Write about The Front Door Slammed

The Front Door Slammed

Wham!

I jumped as the front door slammed behind me.  Fear washed over me in waves of ice water and I struggled to breathe. I shivered even though it was August and the muggy heat of Chesapeake had previously been sapping every bit of energy out of my old, tired body. It was a fear reprised from childhood when the front door slamming invariably meant pain and humiliation was soon to follow.

I was an only child – mostly because my mother refused to bring another child into the world to face the drunken wrath of my father. Consequently, it was me and me alone who had to bear with the beatings and near-starvation. Surprisingly, my father was never unkind to my mother even when drunk – unless, of course, you counted the beating of her only child as being unkind to her. He never laid a finger on her, almost never had a cross word for her and was constantly bringing sweet, unexpected gifts to her.  Usually just before he beat me.

It had, obviously, been many years since my father had beat me – he died peacefully in his sleep more than thirty years ago. No, I had nothing to do with his death, although I had often turned the idea over in my mind more than once - even as a grown man. No, it was a natural thing. He even looked kind and somehow angelic lying there in his coffin. It was all I could do to pretend to mourn but I felt that it was required of me in order to protect my mother. No one ever knew about that side of my father – no one but me and my mom.  She had tried to protect me but my father had created a small prison out of a closet and if she interfered, he would put her into it until the beating was done.  I'm amazed that my mom retained any degree of sanity at all.

I have never married. How could I risk the possibility that something evil and foul lived within me and could, at any moment, leap out to destroy my family? No, it was better that I remain alone. I turned down all attempts at friendship from the people I worked with, as well. After all, I might strike out at them, too. Who knew how deep the stagnant pool in my heart?  People considered me to be antisocial when, in reality, I was doing my best to keep from destroying the social network around me. It has been a lonely and sad life but I can’t do anything to fix it.  I mean, who could I tell?  Who would believe what I had to say – about my life, my fears or the slamming front door?

Me versus You

I thought I knew the answers; turns out that I don’t even know the questions. I am nearing the end of my life – well, I am certainly closer to the end than I am to the beginning. And I am just now learning that I can never learn enough to keep up with the changes to the world. No, I’m not talking about new gadgets, new inventions, new ways to do things – I’m talking about changes in people.

What has happened to courtesy? What has happened to respect for a person? What has happened that no one counts for much of anything any longer?

I hold a door open for anyone – not just women, the elderly, or handicapped folks – everyone. Why? Because that is what I was taught – courtesy is indicative of a concern for others. It is indicative of the fact that I am recognizing that person and respecting them. How many folks do you suppose bother to say thank you? I’ve never actually counted but I am going to start doing so just so I can answer that question for my own benefit.

How many times have you wondered just where the world is going? I find that I am more and more frequently wondering just that. When did our love for others become just a self-love world? At what point does our self-love give way to a hate-others sort of society? We are already all about self-love; we are well on our way to hate-others, I believe. I don’t think I want to live in that sort of world, do you?

It’s not about Democrats versus Republicans, blacks versus whites, old versus young or anything else other than me against you. Me is much more important than you. Me is what it is all about – you is so last week.

Are you tired? I am.

Write About a Mess

I hit him - hard. He got back up and wobbled over to where I was standing. His lip was bleeding and my knuckles were skinned. I wasn’t sure but I think one of them was probably broken.

“Is that the best you can do,” he sneered? “My sister used to hit me harder than that and she only weighed about 70 pounds.”

“Listen, I said I don’t want to fight – why can’t you just leave it at that? Why get yourself all smacked around and maybe get some real damage?”

“Real damage? You’re going to pass along some real damage to me?” He looked up into the sky. “I don’t see any pigs flying,” he laughed.

The stretch of his lip when he laughed caused it to start bleeding heavily. Large drops rolled over his bottom lip and spilled to the floor. As I stood there, momentarily mesmerized by the blood flowing from his lips, he swung a huge haymaker right that caught me squarely on the side of the head. My eyes momentarily rolled back in my head and I abruptly sat down; not neatly or gingerly, mind you, but with a huge ‘whump’ that rattled my teeth together.

He stood over me and there was no longer a trace of laughter in his face. I knew what was coming next – a swift kick aimed at my ribs but I managed to partially block it with my left arm and I caught his foot with my right hand and pulled over and upward as hard and fast as I could. He fell backwards and his head smacked against the floor. He wasn’t unconscious but he was temporarily out of the fight. I took advantage of his situation and struggled to my feet. My head was throbbing and my left arm was strangely numb.

I knew that I had to do something to stop this fight; it was way out of hand. I did what any self-respecting boy would do.

“Mom, Mike started a fight and when I hit him back I split his lip. The blood on the floor is from his lip – he made the mess, not me!”

Writer's Assignment - Someone Calls Your Name

It was late and it was cold. The street was dirty, filled with muddy water from the recent, heavy rains. It was dark; most of the street lights shattered by vandals and the few that were left seemed to make it darker rather than lighter. Random pieces of trash floated down the gutters turned impromptu rivers. My shoes were sodden, filled with water from the multiple openings in the soles. Had it still been raining, my heart would have filled with water as well, flowing in through the holes in my soul.

I tried to pull the threadbare coat tighter about my shoulders but it, too, was sopping wet and having little to no effect on keeping me warm. At least the boonie hat had kept most of the rain off my head. Both had come from a thrift store that wasn’t too concerned with how clean things were before they sold them. I had waged a small battle with certain bugs for several days before the folks at the shelter had helped me conquer them. Life hadn’t been all that wonderful lately.
“Hey, Frost, where are you going?”

I stopped dead in my tracks for a few seconds and then slowly turned around.

No one was there. Just more trash and more water. More cold. More emptiness. More darkness.
Had I been so sunk in my misery that I had started imagining that someone cared about me? I started to laugh but the dry, hacking cough I had developed in the last day or so stole my laughter and drowned it in its infancy. I couldn’t even begin to believe that someone had some sympathy or concern for me.

I turned back around and continued my plodding trek down the street; stumbling now and again over things hidden beneath the brown water. I don’t know why I continued in that direction – all directions led to that ultimate destination of a destitute and useless end.

“Hey, Frost, didn’t you hear me? I’m talking to you.”

I stopped again but didn’t turn around. What would be the purpose?

“What do you want?” I whispered.

“You, of course,” the voice spoke. “I want you.”

“Why?”

“Because you have no time left and I am here to collect you.”

Ah, I thought – the Grim Reaper. Thanatos. Apollyon. Abaddon. Death. Well, he would get no argument from me; I was more than ready to leave this mortal coil and shuffle off to my reward or, more likely, to my punishment.

“What took you so long?” I asked. “Why didn’t you show up a couple of years ago when I was on top – why wait until I had lost everything? Why the prolonged suffering?”

“Not my choice, friend. I’m only the transportation; it’s someone else’s decision as to when I show up.”

Surprisingly, the water in my face was warm and the pavement was soft as any mother’s love.

12U Fast Pitch Softball

All this week, my middle granddaughter (Autumn Woods) has been up in Washington, DC playing in the NSA Nationals Tournament for 12U Traveling Fast Pitch softball. Her team lost their first game in the actual "it counts" part of the tournament yesterday and then battled back to get to the final 4. Unfortunately, they lost their second game this morning (double elimination), so they ended up in 4th place. Still pretty darn good out of a field of 17 teams. I didn't have a photo of her in this team's (Galaxy Red) uniform so I used a photo of her from a couple of years ago when she was on the Triple Threat Lady Tigers (10U) and they won the Pony Nationals up in Delaware. Eileen and I went to that tournament and it was quite the show!

Congratulations to you, Autumn, and to Galaxy Red for their fine tournament play!

The 11th Commandment - Tease not lest ye be teased.

I admit that I have a terrible habit - I pick on my grandchildren. Now, I do pick on them, but it isn't out of meanness - mischievousness would better fit the situation. Unfortunately, as they have grown older, they have learned how to play the game and I am frequently on the receiving end of their wit.

My youngest grandchild is August, who is almost 9 years old. When she was about 4 or 5, she was riding in the back seat of the car and she was pretending to be a policewoman writing tickets. I'm sure you can guess who was the recipient of all those tickets - it appears that I couldn't do anything right. Finally, I complained about all the tickets and why she was being so mean to me. Well, she didn't answer me directly - she merely said, "I love my job!"

Fast forward to this past Sunday - she was going to church with us and, as per our routine, I was teasing her. After this long back and forth about something, she just kind of shook her head and said to me "Grandaddy, you have sooo many things wrong with you."

Out of the mouths of babes.

Have I ever mentioned that Eileen and I have 2 dogs? Here is a photo of Shamus Lochlan MacGregor when he was just a couple of months old. He and Eileen fell in love with each other at first sight. She was "browsing" at the pet store while I was doing something else in the mall and she said that all these folks walked by him and he just lay in his cage looking at them. However, when she walked by, he got up, came to the window and put his paw on the window so she put her hand to the window as well and they just stared at each other for a while.

As fortune would have it, our youngest daughter (Katie) happened to be in the mall and when Eileen saw her and told her about the puppy, she wanted to go see him. I had already checked on the price and told my daughter that there was no way I was going to spend that kind of money on a dog (big bucks!). Anyway, while back in the pet store, Katie had the girl get the puppy out and give her to Eileen. Tears just blew loose from her eyes and I knew that I was sunk - big bucks or no, that puppy had to come home with us.

I'll have to tell you the story of our other puppy some other time - I don't have a photo of her in this computer.