we come in contact with. I located the light switch and for a long time I didn’t like what I had seen in the mirror. I now see all what I once only looked upon. Once upon a time, I use to think my father never loved me but I no longer can afford to think that way anymore. I have to reach for a higher cause for him. Just because I never knew my father I don’t think I have the right to judge him. I learned that concept from my own experience and from my children who are now adults.
There’re many beautiful revelations that come from out the mouth of the young and innocent. Out of the mouth of a babe the value of life reveals itself. My father didn’t take the time to visit or to reach out. My father was never given the chance to speak for himself in this regard. I wasn’t for some reason, never bitter about his absence. At a very young age I knew one day I would discover the reason for his disappearance. It is possible my dad may have done my family a favor by staying away. During my father’s time a set of family values were in place. There was a standard and a way of life. When it came to marriage it was called, “I Respect You” marriage. Today, that point of view is long gone and removed from our thoughts. It’s gone because we have accepted other peoples cultural values. Now, when we marry we marry with the mindset of the “I Love You” marriage or “The Business Agreement” marriage which always come with a clause attached.
Guilty Confessions
I think I’m beginning to understand my fathers pain, struggle and suffering. I never met my father. My dad was a three time loser, in and out of prison. Prison become a revolving door for him. A slave to the system who died a felon affected with AIDS. Dad infected his wife and my little sister whom I never had gotten to meet. No matter the circumstance, I know better and I’m not making any excuses. I’m just explaining and sharing a pain I can no longer hold within. In short, my father doesn’t owe me anything. He did the most important thing he could do and that was to help give me life. The rest, is up to me to figure things out.
Just because you’re an adult (18/21 years of age) doesn’t make you a man or a woman. Manhood & womanhood is an on going process. It’s continuous and it’s not given. Manhood, is acquired through a persons life experience, his mental, and spiritual growth. I would like to touch on a few things if I may. The power of love and it’s innocence at the age of 16 and 14 years of age is pure and untainted. Love isn’t blemished by the atrocities of the world. Nor from the outside noise of rambling and foolish chatter. The power of love transcends the seen and the unseen. Love in it’s purest form is fearless, bold and often blind. Nothing stands in its way. The old and weary may have forgotten its glory days while basking under the sun. Treading through the snow and slush during the storm of life can also pay a serious toll on the mind, body and what’s left of the star dust inside.
Hope this is not too graphic but it’s true. With the saddest and deepest apology, I shamefully admit and I regret to have taken life. Through abortion I’ve taken four lives. I’ve advocated and paid for abortions. There was a time I thought it was a way in dealing with a particular issue. The constant glaring factor in this equation is one continuous fact. Nobody aborted me. How dare I take a life. I have no idea of the pain and suffering I have caused to the women that were involved. Personally, I don’t know a man who would admit to such a crime. However, I know he exist.
Guilty Confessions
When I was 16 years old I met a beautiful young Jamaican princess by the name of Donna. Donna was only 14 years of age. I was madly in love with her. I was living in the Bronx at the time and Donna was living in Jamaica, Queens Village. Donna was a dream of a sight with a hypnotic perfume scent. I watched grown men trip over their feet while looking at her. I remember going into the corner store with her and the man behind the counter didn’t even care to notice me. He was too busy looking at my Donna. I wasn’t upset. I found it very interesting and telling. As Donna placed her items on the counter the man started putting the items inside the bag. For every item he touched he missed the bag and the items fell back onto the counter. He was so in aw from the very sight of her that he couldn’t remember to close his mouth which he left wide open. I helped him with the items and placed them inside the bag and smiled. I remember as we walked outside from the store, back to her house, a city bus full of high school kids hung their heads out of the back window to look at her. One guy almost fell out the back window onto the street. At that moment I knew I had a gem. Actually, I knew what I had the very first night I met Donna. Even my stepfather couldn’t take is eyes off her when she came to my house for a visit. We cut school together. We played house and ate good Jamaican food. Donna was my endless love.
We would spend hours talking on the phone every day. Her mother would yell at her to get off the phone and Donna would say, she couldn’t wait to have her own place. I tried to see Donna every chance I would get. We made love in every room in the house. Then things had gotten blurry and I would later discover Donna was pregnant. I was so happy and I couldn’t wait to see her. In my head I was going to be a father. Time had passed and the next phone call was a demand by her mother for me and my parents to visit the house and have a round table discussion. I was scared and excited. Scared of the unknown but excited to once again to see my Donna. Once we had gotten to the house I felt a strange vibe. I jumped out of the car to open the gate, ran up the steps to the door, to ring the doorbell. Donna’s mother answered the door. From the expression on her face I knew this wasn’t going to be a good visit. It was the meeting of the two families without the children. My mother and stepfather was taken downstairs to the basement and I was asked to wait in the dinning room next to the door leading to the street. I was sitting in the dinning room alone and then Donna came out and sat down next to me. At first glance I could clearly see she was with child. I reached out to touch her. Donna wouldn’t look at me and said, “They aren’t going to let me keep it.” She added, “It’s because you’re American”.
Sometimes your skin folk is not your kin folk. I had known about racism and I experienced it before but never with my own people. It was difficult to understand and to accept. I thought we were the same. I learned quickly we aren’t the same because we’re not on the same page. I knew some people who lived in and around the Caribbean Islands were under the British rule but I thought we all were brought over here on the same slave ship and dropped off at different ports.
Guilty Confessions
This was something I’ve tried to block out of my mind for decades.
Donna’s parents viewed me as a Yankee. As if my blood was different from theirs. Sure, our customs are different but it didn’t make sense. When I tried to make sense of it, it made me feel as if they’re saying, I wasn’t good enough for their Donna. The impact of such a reality rocked my world. It reshaped my mental and global point of view. It devastated me. It also allowed me to peak inside a window of a scheme called, divide and conquer. Later, I withdrew from interacting with other people. For a year, I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I see Jamaican men and other people from that region date and sleep with American women but I can’t be with one of theirs. They can take our money, live next door, sell us weed and curry chicken but won’t break bread with us by selling us the idea of bridging our collective cultural differences. We can work side by side but deep down we’re not good enough. Not all of Jamaican people think this way but enough do and that’s a form of continued divide and conquer. Isn’t the primary foundation of the British government is to instill and to enforce European cultural values? Isn’t the British educational system another form of oppression applied to all outside belief? Why isn’t it a mandatory requirement for each individual learn about their historical cultural values? Doesn’t the British flag stand proudly in full support of European cultural values? All I ever wanted is to love her and to be loved by her.
The drive back home was silent. I dared my stepfather to say anything to me. I felt like I shamed the family. During the car drive back home my mother whom was upset demanded me to ask my grandmother for her saving bonds to pay for the abortion. In my mind, that wasn’t right. When I had gotten home I took the long way to my grandmothers house. I told my Nana what I’ve done and the overall consequences and the family decision made behind my actions. It was the first time I saw my grandmother, my Nana cry. I thought to myself, I did that. I crushed her heart. I hated my mother for making me ask her for the money. That experience devastated me. The golden child perception was removed and I was no longer seen as such. It changed me for the rest of my life. At the time, I didn’t know my mother was trying to make and raise a man. Instead, I became a loner and slipped into a different state of mind that showed me that abortion was the way to solve unwanted family issues. I didn’t realize at the time I was wrong for having such a mindset. For years to come, I was short tempered, angry at the world and I started not trusting women, starting with my mother. I started drinking and smoking weed. After Nana pasted I became a loose cannon. I introduced myself to cocaine.
A year later I went back to Jamaica Queens to find Donna. I knocked on the door. Her mother answered the door with a baby in her arms. The baby boy whom looked like Donna. Staring at the baby I asked her mother where could I find Donna. She didn’t seem surprised to see me. It felt like she was expecting it. “She working at Burger King on Merrick Blvd” she said. I said, “thank you”. I jumped on my bike to Donna’s job. When I had gotten there she was behind the counter talking to the manager. I stood in the background. Donna looked up and noticed me, asked her manager for her break and sat with me. Donna shared with me after we had broken up she started dating a Jamaican man who lived across the street from her house. She said, he’s a mechanic and her mother approved. I think I must have cried all the way home. I don’t remember the ride back on my bike. I don’t remember the long train ride either. Everything was a blur.
The past informs the present
Four children by four different women is nothing to brag about because I deserve everything I get in return. I love each and every one of them, dearly. More than $200,000 paid between two children in child support which is hardly enough to raise any child.
Married once for 11 years, separated for 6 years. I don’t think I’ll ever do that again. I ran 1,000 miles from New York to Atlanta with my tail between my legs, licking and trying to mend my mental, spiritual and financial wounds. All in hopes to gain a fresh start; a new beginning. Nobody knows me here. Yet I still walk with my head hanging down. Rarely making eye contact with anyone and speaking to no one. One day, I’m sure I’ll die alone, sadly found in my home. Just like the man who lived above me. He had no one to check on him.
The darkest days of my life.
Nana, please forgive me…
I’m just a bastard
A child of a bastard
A loose cannon without direction
Following my erection
I was…
16 years old, she was 14
Still can’t let it go
To this day
It haunts me
Like a nightmare
I’m a repeat offender
I know I’m fucked up
I must be like my father
Expressing my feelings
I’m hot like the summer
Maggots fall from the ceiling
I confess to a crime
Now I’m constantly dreaming
How I lost my mind
My heart won’t let go
I just want you to know
What it sounds like
What it smells like
When a body just implode then explodes
I was…
16 years old, she was 14
Still can’t let it go
To this day
It haunts me
Like a nightmare
I’m a repeat offender
I know I’m fucked up
I must be like my father
I’m a joker
A real loser
Never really happy
A great pretender
At his best impression
A sad, depressed
Mother fucker
I am not even half a man
Now I’m in the shower
Soaking my head for hours
Until the water runs cold
I only pretend
To be bad and bold
When I’m really shrinking
What was I thinking
My breath from over the years
Has to be stinking
I hear laughter
Deep in the background
I’m in the bathtub crying
Thinking about dying
I just can’t let it go
I wanna take my life
Now my body’s shaking
I’m cold and I’m numb
Feeling life slip away Feeling some type of a way
I was…
16 years old, she was 14
Still can’t let it go
To this day
It haunts me
Like a nightmare
I’m a repeat offender
I know I’m fucked up
I must be like my father
Just…
A sad, depressed
Mother fucker
I am not half a man
I’m a repeat offender
Don’t know what I was thinking
Why didn’t I change her mind
Instead of drinking
Drowning sorrows, life’s a bitch living out of a bottle
After the round table meeting mother told me to go ask Nana
for money (savings bonds) to pay for an abortion. It was the first time I ever saw my grandmother cry. I did that. I made her cry. I must have crushed her heart (I tried to wipe her tears from her eyes) I was no loner the golden child in her mind. I was full of shame and disappointment.
16 years old, she was 14
Still can’t let it go
To this very day
It haunts me
That’s why I’m so lonely
I know I’m fucked up
I have to be just like my father. My mother must look at me and see a failed relationship
Just…
A sad, depressed
Mother fucker
I am not even half a man
I’m a repeat offender
I must be like my dad
I’m the mad yet sad guy
Tryin’ to get by
I didn’t even try
To change her mind
Our parents didn’t want to hear it
This messed me up for most of my life
They called me Yankee
One called me a Gringo
It was hurtful
A story of how I took a life
I was young and kinda dumb
Now I’m all alone as I should be
My family didn’t abort me
I think about it constantly
I’ve yet to be a man
I’ve dedicated my entire life giving back to others
The life I took
Still haunts me
I took life a long time ago
What was I thinking
I started young drinking
Drinking and smoking
I even started choking
purposely trying to kill myself
Silently drowning in pain and sorrow the unborn will never see tomorrow
I can’t let it go
I’m a bad boy
I’m a loser
Always running
Away from problems
Instead of confronting
My demons still haunt me
Like October 31st
My mother’s birthday
I was…
16 years old, she was 14
Still can’t let it go
To this day
It haunts me
Like a nightmare
I’m a repeat offender
I know I’m fucked up
One took the morning after pill all I could do is just close my eyes. Here we go again
I didn’t wrap up
Went in without
Back up
I failed to plan
Therefore, I planned to fail
You must got me fucked up
Trying to get unstuck
Now my head is spinning
From all the smoke and drinking
That was when my ears started ringing
I wasn’t aware of all the
Signs, signals and symbols
