Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Finale Part 3 of 3 Query Letter 

“Was nothing real?”

—from the film Truman Show

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Query Letter for The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Dated: February 22^nd, 2025; JoJo Day

To whom it may concern, 

“This world is a mess.”

With humanity arguing over absolutely everything today, that is one of the few statements I could make here that might get a unanimous nod from the imaginary head of public opinion. That said, many people still exist who are hoping all this mess has happened—and is happening—for a reason. 

The story of The Real GOOD Loser is for those people. And anyone else wanting or needing to believe that things on this planet can get better. Also, nobody seems to know what the f is real or not right now. This story is also for those people. Because, as everyone will soon discover, I am very real…I just don’t know about everyone else yet. 

Am I living in The Matrix? … Am I part of the Truman Show? … Have you been watching me all this time? … Are you real? 

Depending on who and when you are, not everything I say here can make sense to you. Like everything, it’s a matter of perspective. If you happen to be a literary agent reading this, I do apologize for the impersonal nature of this introduction, but the goal here is to simply introduce myself and my story to you (assuming you’re real of course).

If you are an agent reading this please know this query to you doubles as the ending to my story that you can be read and/or listen to in its entirety at RecoveryHighSchool(dot)com. I’ve heard that agents are selling the author just as much as the story and so I hope what you find there will be helpful when deciding to represent me or not.  

Yes—This world is most definitely a mess. But the cycle of tearing each other down over it is counterproductive and has only helped create this sad reality of ours. Rather than blaming people, the story of The Real GOOD Loser takes aim at another culprit without making it so personal: Entertainment. 

The psychological effect of all forms of entertainment on a person’s sub-conscious is real; effecting humanity on both a micro and macro level. More simply: The drama we see on screens impacts how we treat each other on streets—and on social media—and in classrooms—and in workplaces—and in homes—and in our minds. 

Could we all benefit from going back to high school to better understand the effects entertainment has had on our reality? 

As a person that tends to punish himself for his thoughts, perception is something I am always trying to pay attention to and learn more about. When it comes to entertainment, I’ll say this now and with confidence: “Perception is vital to our species survival.” 

That is The Great War I believe we have ahead of us and The Great War referenced in the story of The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

What we’ve seen on screen has bled into our reality. It’s made our world a darker place. We humans can debate and argue over everything and anything, but maybe we can all agree on that in the spirit of putting this messed up world back together.

Who am I kidding…that will never happen—But what if it could?

If the fiction on screen created a darker world, could we use it do the opposite? … Could we make the change we need in the real world… ENTERTAINING? 

The story of The Real GOOD Loser merges my real life with fiction and could be labeled as “realistic fiction”. As its author I’ve had a rather interesting life thus far and could have perhaps found earlier success by writing a memoire that might have provided financial freedom for me but would have left me living in this same sad world as before. Knowing that would never bring me the happiness I was looking for, I wrote this story instead, with much more grandiose ambitions than just making myself some money. 

With this story I hope to introduce a fictional character that can change the world using entertainment and at the same time provide myself a voice and platform to change the real world at the same time. My character’s story and my real-life story will “diverge” in many ways, and I like to think this world will need both of us to help make things just a little bit better. 

There needs to be a revolution in education. This story and everything that might come after is also an attempt at making that happen. Have I made my ambitions grandiose enough for you yet? Or should I maybe sprinkle a little more crazy into this for you? 

Don’t worry—we’ll get there. 

In the story of The Real GOOD Loser this teacher character with my backstory was teaching a class called Emotional Intelligence at a Recovery High School when Covid hit in 2020. What is real and not-exactly-real in the story will not be explained entirely here as it is part of the story. Rather I will now only sprinkle you with a few necessary truths.  

When Covid came along and disrupted life as we knew it, I really was teaching at a Recovery Highschool in Worcester, Massachusetts named Rockdale Recovery High; a school established to help students struggling with substance abuse. Teaching there I found their attempts futile as I believe substance abuse stems from bigger mental health issues.

“My conclusion is this: Our environment effects our thoughts, and our thoughts effect our emotions, therefore, to improve mental health on a global scale we must change our environment. Period.”

— from Chapter 21 of The Real GOOD Loser; titled B.S.

A student at that school named Caitlyn said something to me I’ll never forget. After a heart-to-heart conversation with her, she looked at me from behind her desk and said: “You get paid to care.”

I’ve learned a lot about people on life’s journey thus far. One undeniable truth is that many of us are more likely to listen to a stranger than someone we know; a true statement when you talk like me at least as I’ve found people will often listen to doomsayers. But I try to be hopeful when I’m forced to speak to people in the real world. It’s not always easy, and I don’t always believe what I say, but I try. 

Caitlyn had dreams of moving to California back then; the “Geographical Cure” we call it in recovery. Where she is now I don’t know but can only hope she’s stayed in the fight long enough for these words to reach her. 

Caitlyn didn’t need another teacher that day, what she needed was a better world—a better environment—and so I eventually quit that good paying and stable job to write this story…not on a whim but because I believed it to be my calling.  

Once you know everything, I don’t think you’d consider it an exaggeration were I to say this “calling” nearly killed me. That student had no clue how permanently broken I felt when she said that to me. She wasn’t trying to hurt me—she just didn’t know my story. I was twenty years older than her but when experiences connect people is age and all that other “stuff” really that important?

If I had told that student I’d been in her shoes that day she might have rolled her eyes at me. But I had. What she said bothered me not because it was an attack on me or my profession, but because I could relate to how she felt. 

No one cares anymore—People are just checking off boxes for a paycheck these days—This hate-filled world is full of self-absorbed selfish and entitled a holes—It’s true: “People suck!” 

Like Caitlyn, I tend to see money as the underlining drive for most everything these days. With everything these days being rather awful, should I have told her what I think is the truth? 

“Greed is acting like a vacuum on our world, sucking not only money from the many, but also its dreams, compassion, and empathy in order serve the luxury of the few.”

— from Chapter 17 of The Real GOOD Loser; titled Regret

If Caitlyn hadn’t rolled her eyes at me before, she most definitely would have had I said that. People hate when I blame money for problems in the real world: “Why blame something you can’t change?” I’ve been told.  

That same day Caitlyn suggested I listen to a song titled Just Like You by the rap artist NF. Opening up to her, only to be told I get “paid to care” and that I should listen to that song reaffirmed a belief I had years earlier that kids are learning more from the entertainment they are consuming than from me, a teacher at the time. 

The fact this student was growing up in a world that made her feel I only cared because I was paid saddened me and further fueled my desire to try and change things— But how? … How could I make people listen to me? … Who the hell was I?

“Entertainment is an exaggeration of truth.”

— from Chapter 18 of The Real GOOD Loser; titled The D Words.

The characters in my story aren’t entirely real but are based on real people. Like Jayleen. Another student at that Recovery High School who liked to tell me to go f myself. Her boyfriend Jason might have had some Nel from my story in him. Both of those real students were great kids…even if they didn’t always behave or act like it. 

Prior to getting that job at almost forty years old, life had not gone as planned for me. An understatement to a hilarious degree once you know my story. Rather than considering that time wasted, I like to think it was time I was given to do some homework. 

In his book Chasing the Scream, Johann Hari investigates The Drug War; how it started and if it was successful. In that author’s opinion it was not. While I do agree with this opinion, I know how controversial opinions are and how quickly people tend to shut down or argue today. I only reference that book here because of something it said about the early 1900’s: 

“American culture was looking for an outlet for its swelling tide of anxiety—a real, physical object it could destroy, in the hope that this would destroy its fear of a world that was changing more rapidly than their parents and grandparents could ever have imagined.”

Looking at the world today, that line spoke to me. What if we started ourselves a new war? I wondered. 

What if we identified something to fight against that might bring us back together—like they tried doing with that whole drug thing. What could be that something for us today? … What is causing the swelling tide of anxiety now?

As a species, we’ve admitted to many problems, but the teacher in me will list a few here to keep us focused. Many of us have lost faith in people. Many of us don’t know who to believe or what to believe so many of us believe nothing. Humanity today seems to trusts no one yet believe everything.

According to the book Stein On Writing, humanity has learned to “suspend belief for the sake of story”. We’ve become very good at this that author says. If I was your teacher, I might ask you what effect you think this learned ability of ours has had on how humanity perceives reality today. 

In the real world I am a father to three boys who have been raised in safe and loving environments. All three of my boys grew up scared of being alone however and worried about burglars more than I wished they would have. Part of me blames this on one of our all-time favorite movies: Home Alone. 

A poster of this movie hangs on the wall above my computer in the bedroom we share—I’m looking at it as I write this now.

On this poster Kevin looks at me while slapping his cheeks with both hands and making that big o-face of his; the one he makes when he’s using his dad’s aftershave in the movie. Behind Kevin in the poster, two burglars stare at him through a snowy window; Harry and Marv. The caption on the poster reads: “But Don’t Worry…He cooks. He cleans. He kicks some butt.” 

Did some of my boys’ worries and fears stem from this fun movie they’ve loved ever since they were little? 

Many would argue this a silly thing of me to think. Others would argue there is a lot of truth in it. Again, we humans can debate and argue over everything and anything. 

I, however, am not the person you might expect me to be after hearing me blame Home Alone for my children’s worries and fears. In fact, I only used that example here so that I might say this to you now: “I am most definitely not a pussy!” 

That line—though definitely rude and inappropriate—connects to my story and is a line I use here for ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY. Proving a point: The way we hear people speak to one another is often a result of entertainment. 

Even the super special Elon Musk references entertainment when he speaks. According to an article on FoxNews(dot)com he was quoting Tom Cruise’s character in the movie Tropic Thunder on his social media platform when on December 27^th, 2024, he wrote this: “Take a big step back and F—YOURSELF in the face.” 

While I am not a p-word, I am overly sensitive. Which explains only some of why this story took me so long to complete. A crippling sense of insecurity had me revising this story over and over while I waited for the most appropriate time to share this story with the world. That time…I believe…is now.

I believe everyone is “In Recovery” from the effects of entertainment and that all of us would benefit from revisiting “High School” in order to discover ways to navigate recovery in the real world. These beliefs presented me with the following three dilemmas:

One. How do we address the psychological effects of entertainment without overstepping and upsetting an overly sensitive and critical world? 

Two. How do we promote discovery without taking away all the joy entertainment brings us in the process? 

And Three. How do we avoid micromanaging the growth of not only entertainment, but also of the individual?

Surviving in this reality has become exhausting. And it’s not all a result of entertainment. Trust me, I get it. 

The other day I took those boys I just mentioned to the mall. That big fancy mall we walked around has turned into a strip of stores that have a lot of “things and stuff” in them but barely any people. Scattered between people-empty-stores were showrooms of outrageously expensive shoes. “How much do you think dad?” My boys asked with a shrink-wrapped shoe in their hand. They’d then flip that shoe over and laugh at my look disgust. 

As a father, I think paying hundreds, even thousands, of dollars for a pair of sneakers is…well, stupid and shallow. But as a college graduate with a degree in business finance, I find it impossible to make sense of and simply infuriating to be honest.

How is our reality supposed to continue like this? 

Our way of life is unsustainable. I think we all know that at this point. The cost of housing alone is mind-boggling. Crises after crises has saved us here in the United States, but those tricks; or unfortunately fortunate events, won’t last forever. Something needs to change——or break maybe. 

Personally, I’ve lost a lot of things in life. Money being one of them. Strangely enough, losing things has always created opportunities for me in life. So maybe that financial apocalypse we seem to be tiptoeing towards might end up being a good thing for humanity in some way.

Did you just roll your eyes at me? 

This story came together like a puzzle for me. A puzzle with some very sharp pieces. In my struggle to have it make sense, there were times friends and family thought I was hiding my true self behind some character. Other times, friends and family believed I truly thought I was some character. 

This all made life difficult for me but provided me an even better story to tell— Could I use my story to not only save myself, but others at the same time? 

Delaying this story’s release—some by choice, a lot not—had me playing with different ways in which to present it. “Experiments” I’ve come to call them. I wish I could say I planned everything to happen the way it did, but I most definitely did not. I’ve simply tried to make everything seem like part of the plan. What else could I do? … Give up? 

I’m just a numbers guy really. In statistics The Law of Large Numbers states: the greater the sample size the more predictable an outcome becomes. 

I believed I could change our future by using entertainment. To achieve my desired outcome, I would need as many people involved as possible to make the outcome I envisioned more likely. With endless entertainment options for people to choose from today, how could I make this possible? 

What I came up with starts with this story… but this story is just the beginning. 

“Great power lies in one’s ability to shape the future.”

If this mantra is true, money most certainly plays a role. But what if “popularity” paves the roads that enable a person to truly shape the future? 

Not fleeting popularity—like one might achieve by creating a viral video—but sustainable popularity: the kind I hope we might create by presenting the story of The Real GOOD Loser to the world. 

I should sound a little crazy to you at this point, but perhaps those that are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do. Hoping this is true, allow me to now share with you the first two phases by which I hope to use this story to start changing our future. 

Phase One: Get this story published.

At approximately 120,000 words, the story of The Real GOOD Loser is written in a way I hope will keep the distracted mind focused just long enough to maybe learn a few things. As an American with the 2024 election ahead of me, I wrote this story with that election in mind. I wouldn’t be able to change that election but knew it would appear as déjà vu to me for one reason or another. Intelligent consumers of my story will be able to piece together what I mean by that. 

“People need hope. People need to believe that bad things can be turned good. They need to see it happen. They need to be a part of it. That is my quest.”

This is the quote I imagine being displayed on the back cover of the story to be published. I imagine that quote appearing inside to the “Backwards L”. Which from that perspective will look like a J for The J-Man. In the story of The Real GOOD Loser: PERSPECTIVE—IS—EVERYTHING. 

Phase Two: Release the podcast version of this story.

There is a second version of this story I’ve written. At approximately 160,000 words currently, it has the printed version in it but is interrupted with sections titled “Breaking Knews” to be read by a second voice for the podcast: The Narrator. 

That podcast version of this story begins with The Narrator saying the following: 

With great evil spreading chaos across the universe, this story will be an exercise of the mind intended to help humanity navigate a world where deciphering what is real from what is fake has become a constant struggle. A struggle that—as you are probably know—is very real.

This struggle to decipher what is real from what is fake has resulted in a world full of people who find themselves scared, tired, and confused. Or worse. The worse being a seemingly insurmountable level of despair. A level of despair that has many on the verge of giving up completely.

This reality cannot be allowed to continue as there is more on the line than you know.

The changes needed however come with too much Red Tape: rules and orders and systems and people that make transformation slow and ineffective. Hence the selection of this tale; dusted off and shared with you now at this most appropriate time—a calculated decision that will present the most efficient path forward.

Like all stories parts of this one are pure fiction, not much of it though. The challenge of knowing the difference will be left to you Dear Readers and Listeners. Please take from this story what you can and question what you must. Find the truth in the entertainment and kindly use that truth to destroy the world you know and assist in the creation of a better one.

This “Written-For-Audio Production” incorporates audio from entertainment into it; making it a more engaging experience. It is written in a way I hope others might emulate when sharing their own stories with the world someday. It will bring readers and listeners of the published version of this story through it from an entirely different perspective. 

The goal of the podcast version of this story is to tell the world everything about me—the real me: the good, the bad, the ugly, and the very embarrassing. 

“I wish nothing more than to be completely honest with people today. That’s a weird thing to wish for but it’s true.”

—from Chapter 9 of The Real GOOD Loser; titled Diverge

If the printed version is a success, this podcast version should be highly anticipated and might provide the world a voice they can maybe believe and trust in the real world someday (only if they want of course). 

That podcast version of this story will also set up future stories I might write someday. Stories I had originally planned to write before I accidentally burnt my house down and before my two visits to a psyche hospital.

I will need both the written version and the podcast version of this story to explain the vision that had family and friends thinking I had lost my grip on reality back then. Seeing what reality has become today—completely insane—I’m willing to risk being locked up a third time if there is even a small chance I can make this reality better for my boys. 

In a world where miracles exist, magic is real, and dreams come true, the way in which I plan to promote this story is rather simple. 

On April 1^st, 2025—the ten-year anniversary of what is identified as “the biggest mistake I ever made” in the podcast version of the story—I will make the following post on Facebook: 

“I’m excited to announce that The Real GOOD Loser has finally found a literary agent. If you would like to experience the version of the story being pitched to publishers, you can read and/or listen to it for free at RecoveryHighSchool(dot)com. I know it’s April Fools Day, but this is no joke. Thanks for the likes, comments, and shares…it helps!”

I would make that post on the Facebook page I created for The Real GOOD Loser that has over thirty thousand followers; followers I gained by running small ads when I first started working on this story when Covid hit, and on my city’s private Facebook page: Leominsterites Unite. 

I made a post on that local page on September 11^th, 2024, that is written into the Finale of the story. The purpose of doing that was to eventually illustrate the empty and dangerous nature of social media on dreamers like me. 

Sharing that post, I’d then let gossip and the power of the internet do its thing.

I’ve asked twelve friends to read and/or listen to this story while I wait to hear back from agents. I care about what other people think. I always will—it’s just how I’m wired. If those friends like the story but I am unable to find an agent by April 1^st, should I make that post telling people I have anyway? … Would some “lies and deceptions and tricks” be justified at that point? 

That “lies and deceptions and tricks” line I just used was pirated from the show Game of Thrones. In the episode it was taken from; titled Mockingbird, the future queen Deanery’s Targaryen has dreams of stopping the wheel of power that crushes those without and prepares to present the old masters the choice they have before them: “They can live in my new world,” she says in that episode, “or they can die in their old one.” 

Later in that same episode another character says: “If you want to build a better home, first you must demolish the old one.” 

According to a Facebook post, Game of Thrones is the most widely consumed show in the world today. In sharing just a few lines from that show with you here, we can ask ourselves: What information, feelings, and/or emotions, is the entertainment we are consuming feeding us? 

One of the many goals of this story is to answer that question. Asking it now, one might consider the words to the song Civil War by Guns and Roses: “Look at the hate we’re breeding, look at the fear we’re feeding, look at the lives we’re leading, the way we’ve always done before.”

Life has taught me many things and blessed me with many gifts. The greatest of those gifts perhaps being the ability to see people for who they are and not judge them completely on how they behave or act—a true blessing in our current environment as I’m sure you can imagine.

I can only hope I’ve manufactured enough drama here to maybe get you interested in all this. Whether we work on it together or not I can’t know. Still, I think I’m here to make you believe something. For that I hope you’ll wish me luck…I’m gonna need it!

“Whatever happens it promises to be one hell of a show though. So, gather your friends and sit up close, you won’t want to miss it. Maybe you could go and buy yourself a cowboy hat and watch it with me and my dad?”

—from Chapter 8 of The Real GOOD Loser; titled The Bull

Now that you somewhat know the plan, allow me to end here with a few final questions for reflection: Who are we really? … Are we the people we let this world see? …Or is there perhaps more to us than we put out for show—for ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY? (Fill a page!)

Thank you for letting me be your teacher. And remember…the end is only the beginning.

Sincerely Yours, With Love—The Real GOOD Loser: “Ready or not, here I come.”

P.S. 

Maybe everything that happened didn’t happen for a reason. Maybe everything that happened didn’t have to happen. We can’t change the past but maybe we can change the future. From that future perspective, perhaps everything will have happened for a reason.  Through greatness and discipline—maybe we really are the master of our fate?

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The Teacher’s Playlist (final song):

A Whole New World from the 2019 film Aladdin

“I can open your eyes. Take you wonder by wonder. Over, sideways and under… On a magic carpet ride.”

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(End of Chapter 27 and end of Story….?)

To go to beginning of story click here…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Six: Finale Part Two of Three: Showstopper

“There is only one war that matters: The Great War…and it is here.”

— from the show Game of Thrones

The date today is Tuesday February 22^nd, 2050…. I am the Boy Who Died. 

Three voices creep into my dream and tear apart the image in front of me. The sound of a trumpet gets louder as my dream fights to stay alive. One last horn blows and echoes around the inside of my mind louder and longer than what seems possible. Waking up, I smell reality. 

This is how I’ve trained myself to identify dreams now. Smell. Reality has a very unique smell. 

Breathing in that unfortunate smell, I keep my eyes closed as I don’t want to forget this dream yet. Some might prefer to live in the past if they could, but me, I’d prefer to live in these dreams of mine if I possible. But I can’t. It’s taken me a lifetime to accept this…to accept that: reality always wins. 

“We shouldn’t wake him up,” I hear someone say as the emptiness of this reality quickly consumes me. “We should let him keep dreaming.”

“Why do you say he’s dreaming?” a second voice asks as the spotlight in my mind turns to him.

“He had that smile on his face,” a third voice in the room walks onto the platform waiting for him in my mind, “like he was king of the world or something.”

This last comment is made by Jayce; one of my twins. Jayce is My Joker. To me it’s his laugh that makes him so special. He’ll try and make others laugh even when he’s hurting himself. A laugh like that can only cover one’s sadness for so long though—I know that from experience. 

The Three Young Men around me get a small chuckle from what Jayce says about my dreaming face. Time has made them men but when they talk to each other like this I can still sometimes hear them as children. Surrounding me on all sides, I complete their circle by lying in this bed; they have their own chairs in here now and so I know where each of them sits without having to open my eyes. 

For the past few days, I’ve been slipping in and out of consciousness; discussing the life I’ve lived and telling myself I can be proud of the legacy I’m leaving behind. I believe this, I really do. But still it hurts. Because I don’t want to leave them… my three best friends… my wolfpack… My Boys. 

If every life is a story, and if all stories are love stories, you were always the real focus of mine.

Beneath the sheets I move my fingers just a little to make sure I’m still here; to make sure this isn’t another twisted creation of my mind. Feeling the softness of the bed confirms I have not yet made my exit. 

Even if this wasn’t true though—even if I was just watching them have that party I want them to have when I’m gone—I’d still be content. Yes, I am dying, but I have made my peace with this life and with my boys around me this is still a wonderful ending to my story. 

Keeping my eyes closed, I feel my heart inch its way up my chest and feel like I might choke on the sadness swelling up inside me. With a purposeful breath I push it down and fight to stay strong. For them. 

Throat cancer took away my ability to talk to anyone today. Pretending to still be asleep, I force myself to think about that to keep this sadness from overwhelming me.

I was supposed to go see a specialist after being advised by my doctor. But then I got frustrated with the insurance process and those stupid referral requests. The cost of merely existing had me getting mad at those poor people on the phone for just doing their job; like all the bullshit was their fault. Putting Band-Aids on my life had become my life. After a week of trying to set that appointment up my throat felt better. So, I did as I always did…I did what The Beatles told me to do: I “Let It Be”—God, how stupid I was.

Tapping into the anger does its job. I feel the sadness inside me leak away; replaced by frustration and that sense of hopelessness this reality makes certain is always present just beneath the surface. It’s as if I can literally see these emotions that live inside me now. I’m so tired of talking to myself though. It feels like I’ve been doing it forever—When will all this just end already? 

With my eyes still closed, I focus again on the three voices talking all around me.

“Do you guys remember Dad asking us that question all the time?”

It’s funny the things our loved ones discuss when we’re dying. 

“You mean… the question?” I hear Brett reply knowingly. “Who’s gonna change the future?” 

I can’t help but hear the gloom fill the space between Brett’s words. Brett is my other twin; my Believer. To me it’s his heart that makes him so special. He’ll believe in you even when you can’t believe in yourself. Everyone should be so lucky to have a person like that their lives, but a heart like that gets heavy in a world so darkened by anger and hate—I know mine did. 

“Do you remember why he asked us that? Like was he serious? … I mean, do you really think he thought we would?”

The questions are presented to the group by my youngest son; Joey. Joey is my Thinker. All three of my boys have some Joker and Believer in them, but to me it’s his curious mind that makes him so special. His mind is always asking questions and coming up with ideas. In a world so full of problems, a mind like that becomes troublesome—mine most certainly did. 

When these boys were young I had trained them to say, “We will!” whenever I asked this question about who was gonna change the future. It was a cute thing to do when they were all little. I did really believe we’d change the future for a time though. Unfortunately…that time never came. 

The room goes quiet after Joey presents his brothers, Jayce and Brett, with his series of questions. There is a fan on somewhere; the breeze moves back and forth and reminds me that this is no longer some dream of mine. With no one talking, I reflect on that actual dream I was just having before these three wonderful morons of mine decided to wake me up. 

That dream was most definitely some variation to the ending of that story I wrote years ago. Even now, when I am about to die, my mind is still messing with me it seems; attempting to piece together a puzzle I was incapable of piecing together on my own. 

Maybe people will finally read my story when I’m dead?

When I’m gone these boys will find one hundred copies of that story I wrote years ago in my closet. Being told my illness was terminal, I gained the courage to read it a while back. That’s when I found myself wondering if maybe people would finally read it when I’m dead.  

I had originally titled that story Social Recovery 101: A Book That Could Spark A Redistribution. 

That word redistribution I had pirated from the book The Real History Of The End Of The World by Sharan Newman. Many books found me and talked to me in ways I needed over the years. That one discussed people who had prophesized the world’s destruction and had massive followings by doing so. Hoping our world would be awakened rather than destroyed, I gave my story that title as an act of defiance. 

Writing that story had me feeling like the-little-engine-that-could attempting to climb Mount Everest: “I think I can…I think I can…I think I can.” Really, I didn’t think I could. It was like chopping down a forever re-growing tree of doubt. Each day and each chop had me questioning my sanity. 

Part of me was relieved to put it away. I had a story to tell, and I did. Whether people read it or not was out of control—it took me a very long time to accept that. 

People called me a lot of names for believing in what that story could maybe do, funny enough I learned the words friends and family and doctors were looking for when watching a comedian’s stand-up act one day: Russel Brand’s Messiah Complex. “He thinks he’s gonna save the world!” Are the words they were looking for: “He’s got a Messiah Complex!” 

Studying entertainment had me realizing plenty of messiahs had been depicted to me over the years. If people might tease me and compare me to one, I decided I’d be like Harry Potter: the Boy Who Lived. I’d make people believe in magic and miracles again. Me and my boys would be voices people could trust—how blasphemous.

No real messiah would be as angry or inappropriate minded as me. My mind remembers sending that last query to agents and constantly having to erase spam email hoping someone had responded. I’d get excited when my phone rang only to be disappointed when it was just another person trying to sell me something. 

With so many ways to communicate, somehow humanity had lost its ability to communicate entirely it seemed. Life—every goddamn part of it—had become exhausting and FAF. 

Money was causing the world to fall apart around me. Wealth discrepancy connected us all. I, however, would never be comfortable telling people what to do with their money—and said so in that story—rather, I’d need to show people. To do that I’d need money…a boatload of it. 

Yes, I was most certainly crazy and delusional for what I believed that story might give me the opportunity to do. Lying on this bed now though, being called crazy no longer scares me finally, and believing in a delusion or two or three of four seems a bit like common sense. 

Me as President though? … Hard pass on that one. Who in their right mind would want to be President these days? Other parts of that dream I could have lived with.

With that story I’d increase humanity’s cognitive ability to interpret stories. Rather than simply watch and believe, I wanted to teach people how to watch and decipher instead. I needed to increase humanities collective C.S.I. Score: Common Sense Intellect: one’s ability to separate truth from fiction when presented a piece of entertainment in the real world. 

I purposely deceived potential readers and listeners of that story by blurring the lines between fiction and reality. In the end those readers and listeners would be challenged to piece together what was real and what wasn’t. 

The Uncle Marshal me and Joey talked to in that story I imagined being Eminem: the rapper. If the story worked, I’d ask him to re-write that Cinderella Man song for me and turn it into an anthem for The J-Man——If that really happened why couldn’t my boys call him Uncle Marsh someday? 

Many of Eminem’s songs spoke to me over the years. At times some felt like they were written just for me. Did that make me crazy? … Or had I simply become a product of my world? — A person that felt more connected to the entertainment I consumed than the people that surrounded me. 

The idea for that story first came to me in 2014. In the YouTube video I made after the fire in 2016 to try and get people to read what I wrote then I used that song No Love Eminem did with Lil’ Wayne imagining “feeling alive again” if I could escape the nightmare that had become my life at the time. Years later, when I finally attempted writing that story again, what I most wanted was to escape the tyranny of Joey’s mom; Sirena I called her in that story.

She had chosen to play a different role in my life by then and so I needed a name that fit. The name I chose stood for “super powerful enchantress” according to some Google search I did. With a change of perspective, Eminem’s song No Love conveniently described how she had been treating me then—Who would have ever imagined it?

I still believe all people have some good inside of them. She, like the rest of the world, tested that belief to its extreme at times. 

She had rendered me utterly powerless. My only hope of escape, I thought, was to pour my pain and frustration into that story and hope it might break me free of the chains I created for myself by getting involved with her in the first place. 

I really was King Stupid maybe. For so long I tried writing that story in a way that wouldn’t embarrass her. Right up until the very end at least. It’s a miracle I kept it together for that long maybe. 

With that story I’d fight. For me and anyone else feeling chained to a reality controlled by not-so-good people. If my story worked: GOOD would win! —— Eventually…. Finally…. Maybe?

Joey was in fifth grade when I finally put that story away. His mom wanted to send him to a private school thirty minutes away the following year. Like my son, I wasn’t a fan. Looking back, perhaps I was being selfish though. 

I had big plans for me and that story and these boys then and wanted them to live a normal life as long as possible. The fact she was willing to spend some of that house money on him I should have perhaps been grateful for; as her concerns about school were most certainly valid. 

The twins were juniors at our town’s public high school then and learning almost nothing. I’m sure some kids were learning something but most most definitely were not. 

Getting kids to put their phones down and participate and focus on anything was feeling impossible by then. Scrolling had quickly become our life. If entertainment was poisoning our reality—like my book claimed it was—scrolling entertainment put the angrification and stupification of our reality into hyperdrive…while podcasts spread Idiocracy like a plague. 

That same year our town was debating letting a horse track be built on the old dump site just off the highway. Joey’s mom had a lawn sign supporting it of course. When I teased her she said it was her neighbor’s sign. “If you’re going to support something you should be honest about it,” I said to her that day. “I am!” she replied…believing a lie maybe. 

I had given myself one last chance to find a literary agent for my story when all this was going on. Once again I found myself feeling like Will Ferrel in that movie Stranger Than Fiction: “No way this can be real,” I remember thinking. But it was. And I had the pictures to prove it if needed. 

“Useless P.O.S.” — “Psycho.” — “Fucking Loser!” 

The hurtful words she threw at me in the years I spent working on that story are easy to remember now. All I could do then was take screenshots of text conversations on my phone. 

I can’t remember if her calling me an f’ing loser is why I changed the title to that story at first, but it fit nicely when all was said and done. I continued to watch her treat other people good, just not often me for some reason. I think it had something to do with that resentful victim thing I talked about in that story. 

People needed to learn how to laugh at their behavior that story said. Studying hers—like I had my own—would help others. She didn’t need to lose for me to win though. Grow and learn maybe but not lose necessarily. Her and I would always be parents together—for better or for worse. 

That story would just to be an introduction though: “One long disclaimer” I called it. How I’d deal with her later would depend on how she reacted: Would she do what was right for our son … or would I need to make her? 

“Is it better to be feared or respected?” I started that story by asking readers and listeners. “Is it too much to ask for both?”

I wrote that story in the way life pushed me to. Readers and Listeners wouldn’t understand much of it until the very end. Even then they’d need my help understanding a lot of it…which was kind of the goal really. 

I considered that story a recruitment tool: a business plan camouflaged in story that would help me find others that thought like me. No one could fix the world with all its problems—not in my lifetime at least—but I thought maybe we could entertain a troubled world and let the entertainment maybe fix it someday. 

That was the big idea at least. If entertainment was truly hemorrhaging with reality—like I thought it was—I figured we could maybe use that to our advantage. 

“With entertainment we made the fake real not knowing it for the most part,” I wrote somewhere in the finale to that story. “Maybe we could do it again… but better this time.”

To truly change things for the better, I’d need to surround myself with smart people: people like Yuval Noah Harari. His name was always hard for me to remember—never mind pronounce—but I loved his books. His book titled Nexus sits on the bookshelf Joey and I built above this bed I lay in now.

That book discussed how information shaped society over time. “Movements seeking to change the world often begin by rewriting history,” he wrote in another book I listened to titled Homo Deus. Inside the front cover of one of my many journals I quoted something from that book’s chapter about Storytellers: “The power of human cooperation networks rests on a delicate balance between truth and fiction.” 

Words like those made me think that man would understand what I was trying to do. I’d need help from people like him and others like Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy. They were the creators of that show Westworld I liked. I thought they might be the right people to help me create a show of my own someday that might create real change in the real world. 

I wanted to make people dream again. With that story I’d unlock people’s inner child. That’s what that word JoJo stood for. That was the word I’d put inside that Octagon of P.A.I.N.——Not that word dIverge like in that dream I just woke up from. 

I imagined a wide variety of people joining my little J-Squad someday; flying white flags with that backwards L on it and diverging from the future many believed ahead of us. All of us pieces to some cosmic puzzle the universe wanted us to try and put together. 

Thinking Eminem and I might be friends—and that I’d beat X2 in some potential legal battle— and that I’d be partners in some mission to change the world with super smart and super talented people were actually some of my least concerning delusions back then.

I never wanted to be President like in that dream but had no interest in being some playboy either. I had work to do and would live the rest of my life alone if needed. I’d be like Jon Snow in Game of Thrones: sent to the wall to protect the rest of the world from Northern Threats. To me “Northern Threats” were fictional creations of our minds mostly. 

In case I didn’t want to live the rest of my life alone though I wrote myself a potential love interest into that story: a teammate—a female Robin to my Batman…or a Harry to my Lloyd maybe. 

The first version of my story had me marrying Emma Watson. I changed it to Drew Barrymore because her birthday fell on JoJo Day and because of that ham sandwich bit and because I thought people might be critical of me going after someone younger than me. I changed it once more to Miley Cyrus when I watched her make that new year’s resolution. Discovering her birthname was Destiny it had to be her, I thought. 

She seemed like someone who could really laugh at herself—a necessity to being with someone like me—but all three of those woman appeared genuine, kind, and humble to me; the features I most admire in a person. None of them were married then either, and so, while any of them being interested in a twice-divorced-father-of-three-from-two-separate-moms was unlikely, it was possible. 

People love gossip and drama. With that story I was going to feed it to them with a shovel. 

I overthought a lot back then. I even had a choice of songs picked out for whoever might have me: All Of Me by John Legend or Give Into Me from that Country Strong movie. 

By the time I put that story away Miley was doing all these alterations to her appearance. She was doing them all along but started getting carried away. I imagined her a beautifully spirited person that needed no physical alterations and could be a role model to women thinking they needed to do this stuff themselves…watching her from afar saddened me. 

I was different from the rest of the world. Very different. That’s why I envisioned living the rest of my life alone and not letting this reality weigh me down. Perhaps all three of those fine ladies would have wanted to join the J-Man had I made what I imagined real though. Hell…maybe even at the very same time——Giggidy, Giggidy. 

Oh shit…did I just think that out loud? Dear Readers and Listeners….Elvis has left the building! —— Good afternoon, good evening and goodnight.

“Look at him,” I hear one of my boys say from beside me, “he’s literally laughing at himself now.” 

Realizing I can pretend to be asleep no longer, I decide THE TIME HAS COME….

Opening my eyes, the clock I see coming into focus reads 1:19 p.m. I don’t believe in signs anymore but seeing this number now has me wondering if maybe I should.

After watching that second plane hit the twin towers my first month at college I saw the number 911 everywhere. I considered it a sign of something bad to happen in my life until Grammy Price died on December 12^th, 2021—on my mother’s birthday oddly enough—and I started seeing this number instead: 119. 

“Angels are trying to communicate with you.” 

I was working on my story then and read this thing about angels. I told myself it was gram trying to tell me things were about to turn around for me; and the world maybe. Telling my boys this, one of them found something on their phone that said it was a sign of the devil. In that moment I remember thinking we humans could turn anything into a negative.  

I’ve since come to believe that if there is a God it’s not some big thing looking down on us but something very small instead. Working in ways we are incapable of understanding. From that perspective, we are a bunch of big dumb giants; unable to see or hear. 

Looking at this number now—and thinking all these crazy things—has me again wondering if maybe there is something after this…

Maybe I’ll get to see Grampa Phil?

I regret never giving him a copy of that story to read. I just couldn’t. I needed someone to tell me it was good before I was comfortable giving it to him and sadly that never happened. I learned early on not to ask for help or guidance with that story. People had expectations of me and I felt their disappointment deep in my bones whenever I mentioned writing. 

Alone you can only believe in a dream for so long I found. I worked on that story in semi-secret for four years; weaving as many thoughts and ideas and pot-stirring conversation starters into it as I could. I finally had to quit after making that stupid post on my towns Facebook page on September 11^th, 2024; a date I chose because of this number thing. 

With that post I invited people to read my story on that website where they could pre-order a printed version if they wanted. Only one person ever did. Embarrassed, I sent Mrs. Tucker her money back and kept those hundred copies that are in my closet now. 

I figured that many family or close friends would have known my struggle and supported my dream by then. Holy shit was I wrong. The kicker is stupid me honestly thought I was doing that to help them back then. 

Looking past my boys, the computer I wrote that story on is still tucked into the corner of this bedroom. 

I was using pictures of them for chapter headlines on that website thinking it might get the attention of a literary agent. Wanting them to be comfortable with that, the memory of us looking at those pictures always stayed with me…

“Dad,” Joey said sitting on my lap looking at that computer, “I don’t know if I want you to get published.” 

“Why not?” I asked him.

“Because” he answered thoughtfully, “then everything will change for us.” 

One of the twins had his weight on my shoulder while the other leaned on the desk. They have always cared deeply about how other people feel; an amazing quality really. They both knew how much work I had put into that story and that what their younger brother said in that moment might upset me. 

I remember their eyes studying me as I thought on how to respond. 

“Boys,” my memory has me saying to them that day, “there are people this story will help—people that feel hopeless right now…they need us.” 

Joey was right of course; things would change for us, if what I imagined became real, things would change in a way no one believed possible. That, however, is not why I remember that conversation with them that day.

I realized I’d been lying then. I said I was writing that story for them—to give them a better life—but really I was doing it for myself. They had all they needed then. It was me who was looking for a better life and validation from a world I thought might never love or understand me. They already did love and understand me though. 

When I failed to get the attention of a literary agent with that first version of my story, I decided I could handle the mountain of self-doubt and worked on improving it while investing as much time as possible with them. Regardless of what happened, I knew I’d never regret that.

We did a lot of fishing during that time—they fished, I watched mostly—and went to the movies to see Griffen a lot and sometimes out to eat to see Tia. They were old students of mine and all around great human beings; that’s why I wrote them into my story…I thought maybe my story would give them a platform to spread some of their goodness with the world someday. 

That period of my life—when I was trying to patient—was long, lonely, and doubt filled. 

Keeping so many secrets and looking like a failure—a loser—to so many people had me feeling super depressed. I’d go for walks back then and feel like a winning lottery ticket waiting to be scratched some days, most days however I’d go for those walks and feel like a piece of trash waiting to be thrown away. Hope and doubt certainly had themselves a good game of ping pong in my mind back then.

I wasn’t strong enough to use that story…but maybe they will? 

With this question a speck of light splinters through darkness as my boys’ voices come back into focus. They are talking about the “Henrieboys Dorm” poster on the door. The room we are in now looks a lot like it did back then; posters and pictures and puzzles still litter nearly every inch of its walls: my Fortress of Solitude I’ve come to call it. 

Many people are like me today and survive by sharing a roof with family. Generation after generation lived off the wealth of their parents and grandparents; when life was a bit fairer and more equitable. Those days are over now though, and this this dystopian existence appears here to stay. With most of us still slaves to possessions and addicts of consumption; with roofs over our heads but holes in our hearts. 

The sound of footsteps approaching interrupts my critical thoughts.

Rolling my head on its pillow I look towards the door and see a sprinkle of rain tap against the window. A long moment passes before I watch four friends walk into the room: Lauryn, Nel, Pras, and Candace: my students. 

I love these students more than anyone could possibly understand. With seven heads surrounding me now, I feel my momentary joy turn to anger——WHY DO I HAVE TO PUT YOU THROUGH ALL THIS!?! Clenching my teeth, I suddenly feel like some monstrous beast preparing to destroy their existence.

Noticing the change in my expression, my boys look at me with concern. Each of them then turns to the door and looks at the four students standing there. 

Joey breaks the silence and says what they’re all thinking: “What is he looking at?” 

There are so many things I wish I could tell my boys right now. Things they should know when they find that story in my closet. I wish I could jam my memories into their minds so that maybe they’ll understand… 

After reading that story I forced myself to watch that YouTube video I made after the fire: JoJo Apocalypse, I titled it. 

The video still had its four hundred something views, zero likes, and two dislikes. I always thought to know who one of those two disliked belonged to, but the second forever haunted me as I never knew when that person might be looking right at me. 

I got that job teaching at that recovery high school a few years after posting that video and a year after getting out of that halfway house…. but I was only a math teacher at that school. 

That story in my closet would introduce the class I thought this world really needed and make sense of that video. Friends and family did me the favor of acting like that video and everything that happened before never happened. But it did. 

With that story I’d prove to the world—and myself mostly—that I wasn’t completely insane back then. “This is going to work,” I used characters in that video to literally tell people, “It’s a little crazy perhaps—but I’m not crazy. I just finally know what I have to do…and I know in my heart its right.” 

The four students I just imagined coming into this room weren’t exactly real. The names of Nel and Pras and Lauryn were the names of the singers in the band Fugees and Candace was the name of an old girlfriend who died after we separated just crossing the street at twenty-seven years old. 

I had three long loves in my life: my first wife, my second wife, and Candace. She didn’t much like her teeth and would use that feature to do this funny impersonation of Sid the Sloth from the movie Ice Age. Unlike the Candace in my story, my real Candace did die. She lived on in my memory though and I would keep that memory alive if I could. To me Candace had beautiful teeth but an even more beautiful soul. 

Closing my eyes to this reality once more, I think again of what I could done differently to get people to read that story back then… 

Maybe a few more lies and tricks and a bit more deception would have had people listening to me back then? … Or maybe I just wasn’t ready? … Maybe I had more to learn? …

With my eyes closed, I feel a small hand on my thigh nudging me as I continue asking questions.

What else could I have learned? … Hadn’t I been through enough? … Couldn’t I have just caught a break? 

—Ouch! 

My eyes snap open. Looking down, I look to see what has just pinched my hip. Faith; my granddaughter, smiles up at me. Lifting my cheeks, I smile back. 

I never did let another girl steal my heart again, but then this little one came along and captured it effortlessly. When she was born my son gave her this name because of something I supposedly said once: “Faith can be whatever helps make you good person.” 

According to Faith’s young imaginative mind, her and I are boyfriend and girlfriend actually. We even have a song: Bubble Toes by Jack Johnson because of some viral video thing we did a while back. 

Faith grabs my hand, and I watch her begin her routine of tracing that heart onto it. 

A month ago, she was coloring beside me when some cartoon mentioned tattoos. Wordlessly saying I had none of my own, I took that black sharpie marker she’s using now and drew a small heart on the back of my left-hand; just below the pinky knuckle. Faith then drew two letters inside it: a capital U and a little r. This is my mark now and Faith makes certain it doesn’t fade. 

I wrote the secret missing from my story on the smooth white rock my boys had given me with that marker Faith is using now. They’ll find that rock with those one hundred copies of my story. They had given me that rock when I had gotten my diagnoses with a card that read: “You were a wonderful councilor to us and will forever be our rock.”

I held that rock for countless hours in search of some inner peace; never truly finding it. The secret I wrote on it was to be my story’s Showstopper: a funny ending to my story for a world full of people that took themselves too seriously in my opinion. 

In the story my boys will read the ending is different. But with the notes and things I’ve left they should piece together how that secret fits into it. My hope is it provides them with one last awkward laugh from dad.

Faith finishes her work and jumps back a step to sit on her father’s lap. I watch my son wrap his arms around her the same way I once did him. With my son holding tight onto Faith, I watch him press play on the remote to turn on a movie for us to watch: Back to the Future—a classic.

Together we all watch Marty McFly walk into Doc’s workshop. He turns up the volume on the stereo full blast. Preparing to strike his guitar, a young Michael J. Fox says, “History is gonna change,” right before being blown back by the sound coming from the speakers.

The song Power of Love begins to play… 

Is any of this real? …  Or is this all just happening in my head?

I feel an extra set of eyes join us in this room. Zeroing in on those strange eyes, the truth suddenly hits me: All along the target was you…Y-O-U—My Readers and Listeners…My Candidates. 

Finally feeling as I if am the star of my own movie, a commercial interrupts the real movie playing on the television in front of me. 

Frustrated with the ticker counting down the seconds before this movie begins again, I close my eyes to this reality one last time. The rain taps harder on the windows as the sounds of this reality begin fading away. 

I always wondered what I’d say in this moment. Having just closed my eyes to a commercial, I hand the microphone to the frustrated me…

When is enough, enough? … Seriously… How much money do you really need? I mean…do I really need to say it? Fine…I will…for Lauryn: Go F-Yourself. —— Or you could always change…If not now than when? 

The End. (Question Mark)

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

 Earth by Lil Dicky 

“Can anyone hear me?”

*

(End of Chapter 26)

Click here to continue read Finale Part 3

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Five: Finale Part One of Three: Mind-Blowing

“To believe in yourself, to believe in one another…that’s fundamental to being alive.”

—from the show Ted Lasso; episode titled Signs

The date today is Tuesday, February 22^nd, 2050…. I am the Boy Who Lived. 

Another explosive crack of thunder disrupts the sound of trumpets. This storm was unexpected but it’s a good one. What my wife is doing with trumpets in her performance tonight I don’t know, but the sound of them now makes me think finding a quiet place to take a quick nap might be tad bit delusional of me. 

The camera people scattered about liven up this house even more. That’s on me though as it was my idea to invite them in here…

“In a world only sprinkled with truth, it’s about time we discover what’s real. Let’s open that gate and see what’s really going on in there…Why not?”

That’s how we pitched the idea I stole from Pras that first year. It was just supposed to be a gimmick to get people talking. But then it happened for real and once something happens for real people get used to it. The fact I’m still dealing with it now is a gentle reminder that I’ve been in this house for far too long. 

Turning a corner, I waive at a few friends behind their desks, walking down the hall away from them the meeting room on my left is full of those who have come inside to escape the storm, taking a quick right, I avoid them by cutting through the empty dining room and head towards my small office.

I call this small office my Think Tank. It’s where I go to read or get some writing done. My intention for this room today however is to use it for this all-important nap of mine. 

Approaching the door, I see Katelyn vacuuming inside. She’s a member of the staff and will insist on leaving if I enter. Pretending to look busy I walk with faked purpose past the door and feel her eyes follow me as I do. She’s always looking at people like they’re up to no good; a predisposition of character that at this moment might be warranted. 

Thrown off by this change in destination, I stop in this short hallway to think of where I might go take this nap. A picture on the wall steals my attention. Taken at my twins’ high school graduation, me and Dwayne Johnson stand together with a large group surrounding us: The Master Strategist and The Sledgehammer that stole everyone’s attention—Who would have ever imagined it? 

“Hope is the best medicine of all.” 

The quote engraved on a golden plaque below this picture is something I told myself even when I couldn’t believe it was true. Even when I thought this thing called hope might kill me. Looking at this photo now—with a heart full of it—I’m grateful I was right to believe. 

It all seemed like a joke at first. When it all suddenly became a possibility those that fought against us the hardest gave themselves a nickname: The Bully Rabbits. “He lied and deceived and tricked us into listening to him!” they shouted. Eventually we cuddled them into submission of course. In time even they proved no match for The Rock. 

Reflecting on everything that has happened is Mind-Blowing. 

At this graduation Dwayne introduced me as The People’s Secret Agent. “One like the many come to investigate the few and lay the smackdown,” he said in true wrestler fashion. “So that we—THE PEOPLE—might together believe something again…. If you smell what the rock is cooking!”

A smile grows on my face remembering this now. In this photo everyone is trying to imitate that eyebrow lift Dwayne’s wrestler character used to do. My eyes focus on Kevin Heart; atop Dwayne’s shoulders he’s doing his best not to laugh. Hearing those trumpets again, I place both hands on my hips to stretch. 

I’ve since been to places I never knew existed and continue to discover things in this world I still struggle to understand today. I’ve been exposed to some pretty cool advances in medicine, but nothing has much helped with this troublesome back of mine. I tell my wife these joints were overused a long time ago when she teases me. 

Taking a deep breath, the smell of this historic home has me attempting to piece together the journey that brought me here….

That 2024 election made something like this inevitable I think. Optimists who had hoped that election would mark the low point for American society were in for a rude awakening then. With everyone talking in the years leading up to that election I had my head down preparing for the day I might have the chance to say a few things myself. 

“A President’s job today is not to wield power, but to draw attention away from it.” 

I read that in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy while I was doing my best to be patient. Released in the late 1970’s it supported my belief that we Americans had long been conditioned to believe each of us were some Enemy Of The State. The title of a movie released in the year 2000 was just one of the many pieces of entertainment I pointed to that planted the seed. 

“How do you take advantage of a vulnerable population?” I asked the readers and listeners of the story that would give me a platform to be heard. “It’s obvious: You condition resentments and feed fears: make people hate everyone and everything…DER!”

I was watching the show Shameless when Frank Gallagher said something that had me writing that back then. That show had us Americans literally laughing at how messed up our reality had become. In my story I referenced newer shows and movies that people could maybe relate to. But the seeds dividing us had been planted into our entertainment from the very beginning. 

The answers were in my story. I tried not shoving them in peoples’ faces though. I wanted people to find them…like I had to. 

The book 1984 was released in the year 1949 and talked of an intrusive government narrowing the aim of thought and destroying the power of words by the year 2050. “Being a minority of one did not make you mad or insane.” Words in that book both comforted and taunted me. Many fears envisioned in that book I could relate to—like what it said about the distraction of gambling on the masses—but many others were incorrect in my opinion.

“Government manages a country but no longer leads it,” I finally said when given the chance to speak. “Our behavior is being studied as consumers, not enemies of the state anymore——like these books and movies and shows continue to tell us. Those running political PAC’s and those with money are in charge now. Our paranoid and scattered and hate-filled minds are being exploited…Not for control, but for profit.”

Writing my story, I needed to be confident in my opinions. And I was. I just wasn’t confident people would ever hear them or agree with them. 

“History will have us all looking back at what is happening now with some level of shame.”  

My mind remembers the day Donald Trump was shot in the ear during a July rally leading up to that 2024 election. Me and some friends were playing cards above the garage at my parent’s house when I used this carefully constructed line about us all looking back at what was happening with some level of shame. I said that believing it would be un-disagreeable and was once again proven wrong. 

My good friend Spence took offense to my words that day. He was excited to see what Mr. Trump would do to get our country back on track and would never be ashamed. Trying to ease tensions around the poker table that day I said something about us all just fighting over money: “You’re never gonna change that,” my friend replied in that moment. 

The not-really-United States had become a place where the only thing someone like me could count on then was disagreement—which was exactly how they wanted us I thought. I was working on putting the finishing touches to my story together then. Comments like my friend’s made me feel crazy and delusional for believing I might be able to makes things just a little bit better. 

Fortunately, time would prove that crazy and delusional, mixed with a heavy dose of passion, patience, and persistence, can change the world—Who would have ever imagined it?

That 2024 election and everything that happened before and after had to happen I think. People like to feel a part of something; even if that something only serves as a place to aim a person’s anger temporarily. Like schoolyard children, we often need to fight and see things not get better to try something different. Sometimes we have to fight over and over before we learn our lesson. Sometimes we never do. Luckily…most of us finally did. 

We were drowning in conspiracy theories, misinformation, disinformation, scams, and what we called “clickbait” back then. It was a truly exhausting time to be alive. It was the fear mongering that eventually broke the damn though. My mind remembers that semi-fictional documentary titled The Misery Index for some reason…

That film brought viewers through a predicted future where many of the predictions were considered fact at the time. Predicting “job scarcity” by the year 2030, that film claimed the 2020 Covid Pandemic was used to investigate U.B.I.—Universal Basic Income—as Governments across the world needed to find the best way to stimulate a global economy that depended on constant spending and infinite growth. 

Presented as a “Semi-Fictional Documentary” that film showed revenue on gambling websites skyrocketing when stimulus payments were given during that Covid pandemic: “Would people use U.B.I. to support their families?” —It’s narrator mockingly asked its viewers— “Or would people waste that money on the endless pursuit of…more…free…money?”

Most of us knew the game being played on us with entertainment like that by then but the film was super entertaining and so we all still watched it. And so, it still made its money and sufficiently scared us at the same time. It had the doubling effect of having many of us finally deciding enough is enough though. What we were seeing on the news everyday might have had more to do with that. That you couldn’t make up if you tried—or could you?

“It’s darkest before the dawn.”

So many awful things happened in real life that seemed like something that could only happen on a screen once. This line about it being darkest before the dawn sounded like a b.s. line to some fairytale back then. But perhaps we had finally seen enough bad? … Perhaps The Universe was preparing us to finally be capable of believing something good? — Maybe it did all happen for a reason?

Had people listened to me earlier, maybe I could have prevented some of the ugliness of that time, but everyone knows you can’t change history. Thankfully you can most definitely change the future though…

“Hello Leominsterites Unite,” I wrote on my town’s Facebook page on September 11^th, 2024, “I think to have written a story that will change the world and need some hometown friends to read it to see if I’m crazy or not. As people that might know me, I suggest reading the epilogue first. It doubles as a Query Letter to literary agents explaining what this most fabulously magnificent story is all about. This post on our local Facebook page is written into the story somewhere that you can read for free if you so choose afterwards. Looking for a distraction from all the mess. Or perhaps something to look forward to? Then this story of hope might be for you.”

My good friend Keith was the only person I much talked to about my story in the years I was working on it. He said he envisioned it creating an explosion someday. That explosion sort of started with that post I made on our town’s Facebook page. 

The world was looking for a way to organize and fight against what was happening around us then. But yelling was getting us Nowhere Fast—an Eminem song sort of hit the nail on the head back then. 

On my website I let people pre-order a self-published version of my story for thirty dollars if they wanted. The Venmo account I had them send that money to had a picture of me next to a horse I had taken when I was living on The Farm after leaving that halfway house. Given X2’s recent purchase of a racehorse, it was unplanned nice touch I thought. 

I wasn’t the horse she or anyone else was betting on back then. But today I’m both proud and slightly embarrassed to know how much those self-published books are worth. Selling hope during such dark and turbulent times turned out to be an extremely wise investment—Who would have ever imagined it?

The year after I made that post on my town’s Facebook page, those who questioned my sanity got to watch me sitting beside Miley Cyrus on the Jimmy Fallon Show. That night Jimmy asked how I came up with the ending to my story: “Endings are always common sense” —I sort of joked— “when you’re from the future.” 

What I said in that moment now hangs on bedroom walls all over the world with this silly picture of me against a white backdrop my son had taken from the back seat of my car. Those words remind dreamers like me that our endings are never common sense and are always subject to change.

On Jimmy’s show that night Miley told the story of how I blamed her personally for some of the world’s problems: “Was it you who started that whole ‘Free The Nipple’ thing?” she told Jimmy I asked her when we first met. 

I didn’t really ask her that—not like that at least—but that was how she told the story that night. 

In her rebellious youth, Miley said girls should be able to walk around shirtless like boys. By the time we met, young girls weren’t leaving much to the imagination. When my young neighbor used those words Miley said about shirtless girls on me once it made me uncomfortable. Hollywood had a profound impact on society is all I was trying to say. But I wasn’t blaming her “personally” for it. 

It was the entertainment industry in general I was calling out for constantly pushing uncomfortable on us; claiming it artsy or whatever. To me it just felt like too much, too often. Like all the shooting and guns and violence being used to entertain us. 

When I was working on my story Miley said her New Year’s Resolution was to “Read more and meet a turtle”. Hearing that had me feeling like the universe was maybe trying to bring us together. With how I was ending my story at the time, the turtle thing fit—it kinda looks like a turtle. If the universe was comparing me to a turtle however, it was because of how long it would take me to finish that story. 

In my story’s final version, I pitched Miley this idea for a videogame: “Let’s get people making music together in new and fun ways,” I wrote. “If my boys can learn to play Fortnite so well, why can’t they learn to play instruments and make music in the same way. VR technology is begging for something like this——and you’re the perfect person to do it.” 

“You’re talking about creating a Rockband on steroids,” Miley said when we first got together and talked about it. She quickly got investors on board and before I knew it we were making public appearances promoting this game of ours. 

On Saturday Night Live she demonstrated what it would let people do by inserting her own lyrics into An International Affairs instrumental version of the song Higher Love. “This world’s a mess,” Miley sang, “a f’n mess. Yeah this world’s a f’n f’n f’n f’n f’n mess…and we’re all here to help fix it.” 

I can’t remember exactly how that song went but that was the gist of it. Her getting all those celebrities to sing that song with her that night got people all over the world believing in this power of possibility my story talked about. 

A few years earlier, Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce had started dating. My mother’s friend made a comment about it creating an “economic boom” to me once. I thought that was the dumbest thing I ever heard at the time. But then that’s sort of what Miley and Me did ourselves as we became something like an unbreakable force.

People wanted to be a part of something. Some wanted to just rebel. Regardless of one’s approach to changing the world, no one wanted to follow the same script anymore and so we did our best to create one that might include everyone. It’s truly amazing what people can do when they start dreaming together. 

Our first New Year’s in front of the world, I reflected on listening to Miley sing Madonna’s Like a Prayer while I worked on my story. “I had to be careful playing it around my boys though,” I teased her, “because your thonged ass would show up on my phone whenever I did…. thank you for that by the way.” 

With the world basically falling apart around us, it was all sort of fun and games for us at the beginning. That all sort of changed the night of the Oscars. That was the night this spark we started caught fire in a sense…the date was Sunday, February 22^nd, 2026. 

To my right stood Timothee Chalamet; the actor I hoped might play the role of the teacher in the television show inspired by my story someday, and to my left was Steve Harvey; who I had showcased in my video from ten years earlier. Preparing to announce the winner of Most Unifying Character In Film—an award my story gave birth to—the three of us partook in some friendly banter. 

Tim asked what parts of my story were true and what parts I made up. I told him and the millions of viewers watching, “It was always an eight or a two on the Sprinkle Scale.” Steve then gave me a serious face and asked the question that would change everything. “I really want to know though,” he said. “In the real world, do you identify as Democrat or Republican?” 

Presented with this question, I knew however I answered it would result in the potential loss of half my support. “Well Steve,” I said that day; attempting to present a charming and non-confrontational smile, “I prefer to identify as Divergent.” 

Steve laughed at me that day—like he was supposed to. “You sly dog,” he said, “Is that what you’ve been carrying around in that tiny brain of yours all this time?” 

In the video of that moment that is now legend, you see Tim put a hand on my shoulder after a long applause: “You did it,” he says to me, “you made it real.” 

Getting choked up on stage that day was not part of the act. There were a lot of moments like that. Like the world in front of me was spinning and flipping upside down. My heart I thought might explode right through my chest in that moment. Either that or I was gonna throw up. Instead, I just cried…in front of the entire world. 

That word Divergent became something like a global identity to people. It became synonymous with The Resistance: 

Our mission is to unite anyone and everyone in creating a future brighter than this reality. Not removing borders necessarily but instead offering an emotional bridge to all the broken-hearted people living in this world. To seek out peace and new life on this internet connected planet: TO BOLDY GO WHERE NO ONE HAS GONE BEFORE!

It sounded silly so we made it silly. But holy shit did it work. To many across the world, this became the answer The Beatles sang about in that song Let It Be.

Standing in this hallway now, the picture in front of me was taken three months after those Oscars. This was the day Dwayne first teased the idea of running a Divergent Candidate in the next election. Many famous people are sprinkled into this photo. 

To Dwayne’s immediate left is Mark Zuckerberg and Marc Cuban. Marc C had become a trusted business consultant to me and Mark Z was there to give every graduate a new car that year. I told him he could do that as payment for me advertising Facebook in my story and for all the headaches it caused me.

Product placement was the future of advertisements back then; my story showed people what I meant. After this graduation, our town looked like that scene from the movie Mr. Deeds where everyone is driving a red Ferrari. The cars Z gave—(enter name of car here)—were much more modest, but it was still totally awesome. 

To my immediate right in this photo is Adam Sandler and Melissa McCarthy. Adam had become a quick friend to me after I pitched him that idea for that Tommy’s Boy show. And Melissa was there because it was her we secretly planned to run as our Divergent Candidate in the next election. We didn’t announce that then; this was just us stacking more dominoes at the time.

Distrust and jealousy were suffocating all that made humanity good and there seemed to be no way out. We needed to give people something fun and good and exciting to get together and talk about. We needed to create common experiences for people to participate in to fight against the mountain of resentments dividing us. 

Watching rich and powerful people come together and collaborate in cooperation gave birth to a sense of hope this world had not felt in a long time. Even to those that didn’t believe in miracles, or divine intervention, or magic, it all seemed rather magical. 

That was certainly an exciting time for a lot of people, but a truly unbelievable time for me personally. Being asked to make a cameo appearance on that show Ted Lasso seemed like a big deal after this graduation…come to find out that was only the beginning. 

I was voted People’s Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive the following year. I dedicated the award to Lauryn who said I was too old to make it big. That was also the same year I got married again and made the only hole in one I’ve ever made playing beside Rory McIlroy in that celebrity best ball golf tournament we had put together. Uncle Marsh’s Detroit Lions even won the Super Bowl that year. 

Two years after this picture was taken the United States elected its first ever Divergent Candidate. That two-party-left-right-conservative-liberal-red-blue-baloney had finally met its match—thank God. 

Taking another deep breath, I decide I’ve done enough reminiscing for now. 

Turning from this picture, I take a few steps to the door leading to my large office. Opening the heavy door, I see the tall windows behind my desk have their shades drawn; making this an ideal setting for this all-important nap of mine. 

Getting here wasn’t easy. At times I felt so painfully alone all I wanted was for someone give me hug and tell me it would all be okay. Being alone like that is some people’s dream—it was mine for time—but the hopelessness and depression and sadness I felt then made me realize how important feeling connected to other people really is.

“The passion to participate is a gift,” I tell those that listen to me now. 

In moments like this I do still find myself reminiscing fondly on my past though; when I had all the time in the world to take a nap if I wanted. It’s made me see life as a constant struggle between wanting more and wishing for less.

Lifting my feet onto the couch in the center of this room, I lay back and let my head fall onto a small pillow. Interlocking my hands I place them on my chest and close my eyes. 

All my success has resulted in me being called a lot of names over the years. Many of those names have been mean, dumb, or preposterous. The funny ones I remember most though. The one I can still whisper into my wife’s ear to make her laugh whenever we are in public together is still my all-time favorite: “I am The Vagina Whisperer.” 

Nel was right: third time was the charm—she gets me. 

I’ve since found no master of puppets pulling our stings. Many try but they just dangle strings in front of us; and hope we strangle each other with them; out of anger and frustration. Most of them aren’t pure evil either. Just greedy as hell mostly—and slightly stupid maybe. 

There is a lot of excitement about tonight’s celebration. The speech I am to give will be heard by millions that feel now like I once did; alone and scared and hopeless maybe. Reminded of this, I decide to mentally rehearse as I try to fall asleep. 

Visualizing myself doing something is key to getting it right I’ve found and so I picture my audience. 

In front of me is a world that needs me to be more than what I am. They need me and I need them. We are a team. Not many of us are where we want to be yet…but we are all working on getting there—TOGETHER.

*

Speech to be made on February 22^nd, 2050

—JoJo Day—

“A Day To Celebrate Our Inner Child”

[Walking on stage the song Numb/Encore by Jay-Z & Lincoln Park plays; start speech on the words “Get ‘Em J”]

It gets better. That’s what I wanted to tell my children. But I had learned to Show Not Tell. And so, I wondered… How would I show them?

I decided I’d have to build them a better world. And so I am here today, telling you—and anyone that chooses to listen—that it does…in fact…get better.  

Never before had our actions and behaviors been so easily recorded. Not liking the actions and behaviors I was observing, I made a choice to look at humanity for what it could be rather than for what it was: “Just endure,” I told myself, “Eventually they will believe…Why Not?”

A vision of how to build this better world crept into my mind like a caterpillar and made my brain its cocoon. We can be angry and mad and sad together, I thought, as long as we are together in our P.A.I.N. we can create something better. 

That vision—that idea—that dream—that living thing in my head would die in there, or it would turn itself into a butterfly and take flight in this world. Looking out at you now—as President of these United States—it fills my heart with joy to see that thing in my head…whatever it was…taking flight right before my eyes. 

(Pause for applause as butterflies are released)

We Americans envisioned ourselves as leaders. But could we openly accept responsibility for our destructive behavior and creating this US vs. THEM world that had become more and more counterproductive? Could we work in cooperation, out of mutual respect, to end a cycle of hate and distrust and paranoia? 

“Violent revolutions are not the answer,” I said, “but perhaps Revolutionary Ideas can be.”

Education was a tool used to make our world a more productive place for hundreds and thousands of years. I suggested a titanic sized pivot in the model: “Education should now be aimed at making our world a happier place,” I said. 

With endless battles to be fought, I saw this as the one offering the path of least resistance at the time.

More time in school should be spent understanding how entertainment is shaping our perception of reality. On top of doing what is best for our children, entertainment might be this countries number one export: “Why not give our children the tools necessary to produce that export?” I asked.  

We needed to grow. To confuse and rethink. To ask ourselves this most fabulous and magnificent and powerful question: What type of world do I want to spend the rest of my life being a part of?

You had ideas that needed to be discovered. Stories that needed to be told and dreams that needed oxygen to breathe in this world. We needed you to do amazing things. We needed to learn how to lift each other up and not drag each other down. We needed to learn how to be kind—to ourselves and each other. We are no experts at any of this today but continue to work on it. And for that we Americans are once considered leaders in this world. 

The most important element to the success of any healthy ship is trust. Trust between captain and its crew. We did not trust the Government or the Corporations we relied on to keep this country afloat. Something needed to change. As the captain of this ship today, I continue to strive to create that which makes strongest: Trust. 

None of this has been easy. But I feel lucky though knowing many of you have become more open-minded over the years——Speaking of feeling lucky…

In my previous life the idea I would ever be lucky seemed laughable to me. I realize now I was never meant to be lucky. Rather I was always destined to be successful. And…as my wonderful wife here likes to tell me: DESTINY ALWAYS WINS! 

(Look at Destiny and pause for applause.)

When I first shared my story with the world I was a stranger reaching out his hand to those like me who felt like they were drowning. With hope in my heart, I dreamt of opening eyes to new wonders. Today I reach out my hand out once more with the promise of taking you over, sideways, and under, on a—

“—Dad.” 

“Dad…” 

“Dad…wake up…” 

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

Cinderella Man by Eminem

“There’s a storm coming the weatherman couldn’t predict.”

*

(End of Chapter 25)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Four: Fight P.A.I.N.

“Good morning aviators…this is your captain speaking.”

—from the film Top Gun: Maverick

*

“The best revenge is massive success.” That’s what the framed poster of Frank Sinatra hanging on my closet door in my bedroom reads. I won it at a G.A.A.M.H.A. charity event a while back. 

Life continues to teach me lessons at the most appropriate times it seems. After my last day yesterday, I got home and went for a walk. I was listening to that audiobook The Heart of Buddha’s Teaching again when I heard: “Revenge is an unwholesome nutriment, the intention to help others is a healthy nutriment.” 

Sirena called yesterday to see how I was doing, kind of, and was being somewhat supportive of my plan to give my story another shot. But her telling me to be “realistic” and having me promise “no surprises” had me doubting myself again. She believed in this dream of my story once, and while she doesn’t much anymore, I don’t think I needed reminding of that—Or maybe I did? 

Councilor John told me I won the lottery when she left me. Like many things he said, I hated hearing it at the time. As I set out to write this story however, I’m starting to think maybe he was right. 

“For there to be a hero, we need a villain.”

Entertainment has fed us this idea forever. Until I can maybe change what we find entertaining, it’s the parameters of this reality in which I exist. And so, my story will need a true antagonist—a true villain. That is role, I realized yesterday, Sirena has been playing admirably. 

Another reason for Sirena’s call yesterday was to tell me that her and her boyfriend have purchased a racehorse; she said she wanted to tell me before I heard about it from someone else. I had gotten wind of this last week but knew better than to ask her about it…or maybe I just didn’t want to. She called it an “investment” yesterday as this boyfriend knows stuff about horses I guess. 

After dumping that one on me, she quickly told she wants to sign our son up to play in this AAU travel basketball league. Telling her I’m finding watching the boys play sports mentally unhealthy for me right now, she got defensive and took it as an attack on her signing him up for this league. “This isn’t about you,” she said, “it’s about him!” 

In that moment I debated telling her I’ve been feeling super depressed lately but didn’t want to throw up any alarms. I wasn’t planning to fight her about signing our son up for this league as I see it as one way she’s at least spending some of that house money on him. The truth is I know why she’s signing him up for this league better than she does. I’ve seen how she believes her own lies at this point though and know to just be quiet. 

I know this boyfriend of Sirena’s actually. He’s a decent guy from what I know and has kids of his own my son seems to really like. Beneath all the frustration I feel about all this, I’m lucky. Obviously a part of me wonders how long Sirena and I would have lasted playing house with all that money she has now, but everything that has happened is for the best…and in many ways I prayed for this.  

Before going to bed last night, I expressed some of my frustrations again in my journal. “If I do somehow make this story work and become a massive success,” I wrote, “I’ll still help her financially despite everything that’s happened.” 

Lily would never understand that. No one would. That’s why I write thoughts like those in my journal. It lets me continue to be my delusional self without people in the real world hating on me for it. 

Sirena has taken a lot from me, being with her had me questioning my morals at first, then my sanity and everything I ever thought to be true later. It’s not all her fault, but she’s a big reason for my lack of self-confidence today. But I wanted to write this story to help people back then and I decided yesterday not to let her take that away from me too. 

“If everything needed to happen for me to make this work, and I don’t include her in my future success, then what was the point?” I asked myself in my journal. “Revenge. That’s what. And revenge is unwholesome nutriment.” 

I must write this story in a way I protect myself however; and beat Sirena if she chooses to fight me in court over our son. She’s forced my hand at this point. She doesn’t need to lose necessarily though; grow and learn maybe but not lose. I’m hoping to use her and my relationship to teach people the difference between revenge and redemption in my story—maybe that alone deserves compensation. 

Ruminating on all this last night, I found myself giggling at the thought of giving her money someday to invest in another racehorse. “With only one stipulation,” I’d say to her and her boyfriend, “You guys have to name it FakeLips.” My imagination had this horse of theirs winning a race with the voice of that guy from Shawshank Redemption announcing: “And it’s FakeLips by a nose!” 

Sirena did not defend me against labels that made my life difficult and has used them against me to get what she wants. But she’s also pushed me to feel emotions in a way that has made me more understanding of what we humans are capable of; both good and bad. For that Sirena has helped me become me.

It’s human nature though for our son to emulate behavior that might provide him the life he desires. Will he see his mother’s tendency to act selfishly and attack those who question or disagree with her aggressively as a way to get that? Or will he see my more passive, calculated, and patient approach succeed and emulate that instead? 

I’m not completely delusional…or a fool. I know what actions and behaviors tend to win today. I however must continue to force feed myself its delusions or I’m likely live the rest of my life as a resentful victim. 

“There are seeds of many beings inside of us,” that Buddhism book says, “What we become is the result of the seeds we water.” 

Writing this story won’t be easy. To keep myself organized I bought a nice journal to write things down I might want to include in it somewhere. Inspired by painful thoughts Sirena stirred up yesterday, I wrote a quote from the book Ready Player Two in its front cover:

To win the videogame of life, you just have to try to make the experience of being forced to play it as pleasant as possible, for yourself, and for all of the other players you encounter on your journey.

“These wings are amazing.” 

Driving through my hometown of Leominster, Nel’s words spoken from the seat behind me disrupt my thoughts. Glancing in my rear-view mirror I see him looking at me with a mouth full of food. “I’m serious J-Man,” he adds, “they’re doing a little dance right down my throat.” 

Despite our many differences, seeing Nel grin at me and make that goofy movement with his shoulders—in what I perceive to be an imitation of his food dancing down his throat—is a gentle reminder of how alike even he and I can be at times. 

I had promised to buy my students lunch today and am making good on my word. The plan was to bring them to Lance’s American Grille—a staple of my hometown—but arriving there we found it closed. The sign on the door said: “Sorry, short staffed.”

This pandemic continues to stir up rage everywhere. Finding people to work is just one of the many unfortunate effects it’s had. Fights on airplanes and in classrooms have become a regular thing as of late; all of it videotaped on phones and shown to us on the news and on social media. For someone like me desperately trying to stay positive…it’s all very disheartening.  

Finding Lance’s closed, I told them I’d take them to Il Camino or GazBar or The West End Diner; as there is no shortage of places to eat in my hometown. Lauryn however suggested we order food and just drive around, and so we’ve since stopped at Papous Pizza, Roasted Peppers, and lastly Super Wings for Nel. Driving past Paisanos now—home of my aunt Debby’s famous Chet’s sausage—I feel guilty for not bringing them any of our business today. 

Even before this pandemic, I wondered how all these food places would survive. With some of them closing now because of it, I think to know what we’ll blame—The Government, obviously. 

I wrote about this in that new journal of mine after kicking off this exciting year of being unemployed by getting a tax form in the mail. I emptied an old retirement account last year and now must worry if I withheld enough in taxes and how much my tax preparer may charge to deal with the headache. Just opening that tax statement gave me a small panic attack…my mind swelled and my hands literally shook.  

“Government sends us tax forms and asks for money from people like me who don’t have enough.” —I vented in my journal— “The rich don’t send tax forms. Our money just flows to them naturally at this point. With the obscene amount they have already, and the monopoly they are creating from residual income thanks to the internet, they’ll have everything eventually.”

If I make this story work maybe one day I’ll speak to people about how I feel about all this. Until then I’ll have to keep venting in my journals:  

We have plenty to keep us distracted these days. Constant threats of governments shutdowns and impeachment hearings… Mounting infrastructure concerns… Yelling matches everywhere. My first job in finance introduced me to estate planning—an entire industry dedicated to helping those that have the most keep as much as possible. As a free country we are allowed to have our fantasies, but the lines of wealth have been drawn for the most part. Until something happens on a global scale this tax game only stokes resentments. In the meantime, the future of humanity relies on the decency and altruism of individuals. That’s a scary proposal but there are people out there that give me hope. Warren Buffet talks about tax issues a lot and Melinda Gates and Mckenzie Scott have been giving away billions lately. Seeing how their ex-husbands are ripped for their philanthropic endeavors speaks to the difficult task these people face.

I want to believe that good people will step up and lead us into a brighter future when the opportunity presents itself. Maybe I’m just being my idealistic and delusional self…but what choice do I have? The Government we love to hate will run out of money eventually. 

At that point who will we the people blame? —Those getting handouts and wasteful government spending…DER!

Outside it is extremely cold today. But here in my little car these students and I are not concerned by the weather; nor these troublesome thoughts of mine. 

“Nel,” I say looking at him through my rear-view mirror, “What’s up with calling me ‘J-Man’?” 

From the passenger seat beside me Lauryn speaks for Nel. “It’s our nickname for you,” she says. “You started as our teacher, then you became our friend, now you’re like family…we can’t be calling you Mr. J anymore.”

I thought Nel was calling me this name because of the J-Squad sticker decals my brother had made for me to give them on Christmas. Turning to look at Lauryn, I find what she says uncharacteristically sweet and can’t help but feel a bit uncomfortable again.

“Where are we?” From the back seat Pras says this sounding amazed.

“We’re here,” I reply pulling into the driveway of a large house sitting upon a hill; a mansion in Pras’s eyes. 

I don’t have my boys today and made plans for us to hang out at this friend’s house who has a pool table in his basement. This super successful friend of mine bought this house because it was built on the hill he and I used to hang out on as kids. All that success and he still dreams of being a kid again…I can’t help but find funny. 

In historical literature many important lessons are taught on top of mountains. The mountain is symbolical; as it represents great feats taking hard work and dedication. Secretly, I hope these students look back on this day as meaning something more if I’m successful with this story I am to write.

“Before we go inside,” I say unbuckling myself, “I want to tell you a secret.” I pause, turn in my seat, and then lock eyes with Pras. “The adults in your life have no clue what they’re doing.” 

Pras’s face lights up at my words. “You’re the best Mr. J,” he says offering me a fist bump.   

Adults have always hated this line, and kids have always loved it. Like thousands of teachers before me, I use it to create a bond between us…right before telling them the truth.

“None of you know what you’re doing either Pras,” I say; interrupting his thoughts of superiority with my fist. “Someday your children’s children will study our mistakes and start putting this world back together. The secret is to learn to listen to them better than we listen to you.” 

Given my troublesome past there are many things I could warn these kids about. I could talk to them like a confident weatherman preparing them for some disastrous storm. If they question me I could justify each warning I offer them by muttering two simple words: It Happens. 

As a storyteller, I rely on these two words often, but I’m no weatherman and so I try not to act like one to them. 

“A lot of us adults are preparing you to survive in this scary world Pras,” I say. “Just look at this house…” 

My students and I look at the house outside: white cameras are attached at each corner of its brown brick façade; a fancy black fence surrounds the property; and an American flag flies in the sky high above us. 

“We lock our doors and video tape everything today,” —I offer these students my thoughts— “to protect ourselves we put up fences and take endless precautions to feel safe. With phones in our hands 24/7 now, getting away with anything feels impossible, but we live in a time of unmatched paranoia and fear. All of it just doesn’t add up to me—”

Stopping myself from overtalking, I take a moment to think…

As a father I’ve seen my children act like sponges. They have plenty of people telling them to be safe today, which is why I try to teach them; and anyone else that might want to listen to me, to be more understanding. And see the lack of kindness towards ourselves and others as the greatest threat to humanity in the long run. 

Looking at these students I consider offering them examples of the warnings they hear from us adults. Every trauma we have heard about or lived through ourselves. Every crises we know of or have seen happen on a screen or read about. Validating everything we say to them with those two simple words: It Happens. 

“There are good reasons for the warnings we adults offer you guys,” I say to the sponges looking at me now. “But I’m seeing our scars becoming yours and fear our dreams will become yours too: dead. That’s just my opinion of course—” I say raising my hands to prevent any verbal attacks. “What I really need to tell you guys though is I think I figured out how to make my story work…But there’s a catch.” 

“And the catch is?” Lauryn says impatiently as I pause for dramatic effect. 

Looking directly at Lauryn I tell her what this catch is. “One of you will have to die,” I say.

A moment of stillness follows my words. I had planned this conversation in my mind and purposely try to play it up a bit. A hand shoots into the air before an eager voice breaks the silence. “I’ll do it,” the voice says. “Can I be the one who dies?” 

Smiling that wonderful smile that we’ve wrestled out of her over the last five months together, Candace volunteers. “Of course you can,” I reply. “Candace—You’re going to die…I promise you’ll be remembered.”  

I did not anticipate my students so eagerly accepting this news of one of them having to die for my story work. Putting my explanations away, I reach beside my seat to grab the folders I brought for them. In each folder is the last article for our class and the first draft to this Finale to my story I’ve written.

“I have to work on putting the pieces of the story together,” I say handing them the folders, “but the ending will be important, and I hope you might tell me if it sounds too crazy.” 

“You’re crazy is why we love you Mr. J,” Lauryn says. 

Lauryn’s comment makes me feel somewhat uncomfortable yet again. I sit quiet and watch all of them open their folders and focus their eyes on the image of The Octagon of P.A.I.N. and see curiosity begin its tickle. 

“Guys—” I interrupt their focus, “I don’t want you reading them now. Leave them in the car and let’s go inside. I’m nervous and don’t want it ruining our day.”

“Oh stop,” Candace says, “you know we’re gonna like it.” 

“I’m serious,” I say flatly, “I don’t want you to.”

“Fine,” Candace replies closing her folder, “Everything you write is amazing though…you really shouldn’t worry.” 

“This might be different,” I say honestly. “And just so you know the ending is likely to change. Like life…it’s a work in progress.” 

I say this with a smile on my face but a knot in my stomach. I know why I’m nervous but right now these students have no clue. They’ve seen me do some crazy things to keep them entertained this year, but this will bring it to the next level. 

Changing the world can wait though. There are too many lows in life not to enjoy the highs, I like to say, and so right now its best we enjoy this time together. 

We all leave the car and head inside…. 

*

Article Title: Fight P.A.I.N.  

Dated: Saturday, January 23, 2021

“Everybody said it wasn’t possible…Everybody never saw this coming.”

— from the song Thrones by Ivan B

In 2016 I was reading a book titled Altruism by Matthieu Ricard when I accidentally burnt my house down. Altruism means the selfless concern for the well-being of others. Finding that book wet and dirty in my basement after the fire, I had highlighted the following line in: 

“Observing Western society, I was forced to conclude that the ‘wise’ were no longer the main objects of admiration, but the famous, rich, or powerful people had taken their place.” 

Knowing me now, can you perhaps see why this line from that book might have spoken to me? 

Everyone is being called the G.O.A.T. in this or that today. And “I’m him” or “I’m her” or “I’m IT” has become a fun thing to say. When actions and behaviors don’t match principles or morals, I think our current reality is what you get; where this quote about the objects of our admiration could not be truer. The words “worshiping false idols” would most certainly apply for those looking to point fingers.

I know some people living in this reality are happy, but more and more are becoming angry. And we can assume even happy people will be finding it harder and harder to endure this anger. The protests. The shouting. The insults. Much of this anger is understandable if not agreeable. People want more. More respect. More appreciation. More recognition…More money. 

But does protest lead to progress or does protest stall progress?

In class I used that as a warm-up question with you once. That day I argued that more of anything—”accept maybe water and silence”—rarely provides lasting peace. I went on to say that a person could get paid double what they make and in three years be just as unhappy if they don’t enjoy what they’re doing. 

Does what I say still annoy you Nel? 

People are frustrated and many are calling for a revolution in the name of this or that. As your teacher however, I’d warn that a revolution is run on the premise that breaking a system will fix our problems and that we cannot save this world by destroying it. Rather we must evolve our current system into something better—something for everyone: we must give this world hope and let it heal.

“Easier said than done,” a loving student like Lauryn might tell me. “You dumbass!”

Prior to that fire I had this idea of using entertainment to give birth to this hope my dumbass self just mentioned. As my students, you somewhat know how I feel about entertainment, but allow me to quickly remind you here.

Much of humanity is incapable of distinguishing reality from fiction. For those that can, few comprehend the effect entertainment is having on our collective subconscious: our human nature is being distorted by the vast amounts of entertainment we are consuming and providing oxygen to this angry and hate-filled reality of ours.  

I read another book recently titled Out of Our Minds by Felipe Fernandez-Armesto that said ideas are the starting point of everything else in history and that sometimes ideas take a long time to get out of heads and into the world. That spoke to me as I have not yet given up on this idea of using entertainment to transform our reality for the better. 

It’s not just books that have spoken to me over the years but shows and movies as well. One of those movies is Step Brothers; it’s funny and inappropriate and me and my boys love it. At the end of that movie the father is telling those brothers that as a kid he wanted to be a dinosaur, but that life “crushed him into normal”. 

Let me use that line to ask you this: What is “normal” today? 

Is it “normal” to be a heartless, selfish jerk? … Is it “normal” to be scared of people? … Is it “normal” to live in fear and isolation? … Is it “normal” for a good person to be hiding today?  

When I first got the idea of using entertainment to transform reality, I drew an image. I then shared that image with my new friend I met at that detox facility (Billy I called him in my article to you). Sharing with him my plan to write a book he told me that it took his sister two years to get published and advised patience. 

Believing my story would change the world, that wasn’t advice I much listened to at the time—and it would cost me…dearly. 

That good friend of mine died on August 8^th, 2016; two months after I accidently lit my house on fire. I thought I’d have more time to make this world a better place for a good and kind person like my friend. He played a role in this world though and will not be forgotten if I can help it. 

I dedicate the rest of this story to him and every other person we’ve lost on this journey towards Social Recovery….

An image of The Octagon Of P.A.I.N. has the words Doubt, Anger, Worry & Shame, Anxiety, Depression, Hate, Guilt & Regret, and Fear written on each side of it. Arrows point from one side to the next in a clockwise rotation connecting these words. P.A.I.N. represents the acronym: Personal Anguish Introduced (by life) Naturally. Below the octagon reads: “Social Recovery 101”

“What goes inside the octagon?” 

When I first showed my friend this Octagon of P.A.I.N. he asked me this question. It was a good one. And a very important one. I’ll answer that question soon enough, but first I need to try and explain what this Octagon of P.A.I.N. represents.

I have one great enemy in life: Doubt. 

This doubt applies to everything. Myself. People. The World. The Future. When this one emotion enters my mind it begins a cycle. A cycle that leads to anger and worry and shame and anxiety and depression and hate. Doubt, I believe, is the root cause of all of it. Resulting in feelings of guilt and regret and fear that I constantly struggle with. 

I’ve been a loyal and dedicated hunter of distractions to deal with this doubt. But have found the removal of things is what helps most. Unfortunately—as an addict—I super suck at the removal of things. And so, I have continued to be a perfectly patient consumer of potential happiness, rather than a purposeful pursuer of it. 

I play with words here so that maybe you’ll remember and be better than me, for I was never truly patient. Instead, I was constantly trying to trick myself into happiness, rather than working towards creating it inside myself—Will you maybe remember that one?

We all care to some degree. Or want to care somewhat. About ourselves. About other people. About The World. About The Future. 

The battle to stay positive becomes too much though and so eventually our hearts turn cold. When that happens “I don’t give a f” becomes the way in which many of us survive. Thank you Lauryn for the word that describes how so many of us feel. 

“Empathy without love and compassion leads to burnout.” 

I read this in that Altruism book as well. Words can be confusing and so I imagine you having a hard time differentiating between empathy and compassion like I do. I can’t say I’m correct, but I think empathy means feeling bad for someone suffering, where compassion adds the extra element of taking the time to understanda person’s suffering. 

We can only see so much bad before we become desensitized to it. This, coupled with the fact most of us feel like a victim in some way today, has created this sad reality of ours in my opinion…where many people have lost the ability to feel bad for others’ suffering.

I think we have a hard time feeling bad for others because we have seen so much bad and at the same time felt so much bad ourselves. Collectively…we are burnt out. 

The only way to fight this, in my opinion, is to let people see good winning finally. Collectively, we must throw good in people’s faces. We must have ourselves a “GOOD FIGHT!” (My mind imagines a food fight but good being throw at each other instead of food. You get it I hope?)

“The most valuable economic resource at our disposal is trust in the future.”

— from the book Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

Inside that octagon I wanted to place a word that would bring people hope for the future. The word I would use needed to create that trust this quote mentions. It needed to be a word that would unite us all in caring again—About ourselves— About other people—About the World—About The Future. 

Would the word Faith work? 

My councilor at the halfway house told me I “intellectualize” too much. It’s my gift and my curse I think. 

Martin Luther King said faith is taking the first step without knowing where the staircase leads. I’ve taken a lot of steps in faith to get here and for that I am grateful. Faith however, for a dreamer like me, can be a scary word. While it helps for a time, there comes a point when dreamers like me need to see things happen.

Doubt, for a dreamer like me, turns that staircase of faith into a slippery slope with despair and hopelessness at its base. 

Faith without reward—for a dreamer and wannabe doer like me—leads to feelings of anger and resentment. People telling me to have faith has made me feel hopeless and alone at times; like I had no control over who or what I was supposed to be in this life. Its why I’ve come to believe that faith and religion alone will not fix this world. 

I needed put a word inside that Octagon that could unite anyone and everyone in creating a future brighter than this reality. A new word. With new meaning. One that could add to that which brings a person purpose and not destroy it any way. It needed to be a word that could represent a common desire in us all. 

“We humans know our past, even when we’re ashamed of it.”

—from Star Trek, The Next Generation’s pilot episode.

I reference Star Trek here because I was watching a Star Trek movie when I first had the idea of using entertainment to bring us together somehow. If you recall, I wrote in an article to you: “Star Trek needs an origin story”. 

Could we place labels aside and come together to become the one generation that changed the world? … Could we make this humanities “all hope is lost” moment and become that origin story ourselves? 

The energy of thought is powerful, and we’ve forgotten how to use it. As we engage on this journey together, let us harness that power of our collective thought once more. 

Could a single word change the future? … Let us find out together shall we.

—3—

—2—

—1—

“ACTION!”

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION:

“The ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” As your last entry in your journal for this class, please reflect on how this quote I have next to the mirror in my bedroom makes you feel. Fill a page!

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

Fly featuring Rihanna with Nicki Minaj

“I came to win.”

*

(End of Chapter 24)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Three: Fear

 “I’m a lonely insignificant spec on a has-been planet orbited by a cold indifferent sun.” 

— a quote from The Simpsons; The Mysterious Voyage of Homer

*

“That’s wild Jose,” Lily says to me from behind her desk. 

My last day as a teacher at this recovery high school has me hiding out in Miss Lily’s office one last time. It’s Friday and the building is full of teachers preparing for In-Person-Learning that is set to begin again next week. 

With nothing to prepare for myself, I’ve spent most of today listening to those teachers complain about this or that. Students…This virus…Politics…Money…The World. 

Pandemic Life continues, I guess—Or is this just life now? 

As a final assignment for my class I required my students watch the movie Finding Neverland and write a short story inspired by it. Lauryn titled hers “Through Those Eyes”. Giving it to Miss Lily to read, her and I discussed how good it was but soon found ourselves discussing that show Game of Thrones again. Lily finished the show and agreed with me that the ending was awful. And I just told her my conspiracy theory about it. Hence her comment: “That’s wild Jose.” 

People continue to be up in arms about all this “cancel culture” stuff and this more recent “woke entertainment” thing. As usual I try not to engage in all the bitching out loud, but dealing with Sirena has had me bitching a lot in silence lately—which has had me noticing a lot of new entertainment pushing this strong woman narrative. 

I just told Lily this knowing she might get annoyed with me but had to in order to tell her my conspiracy theory about it….

There was this show called The Newsroom I was watching before that fire happened. It first aired in 2012 but was cancelled after a shortened third season at the end of 2014. To me the show was extremely informative and enlightening when I watched back then— Why did that show get cancelled? 

Was it because it was maybe feeding us too much truth? … Was it because it was making us too aware of what was really happening around us? 

There’s a part in that show I’ll forever remember. It’s the part when its main character—a news anchor played by Jeff Daniels—is asked by a college student what makes America the greatest country in the world. 

Pressured into providing an honest opinion to this question, this intelligent man is triggered…and goes on a long rant about why it’s not anymore. 

After giving evidence supporting his opinion, this man says, “It sure used to be,” reminiscently before using words that are forever engrained in my mind: “The first step in solving any problem, is recognizing there is one: America is not the greatest country in the world anymore.” 

For some reason my crazy mind connected that scene to how that show Game of Thrones ended. 

In its last episode, Daenerys—who most all viewers found themselves cheering for at one point or another—stands over the city she had just destroyed. In the background her dragon takes off in a way that has its wings appearing connected to her. Someone with an eye for symbolism like me would see that as the devil taking flight…with our once beloved Daenerys as the devil in disguise.

That episode first aired in May of 2019. A year later Covid came along and disrupted life as we knew it. “If Donald Trump had not come along and surprised everyone in 2016,” I said to Lily a few minutes ago, “Who would have been President of The United States then?” I connected the dots for her and said most experts had expected it to be Hillary Clinton. 

Explaining this, I told Lily how I remembered hearing the writing for the last few seasons of Game of Thrones had been delayed. 

“Were those in power—the people with money that produced these shows—conditioning us in a way that would have us hating Hillary Clinton and blaming a woman when Covid was unleashed?” I wrote in my journal and said to Lily. “Did Donald Trump winning that election in 2016 surprise those planning all this but work out for them regardless?”

I told Lily to watch that episode again and ask herself what people would have been thinking had Hillary Clinton been President when Covid happened last year. “It would have had a lot of us hating Hillary Clinton,” I told her. “A strong woman.” 

I’m not often a conspiracy theorist. In fact, nothing bugs me more than people saying professional sports are “fixed” or “scripted”. Since my diagnoses, whenever I get over-excited about an idea I have—or in this instance a conspiracy theory—I fear my mind might be playing tricks on me. 

When I was putting this together and writing about it in my journal, I knew it all sounded crazy. At the end of that entry, I actually questioned whether or not I should get back on meds again—I’m not sure if that’s funny or not. 

Later that same night I turned on this show Expanse I’d started watching. Realizing that show was about humans divided and still fighting one another in space, I turned off the television and opened a book that night…completely exhausted by entertainment’s ability to make anyone and everyone into an unreasonable-intolerable-hardass-enemy.

A knock on the office door interrupts Lily and I. Principal Sam leans in and tells the two of us to come to the break room. Standing up, Miss Lily walks by me to head out the door. The smell of her hits me as she does—Kinda Cinnamony; my favorite. 

Watching Lily turn into the breakroom in front of me, a loud song begins in chorus: “For she’s a jolly good fellow… For she’s a jolly good fellow… For she’s a jolly good fellow … Which nobody can deny.”

A few students have come in today to surprise Miss Lily. Me and the other teachers knew about this, but it is now clear Lily had no clue herself. Balloons surround a blue tablecloth covered table holding a single card and a cake with the words “Congratulations Lilia!” written on it. 

“Don’t they know you hate being called Lilia?” I whisper standing beside her. 

Turning to look at me, Lily pokes me in the chest. “Shut it Mr. Jose,” she says. 

Miss Lily has gotten engaged. That boyfriend of hers finally proposed after a short breakup earlier in the year. A breakup that lasted only two weeks and was a result of some pornography Lily had found on her boyfriend’s phone—some pornography Lily told me way too much about. 

“The shit he was watching looked so mean to me,” she said looking half heartbroken, half enraged that day. 

I’ve been told “I see people”. Maybe that’s why people share their secrets with me…I don’t really know. The conversation her and I had that day was somewhat unprofessional maybe but also strangely productive. 

Trying to make her less upset, I told her what she described on her boyfriend’s phone is everywhere. “It’s awful,” I said; giving her examples of what I’d seen myself as a person that has been single for a long time now. 

After Lily and I had this conversation that day, she did some research and incorporated what she learned in a class with our students she titled “Fantasy Verse Reality”. In that lesson’s introduction Lily wrote: 

With pornstars becoming influencers on social media, and all of you thinking you can get rich doing an OnlyFans page, you kids need to know the truth: What might excite us visually is not the same as what excites us in reality…and what we think we want and what we really want are often two very different things. Today we are going to have that uncomfortable but necessary conversation.

When Lily did that lesson I thought Nel and Pras might die of discomfort. “What you put online stays with you for life,” she warned them that day—a warning that’s blade secretly cut into my own skin when she it. 

Lily is an amazingly gifted communicator and will be having meetings to continue my class when I’m gone. She’s gotten that ring she’s been so eager to get and I am super happy for her today.

“I still don’t get why you never went after that J.” 

From beside me, Mr. Joseph says this to me while the two us eat our cake. This math teacher friend of mine just refuses to get it. Lily is twenty-seven years old and the list of reasons why her and I could never be a thing are too long and too real to try and list to him. 

For one, I’m an almost forty twice divorced father of three. Something Council John liked to say to the men at the halfway house might apply: Just because the pieces fit…doesn’t make it a good fit. 

Lily and I may have shared a moment though. “I just want to find a good guy J,” she said during that little break in her relationship. “You’re looking for the right guy,” I corrected her that day. Trying to be a friend to her and not listen to that other brain that’s gotten me in enough trouble in this life already.

I continue to be unlucky with ladies my own age these days, but older moms seem to like me for some reason. Last weekend I went to the casino where I played roulette with one who came to like me so much she FaceTimed her daughter who lived in Texas to introduce us. 

“Her daughter’s name was Miranda,” I said to Lily telling her this. “What I really need though is a much older woman like her mom. A super nice older lady who appreciates a back rub and will love me like a little puppy dog…and maybe let me like her face from time to time,” I added with a laugh. 

I went to the casino last weekend to feel alone around people—it’s sad really. Driving home after losing money I shouldn’t be losing right now I couldn’t help but think “landmines” are being set up for my kids everywhere…

“We have no disposable income to speak of these days but it’s becoming easier and easier for us to dispose of our income,” I wrote in my journal that night. “Our state will be selling fifty-dollar scratch tickets soon. How stupidly dangerous and irresponsible. Just another way to suck everything possible from the middle class.”  

Eating cake beside Mr. Joseph and hoping to quiet these negative thoughts of mine, I try to think of something to say that will satisfy the requirement of idle conversation now.

“Have you noticed Lily wears sunglasses all the time?” I ask him. 

“Yeah…so?” he says. 

“Sunglasses intimidate me,” I reply seriously. 

At my words Mr. Joseph lazily drops his fork to his plate. Looking at me he shakes his head and uses that thumb of his to remove some frosting from the edge of his lips. 

“You know J,” he says sucking that frosting off his thumb, “for a good-looking guy, you’re a real pussy, you know that?”

Remembering Uncle Marsh using this same word on me earlier in the school year, I smile a response. “Yeah…I’ve been told.” 

Driving home after Lily’s little engagement celebration, my phone attached to its stand on the dashboard rings. Pressing a button, I answer it: “Hello my dear,” I say solemnly to the pretty face looking back at me.

“Just calling to see how your last day went,” the voice says. “You doing okay?”

“I’m fine,” I answer. “I’m taking the kids to lunch tomorrow…that’s when it will hit me maybe.” Turning my eyes from the road I look into the phone. “We’re calling you X2 now by the way.”

“That’s real nice,” Sirena says. “Asshole!” 

I give her a look through the phone. “Like you don’t deserve it,” I say honestly to her. 

I had told Sirena about my lesson last week. She’s still an English teacher at that middle school her and I worked at together and is truly much better in the classroom than I am. I still run things by her from time to time and teasing each other has always part of our relationship. 

Teaching was her calling, I tell her. The year I was in that halfway house she won teacher of the year in our town— Did she earn that award or was she given it for surviving me that year?

I couldn’t help but ask myself that then. But Sirena is really a gifted teacher, and her students are lucky to have her. Motherhood, however, was clearly not Sirena’s calling. 

“Just because a person is good at producing children doesn’t make a person good at raising children.” 

My mind remembers Sirena saying that once. She wasn’t referring to herself when she said it, but it’s a statement I can’t help but mentally attach to her now. 

I expressed my frustration with Sirena to my students last week; hoping her and my semi-toxic relationship might provide a lesson and also a warning to them, but the truth is my son loves his mom, and she loves him. To our son things are great and really that’s all that matters. Loving a child takes many forms, I’ve concluded, and ultimately I respect her for doing what is best for him.

“If your story works you better not forget how long I took care of you!” 

Hearing me excitedly talk about giving my story another shot, this line Sirena uses on me now is one I’ve heard a lot. The “time she took care of me”, I swear, gets longer every time she uses it on me. 

Sirena really doesn’t hear how she sounds sometimes. When we were together I was the one who could tell her when she sounded ridiculous; like she does to me in this moment. We all don’t hear how we sound sometimes—me included—but Sirena really doesn’t sometimes. 

“I’m proud of you,” she continues after I refuse to respond to her comment, “You know that, right?”

“I do,” I answer…wanting to believe her. 

Sirena is cleaning something as we talk. She’s OCD about her cleaning—just one of the many reasons her and I being together with my boys was always going to be difficult. I like a clean house myself, but there is a healthy level of clean I think. 

Looking at Sirena through the phone I desperately want to believe she’s proud of me but can’t help but wonder what lies she’s hiding from me at the moment. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to look at those lips of hers again without wondering that now. 

When I asked Sirena why her lips looked swollen, she said she had “an allergic reaction to peanut butter”. A lie I believed because I’ll always be gullible it seems. Lily laughed at me for believing that. “I’m telling you J,” she said when I was still questioning it, “those are lip suspenders.” 

I had snuck a picture of Sirena and showed her. Lily calls lip fillers, “Lip Suspenders”, and fake eyelashes, “Tummy Ticklers”. She’s so surprisingly and inappropriately funny sometimes. “I’m sure Sirena’s gonna buy herself a nice set of fake tits next,” she added that day. I don’t want to believe what Lily said but fear she might be right. 

Sirena is always looking in a mirror and is obsessed with two words: big and small. I’ve seen her use these two words on people often but also the destructive effect they have when used on her. Frustrated over this lip thing, I told Lily I’d prefer to “bite and suck on a thin lip any day!” I was making a joke of the situation…but at the same time secretly telling Lily the truth. 

I’m not to blame for Sirena’s insecurities, but I don’t help either.

Over the summer, me and my boys were at the beach when this beyond naturally beautiful woman; wearing a little yellow bikini, was playing with her son not far from us. “Pretty girls like that only get hit on by guys they’d rather not get hit on by,” I told my boys before walking over to this girl and awkwardly asking if she’d take a picture with me to embarrass those boys of mine. 

Maybe I was joking when I sent Sirena that picture. Or maybe I was trying to make her jealous. Either way, I shouldn’t have done that knowing how Sirena thinks. “She’s from Arkansas and owns a bikini store,” I wrote in my text to Sirena with that picture, “If I run away again…look for me there. :0)” 

Sirena used to think I was funny but not so much anymore. I’ve been trying to convince myself that my sense of humor was wasted on her. 

“I know you’re excited to work on your story,” Sirena continues talking to me through the phone. “But you have to be realistic too,” she says. “You’ve come so far, and I don’t want to see you lose everything again…No surprises—okay?”

As I set out to write this little story of mine, not every problem I see in the world around me has a solution. Many of them do though and surprises will be necessary to get people’s attention. 

I could maybe yell at Sirena now like she’s done to me: “I don’t need to tell you everything!” I could maybe say.

“I know,” I decide to reply calmly. “No surprises…I promise.”

What I say to her now is a lie, but it’s better than starting a fight I figure—she’s not the only good liar in this semi-toxic relationship of ours. 

*

Article Title: P.A.I.N. through Fear 

Dated: Friday January 22^nd, 2021

 “You’re almost there and you’re afraid you won’t make it. The closer you get the worse the fear gets.” 

—a quote from the show Game of Thrones

Dear Class, 

Last week I described a future where I had changed the world with this story I hope to write. Allow me to now share with you another potential future…

—3—

—2—

—1—

—Action!—

Sitting on this stage, the lights shining on me are so bright I feel blinded by them. What I see in front of me is nothing short of a miracle. I made it. My book was published—After everything that happened, was I right to believe all along?

Standing in the front row, I watch Lauryn give me that “I love you” sign with two hands she knows I think is corny. I flash my more traditional peace sign back at her and watch her mouth those two words in my direction: “F*** you,” she mouths slowly. 

Seeing this relaxes me some. Looking at family and friends scattered around her, everyone—even Nel—is wearing one of those red hats with that word we’ve made famous stitched across its front. My heart is full as music plays loud. 

The song everyone is dancing to is And We Danced by Macklemore. I might have suggested Wings by that same band had I been asked; it’s one my boys favorites. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many smiling faces at once but feel paralyzed by fear sitting on this stage now—Is it normal to still be afraid?

The music fades and I watch the host of this show make her way to me on stage. She shimmies herself up against the back of her comfy armchair across from me, takes a deep breath, and then wiggles both her arms to the side looking emotional. Silence settles in as the crowd and I wait for her to gather herself. 

Locking eyes, we both smile—that type of smile where both people are trying to stop themselves from laughing. This is really happening, I think to myself, Drew Barrymore is about to interview me on live television.

“So…J,” Drew says slowly as reality settles in, “I have to ask…Have you gotten X2 back yet? ——Or has she maybe gotten you back?” 

Drew’s eyes shift away from me to look at her audience. My face warms but I don’t talk. 

“Oh sweetie,” she says after a planned moment of silence for X2, “I’m just messing with you.” 

Drew laughs and moves her hand in a way that might swipe that question she just asked from the air in front of her. 

“What I’m really dying to know,” she resumes, “is what these secret meetings between you and Dwayne Johnson are all about… Would you mind filling us nosey peeps in on that?” 

Drew looks at me quizzically. 

This moment between us on stage is merely theatre. Drew knows exactly what these meetings are all about. And why I can’t tell her in front of all these people. We have orchestrated this show and have been meeting in private over the last few weeks. 

Acting nervous, I shake my head to answer her question about these meetings. On cue, a large man walks out from backstage wearing a butler suit…it’s Shaquille O’Neal. 

Shaq walks past Drew, between her and the audience, and places a silver serving tray on the table between us. Using a crisp white glove, he removes the lid to this tray revealing a ham sandwich sitting on a single white napkin.

“In case you get hungry,” Drew giggles. 

Shaq puts four fingers over his mouth, gives me and then the audience a funny face, and then tip toes off stage without saying a word. The crowd roars with laughter. 

As the joke recedes, Drew wipes tears from the corners of her eyes and speaks again. 

“Well then,” she says composing herself, “let’s get to it shall we. You’ve come here today promising to tell us this big secret of yours. So… Mr. J… What is it?”

Placing both elbows on her knees, Drew leans forward in her chair and eyes me. Hoping I can deliver the mind-blowing showstopper of a secret I promised, my stomach jumps to its throat as I try to remain calm—Are they ready? I wonder knowing I will find out soon enough. 

In just a few seconds Oprah Winfrey will come out from backstage with Ellen DeGeneres and tell everyone in this audience to look under their chairs. There members of this audience will find my secret written with a black sharpie on a smooth white rock. 

Attempting to give this moment a climactic feel, I stay silent and go to take a sip of water from the glass on the table beside me. Leaning over I find my arms won’t do as I want. Looking down, I see a white straitjacket holding them in place.

Lifting my head, I look up to see everyone in the audience laughing at me. This isn’t my dream coming true…it’s my nightmare. 

How could I be so dumb? … How did I let this happen again? … WHY DID I LET MYSELF BELIEVE I COULD CHANGE ANYTHING? 

The room goes pitch black and becomes suddenly silent. A moment of absolute terror passes before a single light turns back on appearing through a doorway where the audience just was. Through that doorway I see a man sitting on a throne wearing a crown. 

Focusing on this crowned man through that doorway, I watch him stand up, pass through that doorway, and slowly walk down some stairs towards me strapped in this jacket on stage. As this man gets closer I realize who I’m looking at. 

Standing in front of me, this large man wearing an expensive suit grins down at me with lips glistening with sweat. Pulling his right arm out from behind his back, I am frightened to discover he’s holding a gun.

His hands really are big, I can’t help but think to myself. 

Calmly, this crowned man lifts that gun and points its barrel directly between my eyes. “You’re fired,” he says right before pulling the trigger.

—BANG!

Waking up from this nightmare, I find myself no longer excited about writing this story of mine. That’s what intimidating people and fear can do to us: scare us in the light so we destroy ourselves in the dark. 

“They win by making us think we’re alone.” I think that’s what those Star Wars movies say about it. 

Things rarely happen like we imagine. And being afraid is okay I’m told. Maybe it’s a sign of being a good person? Regardless, I’m letting my curiosity trump this fear growing inside me and will try and write this story. As the fears of what I think might happen to everyone if I don’t currently outweigh the fear of what I think might happen to me personally if I do. 

That said, please wish me luck…I’m gonna need it!

Sincerely Yours, With Love, Mr. J.

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION:

“Living in fear is comfortable.” I’ve heard people say that. In your journals, please try and explain to me why that might be. Fill a page!

The Teachers Playlist: 

Ready or Not by The Fugees

“If I could rule the world, everyone would have a G.U.N.”

*

(End of Chapter 23)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-Two: Three Young Men

“In time, you will know what it is like to lose.” 

—from the film Avengers: Infinity War

Thirteen point eight billion years ago, in a computer lab before time, two Engineers were in fierce competition with one another. One, named Alya, had a creation that far surpassed the others, though you’d call it more of a simulation than a creation. As the competition was ending the other Engineer, named Lucifer, became overwhelmed with jealousy. Facing inevitable defeat, Lucifer snuck onto Alya’s computer and punched two buttons: X followed by the number 2. By pressing these buttons in combination, Lucifer added an element into Alya’s DNA creation that would infect it with something called “deceit”… forever sabotaging the experiment. 

It is now the second week of January and classes are still remote. Knowing that next week ends semester two—marking the end of my tenure at this school—there was one more lesson I wanted to do with these students before we ran out of time. Lily is sitting in on this class today as well; her pretty face has its own cube on the screen in front of me.

“Pras, that thinking like that is why this world is going to hell!” 

Lauryn interrupts Pras in the middle of a sentence. Yesterday I had given my students this short story to read and try and make sense of in their journals overnight. Lauryn—who is openly passionate about her religion—gets upset with what Pras wrote about it.

I had avoided conversations like this in class up until now, but with this world “going to hell”, like Lauryn just said, I could not, in good conscious avoid it completely. When I provided this story I purposely intended to spark the debate Lauryn and Pras are having now. Knowing this, I secretly congratulate myself on a job well done.

Here in the United States, we say there is a separation of church and state, but once again, those are just words. 

On one of my walks recently, I made a mental joke that the separation of church and state is about five feet; for that was the distance between two flags on a porch I walked by. One said: Jesus Saves Lives. The other: Trump 2020. 

“It’s hard to stay positive when students are telling you to go f yourself all the time.” 

That’s what I said in this bible study I was attending a while back. I did not however edit myself as I remember the pastor attending our meeting saying using profanity in a chapel setting was inappropriate after I spoke. He said it nicely to the group of men around me, and used another word besides inappropriate I can’t remember. He tried his hardest to say it nicely. I still felt attacked of course…and stupid…as usual. 

Attending those meetings was a consequence of trying to find my faith again after leaving that halfway house. I had gone to this hip new church that was held in the auditorium of my local high school. My first day there I sat in the audience when Pastor Emy pointed into the dark pit of people looking up at him on stage. 

“You there,” he said, “that purpose you have…it’s right. You are meant to be here today!”

When this young good-looking Puerto Rican pastor said this, and pointed his finger into that crowd, he didn’t know I was there, or that it was my first time going to hear his inspirational preaching, but I swear he pointed directly at me. It was weird in the best way possible. 

You motherf***er —I remember my inner cynic thinking sitting there—you got me. 

I’m not a big fan of organized religion these days for many reasons. I did however become a big fan of David’s. After Pastor Emy’s service, I got in my car and realized my wallet was missing. I had a lot of cash in it that day for some reason. 

“Wow…” David said to me with a chuckle, “look at that.” Reaching between two seats David grabbed my wallet and handed it to me it like it was a gift from God. “What are the chances?” he said with that infectious smile of his; not a dollar had been taken from it. 

“You know Jose,” he added in fatherly fashion, “Maybe this was meant to be? Would you be interested in joining a men’s bible study I have at my house on Thursday evenings?” 

That’s how my bible study experience first began. 

David was once a principal at that same school where Pastor Emy was having his service. To me David represents everything that is good about religion. He had a near death experience and says he had a vision that he interpreted as a reason to bring God’s love into the world. 

After that near death experience, David created a chapel in his garage and held those bible meetings I attended. His chapel was beautiful. David carved bible verses onto pieces of wood and hung them everywhere. He gave me one that hangs at my parents’ now. 

“So, don’t grow tired of doing what is good,” it reads. “Don’t get discouraged and give up, for we will reap a harvest of blessing at the appropriate time.” I look that bible verse carved into that piece of wood every day. 

David hung Christmas lights in his chapel and played religious music on a big screen before and during meetings. Having a mind like mine, that chapel was perfect. 

Music like Reckless Love by Cory Asbury would play and I’d just listen to other people talk and look around at those bible verses on the wall. About ten men attended regularly. I was by far the youngest of the bunch. I’m not often comfortable around adults, and those men made me feel safe…for a while at least. 

That day I spoke and used the f-word was sort of the beginning of the end of me attending those meetings. 

Shortly after I stupidly used the f-word that day, I shared something I had written with someone in the group who said he knew a literary agent that might be able to help me get published someday. At the following week’s meeting, I watched that man casually hold up his bible and say, “The only book a person needs is this.”

When he said that I felt attacked. And stupid. Again. He was super nice really but never talked to me about my writing or that agent he said he knew. 

David had this fear of inviting “false prophets” into his chapel and so I began to feel like I was disrespecting him by being there. I imagined that was why that man didn’t like my writing so much. I wrote like I had information people needed—Who the hell was I? … Some sort of false prophet?

While I enjoyed the company of those men, I always felt guilty for possessing a mind that made me incapable of believing like they did. The final straw for me occurred the day a new member of the group was asked by David, “What brought you to Jesus?” 

In response to that question that man told the group that during a hard time in his life he opened the bible and read that homosexuality was an abomination. Why that brought this man to Jesus he didn’t say. 

The men around me didn’t celebrate his words but stayed respectfully quiet. I remember that man kept a phone earpiece in his ear during the meeting. When that ear-pieced-visitor got the men around me talking politics is when I decided I’d had enough. The answer I was looking for wasn’t there, I thought—or maybe it was?

Sirena and I used to attend a more traditional church semi-regularly. On the rare occasion I bring our son to that church now, I’ll get communion and think this pastor isn’t the biggest fan of mine. Sirena is more involved in that church today and so I can only imagine what he thinks of me. I know I’m sensitive, but I am also very good at reading people…that pastor barely looks at me. 

Bringing my focus back to the computer in front of me—and this heated conversation happening between Lauryn and Pras—I decide it’s time for me to speak.

“Alright guys,” I interrupt. “I want to read you an excerpt from a book that might explain why discussing religion is avoided in school.”

With the student’s attention on me, I read to them from an excerpt I wrote down from the book titled a Brief History of Religion by Richard Holloway. 

“It is obvious from our history that humans are good at hating each other. And it is usually those that differ from us in some way who become the objects of our hatred. Race, class, color, sex, politics, even hair color can prompt ugly behavior in us, so can religion. In fact, religious hatred is probably the deadliest form of this human disease because it gives humans’ dislike divine justification. It is one thing to hate people because you don’t like their opinions, it is another thing to say God hates them too and wants them exterminated.”

I look up at the faces on screen. “Like most everything you’ve read this year, I wrote that short story I gave you last night as well. Now I’ll tell you why I wrote it…. You all know I’ve been divorced twice correct?”

“Third times the charm!” Nel chirps in quickly.

No one laughs at Nel’s comment. Looking at Pras and Lauryn, I can see that both of them are still upset over their heated debate. Seeing Lily in her cube I feel myself get excited for where I’m about to take this lecture.

“The truth is,” I say slowly to the irritated silence, “I wrote that short story hoping the world might one day discover my second ex-wife…X-2…was a deceitful…b-word.” 

“Yo!” says a laughing Nel, “You’re a funny man Mr. J!” 

“No—he’s a jerk,” Lauryn says; not laughing. 

Pras is quiet but I see him smile some. He might again be wondering what exactly is wrong with me. 

Noticing Lily has disappeared from her cube on screen, my phone lights up with a message from her: a Cry-Laughing-Emoji, followed by three red hearts, followed by two more Cry-Laughing-Emojis.

Lily sneaks back into her cube on the computer screen in front of me. Her smiling face does not go unnoticed.

“Miss Lily,” Lauryn says sounding annoyed, “Don’t encourage him!”

It is not what I said about my ex-wife that Lauryn is upset about. She’s upset I let her argue with Pras over something that now seems irrelevant. 

“You’re really a jerk Mr. J,” Lauryn adds.

“I’m sorry Lauryn, but that was funny,” Lily says. “Are you really gonna call Mr. J a jerk for making us laugh?”

“Yup,” Lauryn responds; smirking now, “I am.”

Now that I’ve gotten my students attention, I prepare to present the lesson this class was designed to teach.

“How many of you want revenge?” I ask the faces on screen. “To get back at those that have wronged you…To show the world that you were right, and they were wrong…That they stink, and you don’t?”

Saying this, I stop for only a second and focus on Lily. Her face is encouraging as I move forward. 

“I wrote that story on my computer in the middle of the night a few months ago. When I wrote it I was sad and angry—a dangerous mixture of emotions to bring online with you. My wife divorcing me hurt because it wasn’t what I wanted, and for a long time I dreamt of getting her back… lately I’ve been wanting to get her back in a different way.”

This was a speech I had envisioned giving for a while but was unsure I ever would. I continue speaking calmly and honestly.

“Trauma from all kinds of failed relationships is most always a two-way street. Expressing frustration over them on social media only makes it worse and passes that hurt and pain onto innocent bystanders most of time.” 

I stop talking for a moment; imagining I might be attacking some of these faces looking back at me now. Lily knows what I think about breakups and how more has to be done about processing them in a healthy manner in school. Thinking this I continue talking. 

“I think we are living in an era that is proving kids can learn to hate a lot easier than can they learn to love. But I’ve found losing always creates opportunities in life and want you to remember that to really win in this world you’ll need to become really good at losing…”

Grabbing a piece of paper off my desk, I am about to show them what is written on it when Nel interrupts me from his cube on screen. 

“Not to be a jerk Mr. J,” he says, “but that’s Teachers’-Talk. Who wants to become really good at losing?”

The other faces on screen appear to recognize the rudeness of Nel’s interruption. I let the silence speak for me and watch Nel look unsure of himself for once. 

“You have to learn to cheer for other people, if you want them to cheer for you someday.” 

Something I say to my boys comes to me—Should I say this to Nel now? Eyeing Pras; still quiet from his argument with Lauryn, I decide to put my prepared lesson aside as I get an idea on where to take this conversation with Nel. 

Placing this piece of paper in my hand back down on my desk, the acronym I wrote on it looks up at me: P.R.I.D.E.= Poor Ride Into Darkness (for) Everyone. 

“Nel,” I begin, “Did your President lose this year’s election?” 

Nel does not hide his love for Donald Trump. He is the loud opinionated voice I’ve been respectfully listening to ever since that debate where this president referenced the size of his hands as a testament to his manhood. I’ve run into a lot of Nel’s and have been quiet long enough I figure.  

“That’s really nothing we know for certain Mr. J,” Nel replies diplomatically to my question about the election.

“Bullshit Nel!” I say theatrically. “He lost. As far as votes are concerned—he did. I don’t care what your president is telling you.” 

Nel stays silent and I find myself wondering if that attack was just a bit too real. I quickly decide to ask another question in a lot less aggressive tone. 

“Seriously though…Do you really think him losing this election with everything going on was a bad thing?”

“We need him,” Nel says quickly finding his confidence again. “Things will just get worse now.” 

“I was just messing with you to make a point Nel. I’m serious about him losing being a good thing though…You’re gonna see Trump did himself a favor not winning this election.” 

“He’s a narcissist, Mr. J.” —Pras walks into the conversation before Nel can respond— “He wants to win no matter what.”

“Name calling Pras,” I say calmly. “Even if he is that you don’t change someone like that with name calling…you create something they want and make them change to be wanted again.”

As I talk to Pras my mind is not thinking about the same person he is. I’m thinking about Sirena. As far as narcissist go, Lily said the other day referring to her, she deserves an award.

“He’ll never change Mr. J,” Pras says sounding disgusted.  

“Why would he?” I ask continuing to stay calm. “He’s loved for acting the way he does. Most people who don’t like him never will…if he changes he’ll only lose support.”

“If we forced you to Mr. J,” —Lily says; surprisingly jumping into our conversation— “Who would you blame for things beings so bad right now?”  

I laugh a response. “That’s easy,” I say, “not a person at all…the stock market. Like that Wolf of Wall Street movie says…It’s a bunch of fagoosy—pixy dust…”

I stop to make that funny whistling sound Matthew McConaughey’s character makes in that movie. 

“Seriously though, the stock market created a reality impossible to sustain. A trillion-dollar deficit built it in many ways. It built our universities…our corporations…our billionaires. Pointing fingers at people will only create division though and be used to exploit us more.”

Saying this, my eyes focus on Nel. As a Trumper he’s quick to point fingers. At this moment however, he seems to be listening to me and so I continue telling him how I really feel about this. 

“The stock market is not the same one that took care of my grandfather. It’s a casino now. With options trading and hedge funds, people win at the expense of others. We’re fighting to keep something looking good that is destine for a ‘reset’—that’s the word I heard someone use on Facebook the other day. A ‘financial reconning’ I’d maybe call it. War has prevented this in the past more than once though; and with my kids getting to that fighting age, that’s what I’m most concerned about honestly.” 

I stop talking as I see a now overly attentive group of faces looking back at me. 

Feeling suddenly uncomfortable, I realize unloading these opinions on them is not fair. I shouldn’t have used that word reset…or reckoning…and I definitely shouldn’t have said that thing about war. What do I know about war—I’m just feeding fear.  

“This is nothing new, I’ve learned not to worry.”

Something my mother likes to say plays in my head. With the stock market being so volatile these days she says this a lot. I think she’s wrong though. We’ve never lived through a depression like there was a hundred years ago and to me it appears we are repeating those same mistakes from that time in history. 

Thinking this, but not saying it, I smile at the now overly attentive group on screen—Take the crazy down a notch Biff, I mentally tell myself before beginning again. 

“You gotta remember where I come from Lily. To me, anyone saying they know what will happen is lying. To us or themselves. They might believe what they say, or they might be doing it for attention. Either way…no one can predict the future.” 

Saying this, I think of the ending to my story I’ve started working on: We can’t predict the future —I tell myself— but we can try and create it…

*

Article Title: Three Young Men 

Dated: Friday, January 15^th, 2021

 “Through greatness and discipline, we are the masters of our fate.” 

—from the film Edge of Tomorrow

Earlier this week we joked about what would happen if I ever became a successful author with this book I’m hoping to write now that I won’t have a job. While Lauryn claims I’m too old to make it big, I’ve decided to play with your minds some and imagine a world in which she has been proven shockingly wrong. 

In this future world, Tom Brady and I are great friends. I’ve stopped my midnight snacking and Tom has put me on his TB12 diet and set me up with his doctors. My age has become irrelevant. Sorry Lauryn…but welcome to My World.

—3—

—2—

—1—

—Action—

…..

In a galaxy far-far away, Three Young Men: The Joker, The Believer, And The Thinker, lay in front of their screens preparing to watch their favorite show: THE SUNDAY ROAST—A JoJo Enterprise Production.

“Hello everyone, today’s date is Tuesday, February 22^nd, 2050. I am your host Brett Fever, speaking to you live from Ernest’s Maple Barn in Ashburnham, Massachusetts. Thank you for tuning into this special edition of our show as we prepare for tonight’s celebration.” 

Sitting in a simple chair in front of a large window, the pony-tailed host crosses his legs, adjusts his glasses, and then continues to speak to The Three Young Men through their screens. 

“’Each of us can do something to make this world just a little bit better—our energy is measurable and connects us across time.’ Tonight’s Mind Molder is famous for muttering these words.” 

A picture of Jose Julian appears on the top right of the screen. Wearing a V-neck t-shirt, his graying hair and handsome face is unmistakable to those watching. 

“For those following along on J-Chat—where common decency and reliable add-free information is worth a small fee—we have something special in store for you to participate in during today’s show thanks to our friends at Wikipedia(dot)com. But first let us get The Disclaimers out of the way…shall we.”

Out of all the show’s segments, The Disclaimers is The Joker’s favorite part…he leans in mischievously to watch.

“The show you are about to watch has two primary objectives,” Brett Fever can be heard reading the shows disclaimers now appearing on screen. “One. To entertain you. And two. To sell you stuff. What you will see and hear is extremely biased and influenced by our own selfish agendas. Like always, we encourage you to investigate things independently.”

Brett’s smiling face appears again. 

“With those disclaimers out of the way, today’s Sunday Roast is brought to you by The Extender: Encouraging you to stay the person you were meant to be!”

A scene from an Austin Powers movie replaces Brett on screen. 

In this scene Austin is pretending not to know why a Swedish-Made Penis Enlarger was in his suitcase. The Joker giggles louder than the other two young men as a commercial for ‘The Extender’—a miracle vaccine fighting the effects of dementia—continues. 

“People had refused vaccines for many reasons in the 20’s,” the Narrator for this commercial says. “Both good and bad. Today fighting over those choices has subsided. We only want to help you stay you…but if that’s not your bag, baby…then that’s just fine with us.”  

The scene from that movie is replaced by a cartoon skit showing Joe Rogan interviewing Aaron Rodgers and Kanye West; two of the more outspoken anti-vacs critics from the early 20’s. After some talking, a mustached man painted red from head to toe, rushes from offstage and attacks the camera filming with a MyPillow. 

That commercial concludes with that mustached man yelling the word “Traitors!” repeatedly. As that commercial fades to black, the words “Breaking Knews” fill the screen. A YouTube video then begins to play; the title reads: Black Sails­—True Victory. 

This is The Believer’s favorite part of the show…he leans in excitedly to watch.

The three-minute YouTube video is followed by a scene from the 1953 film The War of the Worlds. The fear expressed by the actors on screen might appear laughable to some, but to The Believer watching, this fear, though ancient looking, speaks to him. This Believer worries about what is out in the vastness of space. The idea that a far-off civilization will one day come, and attack, makes perfect sense to this imaginative mind. 

Once that scene ends a montage of films displaying the end of the world appears as a rolodex on screen. A scene from 1983 television film The Day After, is replaced by Will Smith in the 1996 film Independence Day, which is then replaced by a scene showing Ben Affleck in the 1998 film Armageddon. 

As the pages of this rolodex turn, the viewer is taken through Hollywood’s many attempts at entertaining minds with the belief that a catastrophic end to the world was imminent. 

The rolodex disappears and is replaced by Griff-F; the host of this segment. 

“Today’s guest,” Griff begins, “is joining us from The Dream Rehabilitation Center at JoJo University. A school that continues to be both celebrated and criticized for its ideas on how to get the most out if it’s students.”

A video showing this school’s campus plays as Griff-F narrates. 

“Creating Creative Compliments is a requirement for first-year students here. This school will force you to sit in a chair and make you do absolutely nothing. ‘Exercises of the mind to help you breathe and think clearly,’ the course outline says. ‘Undistracted minds can learn to let go of anxiety, worry, and fear. We must learn to sit in silence to maximize our potential.’”

Griff-F appears again. 

“Sitting in silence…Is that really a lost skill? Or even a necessary skill at that? What about watching television together? Is that really something that should be done in a classroom? These questions continue to be debated today amongst academics and fools. Nevertheless, there is no questioning this school’s production of wonderful human beings— Like our guest today…Tia-B.”

The screen splits. Griff-F is now on the left and Tia-B is on the right. Below Tia-B reads: Professor at JoJo University, Traffic Specialist/Infrastructure.

“Tia,” Griff says from his cube on screen, “could you please remind our audience what the word Apocalypse is taught to mean at JoJo University?”

Tia-B is wearing a t-shirt with the word ‘Apocalypse’ written across its front. She smiles big at this question and turns around so the audience can see the back of the shirt she is wearing: “An Awakening Period for ALL of Humanity,” it reads.

A discussion on screen takes place about the upcoming music festival to be held at The Dream Rehabilitation Center this summer. “The Raffle” is happening tonight. Listening to this being talked about on screen, The Believer smiles to himself… imagining that Golden Ticket in his hand.

This segment ends and the viewer is magically transported to a beautiful modern-day city for this show’s main event called “Mind-Molders” where society-shaping entertainment is discussed. 

This is The Thinker’s favorite part of the show…he leans in attentively to watch.

In front of a tall building appears a makeshift living room set within a rock garden. Three chairs sit a few feet apart from one another. Sitting in them are the hosts of this segment: Lainie, Evelyn, and Brodie. 

Lainie speaks into the camera first. 

“It’s a family affair here today,” she says—The camera zooms in on the baby in the carriage beside her— “as I have little Ellie here with me in the heart of Detroit, Michigan to discuss the life of Jose Julian with you.”

Evelyn takes over. 

“This city is beautiful,” she begins, “but not as beautiful as its people…who will tell you this city came to life after appearing in this book.” —Evelyn holds up a book with a cover that is well known to the audience watching— “This book helped readers connect dots as to what was happening in our world and why. This book is considered many things to many people, but ultimately it’s a book about perception that will transcend consciousness on this planet for centuries to come. 

“This book gave birth to a new genre of story entirely. T.I.R.F. we called it: Transformative Inspirational Realistic Fiction. People would use this book as a blueprint to have their own stories told. Creating a new industry for story tellers and sparking what is considered now as The New Golden Age Of Entertainment.”

Brodie takes over. 

“Entertainment was always used to tell stories,” he begins. “Sometimes it tried to teach us a lesson or two, but then this Mind Molder showed up and challenged it to create a future.” 

Brodie stops to smile at the idea. 

“There was an old saying in American business,” he continues. “’People need to fear you if you want them to work for you.’ Jose Julian would build an empire by changing just two words in that sentence, claiming: ‘People need to adore you if you want them to work with you.’

“‘The world needs more unifiers not vilifiers,’ Jeff Bezos said awarding this Mind Molder his 100-million-dollar Courage And Civility Award. Eventually flooded with so much private capital, the only limit to realizing his dreams would become his imagination. This Mind Molder used some of that money to create a show based on his book that would show the world what education in this country could become.

“Sprinkled with conflict and humor, that show entertained us year after year; sewing up wounds that had been dividing us. And keeping us addicted to it by pumping into our veins something that had been missing for far too long…Hope for the future.”

Inspired by what this one Mind Molder accomplished, The Three Young Men continue to watch this show and dream of what they might one day accomplish themselves…

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION:

Which one word describes you most: A Joker, A Believer, or A Thinker? For this exercise choose one. In your journal explain why you chose your word.

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

Believer featuring Lil Wayne

“I’m fired up and tired of the way that things have been.”

*

(End Chapter 22)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty-One: B.S.

 “Everyone can be worthy…just give it a chance.” 

—from the film Shazam! Fury of the Gods

*

I entered The Pathways Halfway House in Gardner, Massachusetts in early October of 2017. That was about sixteen months after that fire I accidentally started. I ended up staying there for six months, finished its program, and then went to stay at a sober house in Athol, Massachusetts run by the same G.A.A.M.H.A. organization: “The Farm” they called it. 

I didn’t want to extend my stay in sober living but did what Councilor John suggested at the time. I lived in a small room on the top floor of The Farm and helped take care of the pigs and horses they had there for a month, before finally moving into my parent’s place; and dealing with my new life as a twice-divorced-single-dad-with-three-boys-from-two-different-moms. 

Prior to all that, the Alabama song I liked as a kid pretty much summed up how I went about life: I’m In A Hurry To Get Things Done And Don’t Know Why. 

Towards the end of my stay at that halfway house I had gotten comfortable with Councilor John and told him of this story I was working on before the fire. That day John said there are too many things in this world to worry about and suggested I find one thing and focus on that. He’d suggest that one thing should be my recovery. 

Whenever I shared my big dreams or ambitions with people they would do this: tell me what I should be doing instead. It took me a very long time to learn to just be quiet. “We do what we need to Pras,” I told him earlier this year because of this, “so someday people might leave us alone to do what we want.”

I did kind of do what councilor John wanted. Eventually. I found that one thing. I however let that one thing continue to be changing the world: I have no choice, I thought, it’s either that or be consumed by what Sirena’s up to. 

People that knew Councilor John well called him Rooster. I like to think it came from the song Rooster by Alice In Chains: “Ain’t found a way to kill me yet,” that song sings. John spent much of his life in jail. When I was having my hard time with Sirena, he told he was so obsessed with getting his wife back himself, that he tried breaking out of prison once. 

I trusted John by the end of my stay at that house but was never completely sure when he was telling me the truth, or just making up stories he thought might help get me through my difficulties. Since teaching at this school—and making up some stories myself—I’ve decided that it’s not too important; what helped, helped, and what was true or not has become sort of irrelevant. 

John had this quote of the comedian George Carlin in his office: “The reason I talk to myself is because I’m the only one whose answers I accept,” it read. 

In that halfway house my choices of what I could do were extremely limited. It’s made me realize how anxiety provoking the overabundance of choice can be. I was thinking about this again when me and my boys were walking around Lowes looking at refrigerators the other day. 

“With more choice,” I wrote in my journal trying to piece together my thoughts and opinions later that night, “we have more things that can go wrong.”

My mother is dealing with this currently. The fancy new fridge she bought not long ago has a light that doesn’t work. It’s not a simple fix like back when we had less choices for refrigerators. She’s already spent hours on the phone and had two people come look at it and it still doesn’t work. It’s become quite the headache. 

Spending so much time with young children, I’ve noticed the level of anxiety many of them experiencing took me years to achieve. I think it all has something to do with the overabundance of choice we have today…that and all this dark entertainment of course. 

George Carlin was a smart man: “The reasons I talk to myself is because I’m the only one whose answers I accept.” —I feel ya Georgie.

I ended up reading George Carlin’s biography because of that poster in John’s office and realized how extremely intelligent he was. I think the same could be said about the many other comedians sharing news with us today…John Steward, Stephen Colbert, John Oliver; to just a name a few that I’ve been listening to lately. 

It is now January in the year 2021 and I am home spending a night with my boys. We are watching the show Stranger Things when my phone rings on the table beside me. Seeing the name of the person displayed on the phone, I crawl out from beneath my boys and quickly grab it. “Mr. Bernard,” I answer getting up and leaving the room, “How are you?”

“Jose,” Mr. Bernard chuckles, “you have to stop calling me that.” 

This call is unexpected and unannounced; normally I get an email before. I never refer to Mr. Bernard by his real name as everyone knows him by that name, and if people knew he helped get me this grant they’d assume things. I’ve told him it’s just easier calling him Mr. Bernard. 

“I’m looking at some letters from your students,” he says through the phone. “It looks like you’re making a real difference over there.”  

“It’s been a crazy year,” I say to his compliment, “but I’m doing my best.”

As soon as these words escape my mouth, I feel dumb. 

Yesterday—Wednesday, January 6^th—the Capitol in Washington, D.C. came under attack by its own citizens. Supporters of the soon to be ex-president, Donald Trump, were disputing election results. The television footage of this was beyond disturbing. Knowing Mr. Bernard may have been right in the middle of it, my comment sounds extremely insensitive to me. 

“You aren’t kidding,” Mr. Bernard says, “it’s been a crazy year for me as well. There’s a future coming Jose I’m not much excited to be a part of.” 

I hear Mr. Bernard sigh through the phone and want to ask if he was there when everything happened yesterday. Before I can speak he continues. 

“I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch with you. With the election and this virus…and well—pure craziness, I fear I’m feeling my age.” Mr. Bernard doesn’t do FaceTime so I can’t see him, but I think to hear the tiredness in his voice. “I know your program didn’t get additional funding,” he continues. “I’m calling to make sure you don’t give up. You have something special there Jose…I want to read you something.” 

Mr. Bernard pauses, then his voice changes slightly as he begins to read. 

“‘Future civilizations will study how entertainment and the internet transformed our world. They will be able to look at our behavior differently with an understanding we cannot comprehend today. They will use what is happening now to improve future life on this planet. Because of this, I propose a full out assault on society using every weapon of entertainment at our fingertips. We need to entertain to transform. We need to accept that this is our responsibility. We need to get people dreaming again. It will take a lot of work, but it will have two major advantages: One—It will be fun. And Two— It will save the world.’”  

My stomach tightens as he reads this to me. 

“Do you remember writing that Jose?” he says once he’s done.

“Honestly,” I answer, “not really.” 

I am being truthful not modest. What Mr. Bernard just read was something I had written when I was in the halfway house putting this curriculum together. I wrote it by memory as it was something I had written before the fire. What he just read to me got me in a lot of trouble once. 

“You’ve done your research now Jose,” Mr. Bernard says. “Maybe you can’t accomplish what needs to be done from a classroom…Have you ever considered getting into politics?” 

This sounds like a joke to me. Not knowing if he’s being serious I answer simply. “I haven’t,” I say. 

“That’s a form of entertainment too I’m realizing,” he says. “I don’t like to believe in coincidences Jose. The day I got that email from your principal with these letters your students wrote, I had a meeting with some college kids who were doing a report on entertainment’s effect on politics in America.” 

“Seriously?” I ask surprised. 

“Yes,” he says, “they were conducting a poll on who was more popular with members of Congress…Frank Lloyd Wright or Frank Underwood—you know, the character in that show House of Cards. Those students claim that referring to the President as POTUS in news coverage only started after the term was used in the show West Wing. Listening to them had me thinking there’s an army of people waiting for you Jose—” 

Mr. Bernard stops suddenly. Like me, maybe he realizes the use of that word “army” a bit much given what happened yesterday. 

“The point is,” he continues after an awkward pause, “with people flying banners of the President holding an assault rifle dressed as Rambo, I fear where things are headed if something unexpected doesn’t come along soon… Maybe your book could be that thing Jose? Maybe not getting funding will give you time to work on it— Will you do that for me?”

“I’ll try,” I answer simply. 

“That’s all I can ask,” he says softly.

Feeling uncomfortable at the mention of my writing, I attempt to change the topic. “Did you get those mittens my grandmother made for you by the way?” 

“I did!” Mr. Bernard answers sounding suddenly cheerful. “If it’s cold I’ll wear them at the Inauguration. Tell her to look for me!”

I tell Mr. Bernard about my grandparents coming down with Covid last week. Him asking me about “Grampa Phil” has me feeling guilty again. It’s hard talking to my grandfather on the phone but maybe I could give him a call and see what he thinks about what happened yesterday. He’s as disgusted with politics as I am these days.

Saying goodbye to Mr. Bernard, I head back into my bedroom where the boys are watching our show Stranger Things. With the three of them filling the bed, I sit at my desk chair and begin mentally reflecting on the conversation I’ve just had. 

Mr. Bernard called to simply check in on me. He had no magic solution to this funding problem as the world continues to fall apart around me. It was nice of him to try and turn the bad news of not getting funded into a positive by encouraging me to work on my book…but I’m just not ready to think about that yet. 

He’s a dreamer like me. Asking if I ever considered politics is proof of that. Knowing I’ll be out of a job soon I find myself pondering his politics comment and can’t help but wonder again if he was joking or not. He knows my past and so he must know there’s no future for me in politics. 

Or is there? —A voice inside my head asks— Is it possible? … How would a life in politics even begin for me? 

Feeling my mind wanting to escape into the realm of impossibility, I force it back into the real world by focusing my attention on the show playing on the big television in front of me. That realm is a dangerous place for it to go and I’ve learned to identify it and avoid it whenever possible. 

“Look at me,” the white-haired doctor on screen speaks to the girl called Eleven. “I know you’re frightened,” he says, “You’re terribly frightened by what you’ve seen. But it’s this very fear that’s now holding you back.” 

Hearing these words, I feel my mind sharpen its focus. 

“You cannot hide from the truth,” the doctor continues, “No matter how frightening it may be.”

“I saw what I did,” Eleven responds; her voice slightly broken by tears. “I am a monster,” she adds shakingly.

“You speak of monsters,” the doctor speaks consolingly to her, “Superheroes. That’s the stuff of myth and fairytales. Reality, truth, is rarely so simple. People are not so easily defined. Only by facing all of ourselves—the good and the bad—can we become whole.”

“What if I don’t want to become whole?” a tearful Eleven asks. 

“Then that is a choice,” the doctor responds. “Your choice. The door is always open. This place is not a prison—This is…” 

I watch the doctor place his finger on Eleven’s temple. He’s telling her that her mind is the prison. I think he might be telling me as well.

“You chose to trust me once,” the white-haired doctor on screen continues talking to both Eleven, and me now. “I’m asking you to trust me again,” the doctor tells us. “Journey with me into the past one last time. Stop hiding Eleven…”  

Watching this, I begin to feel my heart hammer in my chest. I haven’t had this feeling in a long time, but it’s familiar. My mind has become an anvil again; hit from the heavens with an idea— We are all living in The Upside Down, it tells me. 

Entertainment has conditioned us to think all people are evil. It’s conditioned us to be mean and untrusting and hopeless maybe. It’s got us acting and behaving like a-holes and cheering for the bad guys—it’s upside down!

In that video I said humanity was facing a crises. I wasn’t wrong and Mr. Bernard was right—I’ve done my research now. We’ve all done our research now. The answer isn’t removing entertainment from our lives…it’s understanding it. 

Thinking this to myself, I take my eyes off the television and look at my boys lying on that bed.

When I wanted to hide from the world you made it so I couldn’t. I remember drawing on your backs at night and counting to a hundred before trying to sneak out only to have you squirm when I tried. I was so tired all the time. 

Maybe you weren’t three obligations I was ill-equipped to handle, like I thought, but three angels keeping me in this fight until I was ready to fly my own again. Maybe the world didn’t need ME back then? …. Maybe it always needed US now? —— The HenrieBoys.

The “fun me” begins merging my real life with fiction again. It’s as if I can actually feel my imagination trying to put the pieces of this puzzle together in my mind. My past, my present, my future, and my story collide. Visions that were blurry and put to sleep a long time ago begin coming back into focus. 

I feel that dream inside of me waking up. It’s like fireworks exploding in my brain… Am I ready to try this again?I wonder. 

Principal Sam thinks I’ll be eligible for unemployment. I might even be eligible for disability maybe. My parents wouldn’t like that. But I wouldn’t necessarily have to tell them. I could do some construction to keep them off my back if I had to. 

If I don’t do this now… when will I?

I have these articles to use so it won’t be that much writing. And I have Lily to give me an honest opinion when I’m done. I’m not doing this alone anymore. 

My story had a beginning back then. The plan was to finish it as I became a voice people could trust. With what Mr. Bernard just said I think I know how to end my story and start that dream life I imagined so long ago. 

I feel a smile attack my face—the lunatic smile I had packed away like a good boy. The one Jim Carey gets in The Grinch when he figures out how to mess up The Who’s Christmas celebration. 

I suddenly feel like Hulk Hogan. Wanting to rip off this white wifebeater I’m wearing and warn all his Hulkamaniacs to “Watch out brother!” I’m not actually wearing a white wife beater right now, but in my imagination I could be. 

The excited little boy in me laughs at the image— Oh JoJo… how I’ve missed you. 

Feeling this rush of childhood adrenaline, I continue to look at those three pieces of reality lying on that bed in front of me. 

The world doesn’t know it yet but they’re gonna love you…Can dad weave it all together though? 

*

Article Title: B.S.

Dated: January 8^th, 2021

 “Civilization will be saved if we can stir and teach the slumbering millions behind the politician. With this device we can reach them.”

— taken from the book The Soul of America by Jon Meacham

The quote above references the rise of cinema in the early 1900’s. The comment was made in reference to the 1915 film titled The Birth of a Nation. A film described as “a cinematic celebration of white supremacy”. 

I’ve shared with you my opinion that entertainment can be used to build a better world. That film used it to do the exact opposite in my opinion. According to that book, the movie was “immensely profitable” however. Giving evidence to something else you’ve heard me say: “Feeding anger is a profitable endeavor.”

History tends to repeat itself, especially when its profitable. So yes—we most definitely have dominoes being stacked against us when it comes to changing the world for the better using entertainment as a tool to do so. 

But anything can change when a force of greater power presents itself…Could WE be that Force?

As a kid, life was pretty awesome for me. In my pursuit of more awesomeness, I entered adulthood full of enthusiasm; excited to make all my dreams a reality. Then I failed. Over and over and over and over. 

I was advised to expect failure. But those were just words. The feelings and experiences hit different. Life diverged on me then and put me on a path I was ill-prepared for. “School did not teach me how to deal with any of this!” I wanted to shout to a world that did not seem to care. 

Failure made me mad. It made me sad. It made me anxious. It made me depressed. Failure had me detached from caring about anything in this world. Put simply: Failure beat the crap out of me. 

With a severely deflated ego, I traded those Get Rich Quick books I read as a kid for Mental Health books. In many of those books I read things like this: “The only thing you have control over is your thoughts. Your thoughts control your emotions. Learn to control your thoughts and you can control your emotions.” 

When I first read those books I shook my head in agreement like any good student. They were right: if I could control my thoughts I’d be happy. Over time, however, I started to calling “Bullshit” on things I once accepted as common sense. 

I could agree with that statement about controlling our thoughts…if we lived in isolation. A place separate from society and everything that comes with it today. A quiet place much different than this not-so-wonderful reality of ours. 

Many people find words like those comforting and inspirational. After asking myself many questions however, I’ve concluded that statements like those aren’t often applicable in a world where it has become nearly impossible to sit alone with our thoughts. 

For example: Focusing on the bright side of things—like we are told—is impossible if we cannot pay our electric bill. 

The burden of money is real and so many of us have to go to work. We have to deal with bosses, customers, and other employees. Some of us have to deal with students. Good luck with that!

Many of us also have families, where being quiet to focus on our thoughts cannot happen if we want to be a caring and attentive member of that family. I could argue that we are expected to talk all the time. If we don’t, people might think something is wrong with us. 

And when we aren’t talking there is that phone in our hand. And scrolling videos. And social media. And television. And radio. And music. And podcasts now. 

Being able to focus on our thoughts in an environment so full of noise is nearly impossible I think. By the time any of us are able to sit alone with our thoughts, do we really want to know what we’re thinking?

Someone talk … Please. 

The conclusion I’ve come to is this: Our environment effects our thoughts, and our thoughts effect our emotions, therefore, to improve mental health on a global scale, we must change our environment—PERIOD.

I’m not a cynic when it comes to self-help books. In fact, there is a variation of the statement I used earlier that says this: “When you control your thoughts, you control your mind. When you control your mind, you control your life. And once you reach the stage of being in total control of your life, you become the master of your destiny.”

One reason I avoid drugs and alcohol today is because they affect my thoughts. According to this wordier version of that earlier statement, doing this means I am on a journey to control my mind. Once I control my mind, this statement claims, I control my life. And then, once I’ve done that, I will become the master of my own destiny. 

I hope that’s not bullshit, because this a-hole really wants to believe it. 

When I was in early recovery and life was changing without my permission, there was something I said that helped me survive the experience: “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” 

Saying this over and over, and believing it, helped me more than I could ever explain to you, but there was always something about that word ‘Acceptance’ that bothered me: What if everyone just ‘Accepted’ the world the way it is? … And simply ‘Accepted’ that things would never change? 

Questions like that haunted me, but I was told that acceptance was the answer. So, for a long time, I just nodded my head in agreement. 

“Bullshit!” 

I have since accepted—like everything in life—exceptions exist: acceptance is not always the answer. 

In recovery I became a better person and acceptance was a key ingredient to my success. For that I am grateful. Reading the AA book and participating in its program brought me stability that allowed me to be there for my boys. For that too I am grateful. But the world that was waiting for my boys in adulthood continued to worry me. 

Am I supposed to just accept the way things are? … What if I could make this world better for them? … Is acceptance truly the answer or is it merely a chapter in a larger book? 

Sitting with my councilor at that halfway house I told him these questions and concerns I had and how I thought I might be able to change things. 

In that conversation with him, I used a line I had rehearsed prior to talking to him that day: “Walt Disney built a world John,” I said half-jokingly, “Why can’t I?”

“Whoa!” My councilor scoffed at my rehearsed line that day. “Take the crazy down a notch Biff,” he said to me.

That word “Biff”—the way my councilor used it—was a reference to the second Back To The Future movie, when Biff Tannen is lying to Marty’s dad saying he put two coats of wax on his car. My councilor used that word Biff when he saw residents like me exaggerate the truth or say something a tad bit delusional. 

Facebook fed me a post the other day that had me remembering this. That post showed a picture of this Biff character: “We are living in the timeline where Biff got his hands on the Sports Almanac,” it said. You’d have to live inside my head to know why that post spoke to me.  

The day my councilor called me Biff, I remember him reaching for that bowl of M&M’s on his desk. Picking up that bowl, he shook it in my face. “You’re saying I a lot,” he said, “have you noticed that?” 

My councilor trained residents to think the letters on that candy stood for Me and Me. He’d give the same speech whenever a new resident moved into the house….

“All of society has come down with a severe case of the Me’s,” he’d tell us men sitting around that table in the basement. “Someone told me this once and I’m here passing the knowledge onto you. This magazine here says that if a person uses the word ‘I’ or ‘Me’ in a social media post, that person will get twenty-five percent less likes on average. If that doesn’t prove to you people don’t like other people talking about themselves, I don’t know what will.”

When I saw him walk into a meeting with that magazine, I knew what was coming. The day I used that silly Walt Disney line on him, I told him about this book I was writing before the fire. He had seen me overcome a lot by then and so I was hoping he’d encourage me to go for it now that I had some real sobriety under my belt…but he didn’t. 

“There are too many things in this world to worry about,” he said, “find one thing and focus on that.” 

He wanted that one thing to be my recovery. His tough love had gotten me through a lot, but in that moment it felt like it might once again break me. I was desperate for just one person to believe in me then—Just one, I thought, and I can make it real. 

“MY recovery won’t last without OUR recovery!” 

That’s what I wanted to say to him that day but didn’t. I did write it in my journal that night though. The next day I began working on this curriculum I’m teaching you now. 

It seems I have come full circle as I once again consider writing that book. People need to Believe Something again. They need to Believe Someone again. 

So… what do you think— Could I be the person to make them B.S. again? 

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION:

Why is it so hard for people to believe in a person’s dreams today? In your journals, please write some reasons why you think that might be?

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

Drop the World by Lil Wayne with Eminem 

“Because all this bullshit made me strong…”

*

(End of Chapter 21)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Chapter Twenty: Hate

“Times like these…dark times…they can bring people together.” 

— from the film Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince

*

“Is it possible to be gay and not know it?” 

In an episode of the show Two and Half Men, Charlie; the playboy slash womanizer in the show, is talking to his therapist and asks this question about whether he could be gay and not know it. It’s a joke in the show, but one that reminded me that everyone asks themselves weird questions from time to time…especially when growing up—I know I did. 

With children being overrun with entertainment these days, those questions are occurring more often I think. 

When Sirena suggested I watch that show Suits—saying it had a good story with not all that other “stuff”— I didn’t know what stuff she was referring to until later when I was watching a show that used the word “They” when referring to a character. 

Watching things with my boys I’ve learned how they think and what they believe. I can predict their questions and have gotten more comfortable answering them. Not all of their questions though. 

When that show used the word “they” when referring to a character it took all of us a minute to figure out what was happening because of that one word. “These are confusing times Mr. J.” In that moment of realization, words Pras used at the beginning of the year reverberated in my mind. 

Disney is getting blasted for being “Woke” lately. That’s the new word being thrown around now and it was on one of their shows that me and my boys got confused by this “they” thing. As a medically diagnosed “they” because of my schizophrenia diagnoses I think I’m allowed to be annoyed if I wanted to be. Personally though, I’m annoyed with Disney for a whole lot of other reasons. 

Their original shows I now pay to watch on an app aren’t very good. The runtimes are inconsistent; which shows a lack of investment in writing I think, and sometimes the credits at the end of show are just as long as the show itself. It also feels like I’m constantly watching a trailer for the next thing they want me to watch. Like all they want to do is keep me and my kids hanging on…so dad has to keep paying that monthly subscription fee. 

It’s not just Disney doing this. Big name actors and actresses are being paid big money to star in things with stupid stories and dumb action everywhere. Facebook fed me a clip of an actor complaining about what streaming services were doing to the industry the other day. Seeing that had me assuming these actors and actresses are just as frustrated as I am about some of this. 

Disney’s re-telling of the same stories over and over I find irritating as well. I consider it evidence of a society doing very little to encourage both children and adults to create new and original stories themselves. Forced to ruminate on money lately, in my journal I wrote that Disney Corp is another publicly traded company that has lost its way in the endless pursuit of more. 

“I wouldn’t call it greed necessarily,” I concluded in that entry, “but instead a society crushing obligation to shareholders—Mr. Disney would be rolling in his grave I think. Or in that frozen icebox he may or may not be in according to conspiracy theories.”

Disney is going dark for profit too lately I’m seeing. And all its super-hero-multi-verse stuff with alternative timelines is hurting my brain at this point. To me, it just feels like they’re using incomprehensible storylines to milk us for all we got. 

What if I had made different decisions? … What if my life didn’t have to end up this way? … What if I could be a different version of myself? 

“Create a darn future already,” I’d tell Mr. Disney if I could. “And please stop making me think my current reality could be different if only I made different life decisions—Trust me…I get it.” 

With everyone playing The Blame Game over all this “woke” stuff, I pieced together a less exciting explanation of what is happening that I wrote down in my journal after seeing that episode of Three and Half-Men.

“People that don’t feel like they fit reality are the ones most likely to spend time writing stories attempting to change it. I know that’s what I did,” —I wrote in my journal— “Those stories have been turned into things we see on screen now and so many of us feel as if as if uncomfortable is being forced on us.”

I don’t know if writing that would be considered insensitive of me, or “woke” … All the labels continue to confuse me. 

While I can choose not to talk about this stuff if I want, I’m finding my boys can’t. They appear to be walking into the eye of the storm now. “Are we normal dad?” They could ask me today. “I don’t know boys,” I’d have to tell them. “Just don’t use that word normal, ok?…It’s not safe.”

There are truly unique situations I can’t speak on, which is why I would choose to stay quiet about all this and avoid offending someone who I’m sure is a good person. If I were forced to speak on it publicly however, I might suggest humanity is currently experiencing an “over-correction phase” in its evolution due to entertainment; and that an equilibrium will be found eventually. 

This “Over-Correction Period” applies to a lot of aspects of our current reality—not just this woke entertainment stuff. Parenting for example. We over shelter our children today out of fear they might do the things we did in the past or because of the things we’ve heard about or seen on screen—we’re overcorrecting.  

I find myself thinking about all this as Nel, Pras, and Lauryn talk to each other on the computer screen in front of me. These students and I have said goodbye to the year 2020 and are now welcoming in the year 2021. 

With school on winter break, we had planned a short virtual check-in for today. In my email scheduling this meeting with them, I said to come with a few words written on a sticky note that might describe the year ahead: “Write yourself a fortune cookie,” I told them. 

All of these students on screen did what I asked and came to this meeting with a sticky note stuck to their heads. Mine read: “You will be The Boy Who Lived.” I didn’t tell them this ties into a lesson I have planned for next week called The 400 Pound Gorilla. The fact they did something silly like this without me having to explain myself shows how far we’ve come, I think.

While I attend this meeting for my students, my mind is elsewhere.

Last night both my grandparents were brought to the hospital by ambulance. My grandfather was diagnosed with Covid a few days ago and now my grandmother isn’t feeling well either. They are both almost ninety now, and so it’s a scary time for my family who was once all very close because of them. 

The guilt over not visiting them more is hitting me hard. Adding to that guilt is all these poor me thoughts I’ve been having lately. 

Sitting at this computer I can’t help but think of how alone and perhaps frustrated they might be feeling right now. My mind remembers a post I saw on Facebook about the hospital they’re at: “It’s an absolute joke,” that post read, “I’ll get a bill for my ambulance ride to another hospital faster than I see someone here.”

While I worry about my grandparents, these faces on screen need me and so I’m doing my best to stay present. Pras sits alone in his cube while Lauryn and Nel share one; the two of them are together at Nel’s house. To start this meeting, I asked if anyone made a New Year’s Resolution for themselves. 

“I’m gonna stop swearing,” Lauryn answered first. 

“No f***ing way,” I quickly responded. 

Hearing Lauryn’s resolution, I couldn’t help but make a joke of it by throwing an unedited F-Bomb her way. After getting my laugh, I told Lauryn I liked the resolution as swearing often makes it hard for people to see how awesome someone like her really is. 

“Mr. J,” Nel then said from beside her, “we’re watching the show Ted Lasso. He reminds us of you. We both think so.”

“Yeah,” Lauryn added, “if you weren’t going gray and could grow a decent mustache you might even look like him Mr. J.” 

Lauryn snuck in that jab with a big smile on her face. 

All my life people have compared me to famous people for some reason. Being compared to Uncle Jesse from Full House was perhaps more flattering than this comparison, but I still took it as a compliment. Telling Nel and Lauryn I’d seen that show has me listening to them tell Pras about it now. 

Watching Ted Lasso made me laugh, cry, and think all at the same time. A show like that, watched together and discussed constructively, could help these kids learn how to communicate with each other better. And feel more connected outside the classroom in the real world. I told Lily my thoughts on this when we were doing that sarcasm meter lesson with texting. 

“Ryan Reynold’s-type-sarcasm is funny in movies,” I told her. “But in the real world someone who talks like that all the time comes across as a jerk. Someone needs to teach these kid this stuff,” I said, “I think watching things in school together would help.” 

Suggesting kids consume entertainment in school would have people yelling all the things they need to be learning instead. I, myself, dreamt of teaching financial literacy to high school students once. 

It’s not that I don’t think we should anymore, I just don’t think we need to jam an entire class down their throats: introduce them to ideas and show them where to find the information, then move on—a lot of topics could be covered in this way I think. 

Kids can YouTube and Google their way to most all information they might need someday; and educate themselves when needed or interested. They cannot however YouTube or Google how to be a decent human being. Or how to consume entertainment intelligently so that it might not poison their perception of reality and of people in general like it is now. 

Life is all about sharing common experiences. With cellphones that’s getting harder and harder to do with kids. Sirena thinks the answer is to remove phones from school. While that might help in school, I told her just the other day when she was complaining about this, it won’t help these kids in the real world. 

Consuming entertainment together in school would take time and build relationships. It might also help with this distracted mind thing; as I’m noticing my boys having a harder and harder time sitting through shows and movies as they get older. It’s not just them… It’s happening to me too. 

I remember first talking to Sirena about this when we were watching the show Modern Family before that fire. This class I’m teaching now was just a dream back then. Her divorcing me left me to watch a lot of things with my boys I wouldn’t have otherwise and has convinced me I’m right about a lot of this stuff—a silver lining, I guess. 

“Hey Lauryn,” I interrupt my student’s discussion on screen, “is wanker a swear word?”

“No, Mr. J,” she says with a smile, “It’s not…you wanker. Hey—” she adds, “Did Miss Lily show you that video she made about your class yet?” 

“She did,” I answer. “It was awesome, thank you guys. Just so you all know, we can still have check-ins like these if that funding doesn’t happen.”

Lily sent this video she made along with a course outline and examples of student work to the Massachusetts State Board Of Education. She hopes they will see what we are doing in this class and fund the program through the end of the school year. 

Lily and I both know this is unlikely to happen but haven’t said so to these students. Her feeling invested in this program has me feeling optimistic about its future though. 

“Mr. J,” Nel says from beside Lauryn. “What did Linda and Ernie think about Miss Lily by the way?”

“Yeah,” Lauryn adds, “did Mommy and Daddy approve or what?”

Lauryn and Nel tease me for a few minutes about this Lily thing. I let them have their fun and soon find myself saying goodbye to the two of them. Pras then becomes the only face I see on my computer screen. 

“Mr. J,” he says, “why don’t you support the Black-Lives-Matter movement?”

“What are you talking about Pras?” I ask not having any clue why he’s saying this to me now. 

“I know you’re not a racist or anything,” he says defensively. “When we were back at school on Halloween, I overheard you talking to the other teachers and you said you weren’t a fan…I’m just curious.”

Thinking back on that day, I quickly remember the conversation Pras is referring to and for a quick second feel uncomfortable. Pras and I have what I consider a friendship at this point though and so that feeling quickly fades allowing me to explain myself.   

“I said I’m not a fan of the slogan Pras—not the movement in general. With everyone fighting over words that slogan was just asking to divide people I think.” 

“What are we supposed to say?” Pras says sounding slightly annoyed with me now. “If we can’t get peoples’ attention nothing will change.” 

On Halloween the conversation Pras overheard began when a fellow teacher said, “My jerk neighbor is selling shirts that say All Lives Matter….He thinks he’s so smart but really he’s just a racist in denial.” In response to that statement, I said this thing Pras overheard about not being a fan of the slogan. 

Opinions continue to exhaust me. Signs in front of people’s houses have been popping up supporting this or that lately. When I see one I can’t help but think its someone’s passive aggressive attempt at fighting against someone else’s sign. 

Pras overheard me saying things to try and fit in that day. Him talking to me now is a reminder to stay quiet. Unfortunately, that’s not a very normal thing to do these days. Earlier today that sports station I listen to in my car was playing entertaining calls from the past year to celebrate New Years. 

One man complained about the cost of beer at a Patriots game. “Then that damn computer asks you for a tip,” the man shouted sort of hysterically. “It’s criminal…Robert Kraft—you’re a crook!” 

That caller spoke to me as over the summer I took my boys to a pre-season football game and paid forty-five dollars for three pieces of pizza; I saved fifteen bucks by not getting myself one. I try to stay quiet but often can’t, and so now find myself trying to make things right with Pras. 

“I’m not saying you shouldn’t try and get people’s attention Pras,” I tell his face on screen. “But money will have everyone on the same team sooner or later. I just think people need to be more patient sometimes.”

“Patient!” Pras replies sounding super annoyed with me now. “We have been patient and racism in this country is only getting worst….” 

Pras begins to lecture me as I start to feel that thin ice I’m walking on with him cracking beneath my feet. Listening to him has me remembering an audiobook talking about this: “Traditional racism on our planet is waning,” that book said, “racism today is based more on cultural differences than anything else.”

I heard that on my way to a softball game back in September; where a team in our league is full of Spanish speaking players. When they’re kicking our butt and cheering in a language I don’t understand, I think it’s natural to feel irritated. I feel the same way when a big loud pick-up truck or fancy sports car speeds byes me on the highway. 

If that falls under “cultural differences” I’m not sure. But it’s what I thought about when I heard that thing about traditional racism waning. 

When I explained what parts of that a-Hole story were made up to Pras, Nel, and Lauryn I told them the world is full of angry and frustrated and hate-filled people right now. I know what Pras is saying to me through this computer screen is true—and with the ugliness I’ve seen lately I can completely understand his desire for all the ugly racism to end right now—but ignorance spreads when provoked much easier than compassion can be taught to fight against it.

I don’t know if I read that somewhere or if I just made it up, regardless I know better than to throw such a wordy statement at Pras now. 

My youngest asked what we sound like to Chinese people the other day. How racism based on language barriers will be solved that audiobook didn’t address—should I bring this up to Pras?

“I just think we’re going backwards Pras,” I finally say once Pras gives me a chance to speak. “Some people will never change, and I just think we’d be better off letting their racism die with them.” 

“Jeez,” Pras replies. “That’s harsh Mr. J.” 

Seeing Pras soften a bit I consider saying something about those MAGA hats he was talking about the other day. “Red is my favorite color,” he said to me. “Now I can’t see a red hat without thinking someone might be a jerk.” 

Bringing that up would get Pras talking about politics again. Not wanting to do that, I try to think of something to say that might end this discussion and not lengthen it.

“Things are messed up Pras,” I decide to say. “Most people can hate anyone today regardless of skin color. I just think maybe we make it worse with signs demanding change of people that can’t. We poke the bear so to speak. Have faith though, Mr. Future President, things will get better…eventually.”

“You’re so stupid Mr. J.” 

I’ve been calling Pras “Mr. Future President” jokingly lately; it’s how I introduced him to my boys. He loves his politics, and I sort of tease him for it. 

Pras laughs and I see his face soften more. Seeing him smile has me feeling grateful to have survived this conversation without falling through that thin ice. 

I now feel as if I’m safe—for a quick second at least…

*

Article Title: P.A.I.N. Through Hate 

Dated: Friday January 1^st, 2021

 “A genuine leader is not a searcher of consensus but a molder of consensus.” 

—a quote credited to Martin Luther King Jr.

“Hatred makes nothing but more hatred.” 

According to one of the many books written about Martin Luther King Junior, his grandmother said this to him once. Do we credit her for changing the world? No, we do not. But she did because of the words she used and how they reverberated in another’s mind that was listening. 

Class next will focus on the following question: We know the words we should not say, but why should we not say them? 

As a warmup to that discussion, please read the following article and complete the reflection in your journal. A warning ahead of time: I had a different article prepared but changed it some today after talking to Pras—please keep an open mind as you proceed…. 

In 2014 I entered my first detox facility and was unpacking my bag when a familiar face passed my door. We saw each other in that moment but didn’t say anything. Little did I know that person would become a great friend and change my outlook on life forever.

That person I saw walk past my door went to the same high school as me where football is kind of a big deal. He was the quarterback when he was a senior and I played quarterback when I was a senior five years later. We darn well knew each other that first day but were both too ashamed to say hello at first because of where we were.

“Jose my ***g*…where you at Cracker Jack?” 

Three days later I was in my room when I heard this yelled from the hall. There was no question who was looking for me—it was my new partner in crime: Billy Preston. 

That’s not my friend’s real name by the way. It’s just the name I’m using for this article. You’ll know some of why I’m using a fake name in just a few seconds. 

3…2…1…

I think my friend may have had “Race Identification Issue”.  That description, though potentially super inappropriate, could not be more accurate if you knew my friend— “The Kid” we sometimes called him. 

My friend was white like me but hung out with a lot of black kids growing up and sometimes threw words around that made me cringe. When he yelled from the hall “Jose my ***g*…where you at Cracker Jack?” he was a white kid—a “Cracker Jack”—yelling to me around a bunch of people we barely knew. Cringe.

My roommate in that place was black by the way. Luckily Billy had already made him a friend and so it was cool. Not to me, but to my roommate it was. 

“That’s retarded.” 

I planned on starting this article by saying that before I chose to use the more controversial N-word with you here. I was going talk about my friend Billy but use something I said growing up that is now considered super inappropriate instead of this thing Billy said. 

Today I think the word “special” is acceptable when actually referring to a mentally challenged person. But if that’s true, then does that make all the people I call special retarded? 

We live in sensitive and confusing times. Our class this week will focus on words and how they make us feel. Whether words are said out of ignorance, stupidity, or some other reason, the people that use them are just people—like you and me—and you should know how I feel about people by now: I like them even if I don’t often like how they act or behave.  

In recovery we talk about the dangers of playing the victim a lot. If we were to write a list of victims, and define “victim” as “someone disadvantaged by the system”, what would be on our list? 

Slaves? Women? Veterans? LGBTQ? Victims of an unjust financial system? Victims of a broken health care system? Victims of a broken educational system? What about people that lack decent parents or guidance—Are they victims of a faulty system as well? 

Racism. Reverse Racism. Retaliatory Racism. The list of what makes a person feel like a victim is endless. What about me? Someone not affected so much by the list I just provided maybe but still feels like a victim. I’ve been screwed over a bunch——Where does my Victimhood fit in? 

I was grateful to have my friend Billy with me at that detox facility. It was the first time either of us had been to a place like that and we both attacked recovery like we attacked sports: we were attentive students serious about getting our shit together and willing to put in the work. 

A counselor at that facility gave us all a white piece of paper one day and told us to list all the things we hated on it. Making that list was one of the more memorable things I remember doing there. As you might imagine not everyone was happy to be there and so the list of things some of us hated was rather long. 

We folded up our lists and then placed them in an empty tissue box. That councilor then told us about The 400 Pound Gorilla. 

“Negative thoughts can consume an addict,” that councilor said. “This is the number one cause of relapse. Visualize a 400 Pound Gorilla in your head fighting away the demons that want you to fail. Hate nothing. The things you hate are just things and the people are just people—like you and me.”

After dinner that councilor took us outside and had us make a circle around a fire pit that was at the center of the facility. That councilor then lit that tissue box on fire. 

“This world is not overflowing with hateful people like we sometimes think it is,” that councilor said. “It is overflowing with hate-FILLED people. Those are two very different things.”

Years later—when I found myself in that hallway house you’ve heard me talk about—I was more beaten down by life. And by addiction. I was in that “all life is suffering” mindset and hated many more things. Had I been given a white piece of paper to write the things I hate then however…I might have only written one thing: ME.

“You are in crisis, Jose,” my councilor at that halfway house said to me once. “Train your mind to see that crisis creates opportunity.”

My councilor at that hallway was full of words. Not all of them made sense to me. “Focus on the person not the stories they tell,” I heard him say once. “The stories are just stories—the person is the message.” 

In places like that you can find things to like about most everyone. At least I did. Following those same people on social media—or watching when they are gathered in groups—you will see how they ACT in front of the world. 

When you get to know people in places like that—when they are alone, and sometime at their lowest—you can often see them as they want to be; as they were as children maybe. They are delicate. They are sensitive. Many of them are open-minded and full of questions—not all, but many. A lot of them, crazy as it sounds, are optimistic. How many optimistic people do you come across in the real world today? 

“Everyone is recovering from something J.” 

My friend Billy said this to me at dinner one night at that detox facility in 2014. It was like a lightbulb had gone off in his head. I would have loved for this friend to be with me at that halfway house three years later. Sadly, he died before I was fortunate enough to make it there. 

Those words he said reverberated in my head though. And I say them to you now so that they might reverberate in yours. We all have a reason to be angry and hate people today. And to hate the world if we so choose. My friend Billy was right: “We are all in recovery.” 

We are all a victim. From what doesn’t matter. We can call ourselves victims of a broken world if we want. 

As you go about life, keep that in mind when you hear words that might offend you. Feed that 400 Pound Gorilla in your head and tell yourself that the person saying those words is just a person—even if the words they use might be a bit retarded…like me. 

I know that’s insensitive of me to say, but: “Focus on the person, not the stories they tell. The stories are just stories—the person is the message.”  

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION:

“This world is not overflowing with hateful people like we sometimes think it is—It is overflowing with hate-FILLED people. Those are two very different things.” In your journals, please write what you think this means and whether you agree or not.

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

Bombs Away (feat. Morgan Freeman) by B.o.B

“The end is only the beginning.”

*

 (End of Chapter 20)

Click here to continue to next chapter…

Listen to chapter audio by clicking play above… Listen and Read at the same time to improve your “focusing fortitude” :0) Pictures related to chapter can be found by scrolling to bottom of this page.  Enjoy the ride…

The Real GOOD Loser, A Story That Could…

Start of Act Three: The Prestige

 “The futurist gentlemen. The futurist is here. He sees all. He knows what’s best for you whether you like it or not.” 

—from the film Captain America: Civil War

*

Chapter Nineteen: Power of Possibility

“I’m something of a magician…Prepare to be amazed.” 

— from the film Wonka

*

It’s two days before Christmas day in the year 2020, and I find myself looking out the large front window in my apartment above the garage at my parents’ house, at a flock of plastic pink flamingos taking a stroll in a winter wonderland below me. 

Flamingos are our city bird or something. Sixty of them were used to celebrate a relative’s birthday a few summers ago. Nel called them pelicans when my boys first took them out of the garage. 

“Flamingos don’t fly until they’re shown how.” A minute ago, Lauryn was looking out this window with me and my son and said this thing to him about flying flamingos. Now I stand here alone wondering if she was joking or not—I’ll Google it later. 

Lauryn and my youngest are inside playing with Legos behind me, as I drink my coffee and look out this window at Nel and Pras fooling around with my twins in the snow below. Nel and Pras talked a lot about my boys and “Ernie” and “Linda” after they came over on Thanksgiving; most everyone calls my parents by their first name. 

With this pandemic, social gatherings are still not being encouraged and so were talking about what little plans we had for holiday break when Lauryn suggested my family should meet her: “Don’t you want them to meet Mama, Mr. J?” she said. 

The fact Lauryn was trying to act cheerful that day made me hopeful she’ll make it past this difficult time. These students then basically invited themselves over today. “I’ll drive,” Nel told the group. 

I’ve come to the realization that Christmas brings out the worst in me. It represents everything I don’t like about the world today: the mass exchanging of money for stuff. With the news of my program not getting funded; and this whole Sirena thing, I’m feeling extra Scroogey this year. 

The twins spend Christmas Eve at their moms. My youngest spends it at Sirena’s until late when he gets dropped off here to open presents from Santa in the morning with me. Two days before Christmas day—today—has basically become my Christmas with the boys I guess. With nothing planned, I let these students invite themselves over knowing my boys would again enjoy the company. 

I told Lily I hate the idea of gifts in general: “Getting them as much as giving them” I said. If an idea for a gift comes to me, I’ll do it. I made a calendar for my neighbors’ kids Owen and Dani this year of pictures I took during the pandemic; that I thought was a cool gift. But as a person that tries acting like they care about people all year, having to buy a gift for one of the hundred reasons we’ve created to buy gifts to prove to someone we care is beyond irritating to me. 

Having Lily to vent to has been a blessing. While I do genuinely hate Christmas right now, talking to her has had me at least laughing at myself for it. I know how I sound talking about this and do my best to hide it from my boys, but I can’t much hide it from myself: “Kind of like that stupid elf,” I told Lily, “Skittles is the stupid name my son gave ours.”

Looking out this window, the television I bought my boys for Christmas last year is wedged between a couch behind me. I—slash Santa—bought the boys that tv and a basketball hoop for this big living room last year. The next day a basketball hit the new tv and broke it. 

My boys felt awful when that happened, but really it didn’t bother me much. Despite what Sirena wants to say, I really don’t care about money. I know I should, and will have to soon, but that day I tried making a joke of it and told my boys we’d use that broken tv to prank someone someday. Really though, it’s only wedged behind that coach now because it’s a hassle throwing away.

I was talking to these students about things that would change in the future the day I told them this TV story. I said Christmas won’t be consumer driven when my kids are adults: “People will have learned by then,” I said, “that, or completely out of money by then.” That day I told them how I call presents “landfill”— Bah humbug, I should have maybe added. 

When Lauryn asked me if my twins still believed in Santa that day I said I think they might and asked if I should tell them the truth: “They already know Mr. J,” Nel said acting like he knew my boys better than I do, “They just don’t want you to know they know.”  

Hearing that had me thinking of my twin’s other dad. He thinks my twins know and are just playing dumb for us and their siblings. 

My twins have a great mom and a great environment at her house. Her and the man she is with now—who has earned the name “other dad” in my mind—have two girls together and are basically married without the title. Their mom is happier with him than she ever was with me. As is Sirena with her new man it appears…making me the common denominator in both of these failed marriages of mine.

These twins playing in the snow will already be in high school next year. Watching them now has me thinking about the day I attended their fifth-grade graduation…. 

I had just gotten out of the halfway house and sat in the bleachers of their gymnasium watching this video their teachers had put together that had the song Count On Me by Bruno Mars playing in the background. With both hands in my jacket pockets, I clenched my jaw and sucked hard on my tongue watching it; something I learned to do to stop myself from crying in public.  

I was there alone that day but even if my parents were with me, I’d still have felt the same. I felt so painfully alone around people then. I’m a little better now, but not always. 

My boy’s Papa was there that day just a few bleacher seats to my right. When I’m near him I wonder if a piece of sand feels as completely unnecessary as I do. My life was a disaster then—Didn’t he know I was sorry?

I started dating his daughter as a freshman in high school. When I proposed to her I made a snowman in front of his house to do it. He made a comment to me that day about not trusting me as I had broken up with her twice before finally deciding she was the one. He was mostly joking when he said that as we were good friends then, but with how things ended his words reflected on hit different. At that graduation I could understand why he hated me. I hated me too. 

Not long after that graduation he and I ran into each other at the gas station. Surprisingly, he acknowledged me. “Glad to see you working again,” he said. I had my construction boots on and was driving my dad’s truck. “You’ll be able to help more now I assume,” he added. 

I didn’t have time to say anything that day as he quickly got in his truck and left; proud of himself for sticking up for his daughter I assumed. He was talking about money. That was another big “I F’ING HATE MY LIFE!” moment for me.

I guarantee his daughter doesn’t tell him about the extra money I give her before school each year for clothes. Or that money I give her to use for presents from Santa each year. She doesn’t ask for this money I just give it…without a thank you from her obviously. 

He probably doesn’t know I give her more than I’m legally required to each month. Or about the tax credits and stimulus payments I let her have. He might not care to remember me willingly giving his daughter half of everything when we got divorced either. And he most definitely wouldn’t care I have literally nothing now and get nothing for raising my other son. 

My twins love their Papa. “Some people just can’t forgive,” I tell them when I know their upset he ignores me. 

No amount of money I could give would be enough. The only way he’ll overcome the hate he feels towards me would be by understanding and accepting that that divorce wasn’t all my fault. His resentments have turned him bitter, and I hate the role I’ve played in that because he really is a good person…I was closer to him and his wife more than my own parents in high school. 

In my mind us becoming friends again would be simple. He’d walk up to me and shake my hand in front of the twins. He’d call me an a-hole and I would call him an a-hole back. We would both laugh, and it all would be forgotten. 

I know that delusion is unlikely to ever happen. But do wish my boy’s Mema and I could be close again: “She’s the best back scratcher,” I tell them—I miss her the most.

Feeling underappreciated makes me extra sad around Christmas. And angry too I think. I know I can’t be alone. That’s why I look at this entire holiday as just one big event stoking those resentments dividing us. 

Thinking this to myself—while standing at this window—I can’t help but picture Jim Carey’s Grinch standing on top of that mountain listing all the people he loathes: Where would my list end? I wonder. 

Having this conversation with myself, the four boys moving in the snow below look up at me. I nod my head to confirm that I do in fact see the artwork with those flamingos in the U-driveway below. “Yes, I see it,” I mouth smiling at them.

In my mind I sometimes refer to my twin’s mom as Martyr Mom. I started using that name after seeing an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond where Ray uses that word on Debra and gets himself in trouble. 

Martyr Mom doesn’t like to ask for my help or involve me in things if she doesn’t have to. She really is a great mom though. She’s the reason my boys say “love you” whenever they say goodbye; words my family don’t often use on one another.

The twins were only two when their mom and I got divorced. On the day I moved out for good their identical little heads popped up from the bottom of a window that was eye-level with our driveway. Their little faces in that window tormented me for a long time.

I’m the one that asked for the divorce but none of it was easy for me. I remember driving around back then listening to Highway Twenty Ride by the Zac Brown Band and crying. 

I told myself I had no choice but to leave. Martyr Mom wasn’t involving my parents in their lives—she didn’t “trust them watching them” she said—and I just felt like a passenger along for the ride. 

I told myself that by the time these boys were adults I’d be a better father to them than had I stayed. That was always just me justifying a difficult and very selfish decision though. A decision Percocet helped numb me to its consequences for a while. 

Outside this window I continue to watch my twins play the role of Dumb and Dumber; while Pras and Nel play the role of Dumberer and Dumbest. They all giggle looking up at me once more and I can only once again shake my head at the arrangement of flamingos in the snow below that now clearly resemble a gigantic penis and balls. 

With my coffee in hand, I look across the street and wonder what the Tall’s are thinking about all this. If these neighbors are watching, they’re probably just laughing at us like usual—they know this is the fun house.

Down the road I see Geanna and Gemma—both spelt with a G—headed this way with their little white dog. I’m horrible with names and currently forcing myself to remember theirs as Gemma got mad I forgot hers just the other day. One of those girls is my twins age and one is a bit younger. Their mother called moving into this neighborhood “living the American Dream” when we first met not long ago. 

In addition to that mom’s full-time job, she is starting an event planning business; POP By Posh she’s calling it. Hearing that I couldn’t help but think about when I tried opening my own business to pay for that so-called “American Dream” she referred to: “The American Trap,” I call it now

Buy a car—get a dog—get married—buy a house—have a kid—pile on the responsibilities as fast you can and soon you’ll be happy… “The American Trap.” God—I’m so miserable I can’t even stand listening to myself.

Below me, I watch the girls walk past without anyone acknowledging each other. Nel says something to my twins that has one laughing and one ducking his head; looking embarrassed. 

I dream of a world where kids are friendlier towards each other and try to lead by example. That’s why we know Geanna and Gemma. But watching this lack of interaction occur from out this window is yet another reminder of the uphill battle I face. 

The sound of crashing Legos gets my attention. Turning, I see my youngest has just emptied another bucket on the floor. The counter I can’t help but notice is a mess from that “moonshine” Nel was making with my boys before they went outside. I like to keep that counter clean and remind myself to clean it later. 

Lauryn and my son are working on a Lego table to the left of that messy counter. Above their head hangs what I consider my most prized possession today. 

When I got out of that halfway house Tammy—my son’s daycare teacher—wrote on a piece of paper “I am lucky because…” and had him tell her something to write. He drew two stick figures and had her write: “I see my Daddy!” 

Lauryn and my son are spelling his name with Legos. From across the room, I watch her ask him how many letters are in each part of his name like he’s some dumb little kid. None of my kids‚ or these students—are dumb little kids, but this one most definitely isn’t. 

While driving the other day he asked why the moon looked bigger than the sun after learning something in school. To answer his question, I used signs at different distances to explain why that was. Putting that together, he then asked about the size of space and if there was an end to it. Once he contemplated my too complex answer to that question this, not-really-dumb -little kid, asked if that was where God lived. 

“Six—Six—Six.” 

I see my son answer Lauryn’s question to how many letters are in each part of his name. With shocked fear in her eyes, Lauryn looks up at me watching this interaction from across the room. My son then watches the two of us smile and laugh at something he doesn’t understand. 

Adults and their dumb signs, I think to myself, I’ll have to explain that to him later—Once I figure out how to answer that whole God thing… Children and their dumb questions.

On this day the serious business of growing up is being put on hold for all of us. My dad is downstairs making a batch of his homemade Cookie Dough and Oreo Ice Cream and Lily should be here any minute with the pizza she’s picking up from Athens. The plan is to eat and watch a movie. When Lily texted me saying she was on her way, I told her to look for flamingos. 

Turning once again I look at the group of boys outside. 

Maybe one day I’ll tell these boys everything that happened before. Maybe one day I’ll tell them the truth about Santa. Right now, however, I’ll iron in this memory being made in the snow below me; and hope that one day I’ll be remembering the good days and not the bad anymore. 

*

Article Title: Power of Possibility 

Dated: Friday, December 25^th, 2020

 “People. We think. We reason. We have free will. We can change our destiny.” 

—a quote from my favorite show Lost

For a week and a half, I tried to get all of you to see this world we are living in today with a sense ofImpermanence: a noun; meaning the state or fact of lasting for only a limited period of time. 

With winter break coming up, I gave you an assignment titled The Power of Possibility in which I asked you to write a short story where you imagined the world thirty years from now; with only one stipulation: that things in thirty years are better than they are today: “How did it happen?” I asked. 

I stole/pirated the idea for this assignment from an old Simpson’s episode. Your stories were so good, Miss Lily and I will be asking your permission to use them as examples of student work when we present this class for future funding. Here is a summary of what each of you wrote: 

Nel titled his story: “Speed Free Zone.” 

Listening to Nel rant about “power tripping cops” after he got his “undeserved traffic ticket” I encouraged him to use his frustration to change things. His story envisioned a world where registered cars had sensors placed in them. “Sensors placed in cars reported aggressive driving to insurance companies,” Nel wrote. “Reducing the amount of anger directed at cops responsible for giving tickets to drivers.” 

Dear Nel, you had a hard time getting started but showed some truly original thinking on your part. Way to go kid!

Lauryn titled her story: “NON-FAF.” 

Imagining a world that had outlawed filters on social media platforms because they were deemed a “public health risk”, parts of Lauryn’s story made me literally laugh out loud. I don’t do TikTok, yet, but the statistics regarding the growth of “influencers” since its creation blew me away. 

Her story made me think of how I feel when I look at old pictures of myself. All of you will have many more pictures of yourself to look at someday and I worry about what that will do to your psyche. 

Dear Lauryn, you made me think. Great work my dear!

Pras titled his story “RECYCLE ECONOMICS.” 

Imagining a world that had become more equitable—and perhaps kissing my butt some—Pras wrote: “If you give people more money it will be recycled back into the hands of the wealthy. Most of the population will die without amassing much wealth, but their lives would be lived more happily…The wealthy are admired rather than scared and hated.” 

Dear Pras, your story would gather many cheers in our world today and at the same time receive a lot of ridicule. When that happens, you know you’re onto something. Nicely done my friend!

Unfortunately, none of us can live in the future. Rather, we must face the days ahead and deal with the world in which we exist today: The Not-So-Great One. 

Here I’m tempted to discuss the evolutionary process of a species with you. But we are on break, and I don’t feel like putting that much work into this. So, I’m just gonna say something here I’m sure you’ve all heard before: “Be the change you want to see in the world.” 

An entire class should be taught on how to do this. I’ll only share a few examples with here though hoping they might stick. The first being this: When you go to stores like Walmart—put your carriages away. 

Don’t just fling them into the receptacle either. Take the extra few seconds to push together all those carriages that might be flung about. People will see you do this and maybe it won’t change anything in that moment, but people will know it was done and that begins a wrinkle. 

Everything we do in life creates wrinkles…not just stupid things. 

The worker responsible for putting those carriages away—who has their own problems and doesn’t make nearly enough—might appreciate someone in the world being considerate to them. A wrinkle. Someone might be watching you put that carriage away. They might remember and put a carriage away themselves someday. Another wrinkle. 

Some of these stores are a like war zones and don’t have receptacles that work properly. But we’ll make them change that too. Eventually. When I go to a store and see all those carriages put away nicely, I’ll know you’re out there changing the world. 

Also: DON’T KEEP A SCALE. 

We all do this whether we realize it or not. We keep a scale of our good deeds and weigh it verse good deeds done for us. We are all so focused on what’s going on with ourselves, yet we all still find time to think about this scale… Try not to. 

In my personal life I run into this scale thing a lot. People know I’m capable of doing a lot of things. And so, people still look for my help doing a lot of things. 

My uncle made a comment to my grandfather over the summer about me not doing some work he needed done on his shed. That uncle was kind enough to drive me to those electronic shock therapy sessions I told you about. When I heard what he said, I took it to mean I owed him for when he helped me during my difficult time. 

My uncle might be keeping a scale, I thought. 

This uncle’s son tackled addiction with pills before me. I remember visiting him twice when he was in rehab. Did that son ever visit me when I was in that halfway house? No, he did not. 

I love my cousin and my uncle, but in some ways was keeping a scale myself. Being aware of that however is part of growing; according to that book The Heart of Buddha’s Teaching I’ve been listening to during my walks. “Healing begins when ignorance comes to and end and understanding arises,” that book also tells me. 

I’m reminded of a scene from the movie Billy Madison now. 

In this movie Billy is a spoiled rich kid that goes back to school to prove to his father he’s not an idiot. He is. In the movie Billy tries making amends for being an insensitive jerk as a kid and calls a boy he bullied. That boy answers and accepts Billy’s apology like it’s no big deal. Hanging up the phone, we then see this grown man cross Billy’s name off a list that hangs on the wall behind him: “People to kill,” that list reads. That grown man then proceeds to put lipstick on himself. 

The point: Don’t keep a scale——AND DO NOT KEEP A LIST! 

We are all troubled high school kids whether we realize it or not and I understand if doing some of this can be difficult as we all carry baggage. To that however, I say this: “BE SELFISH!” 

Be kind to yourself and others because it makes YOU feel better. Be kind because that’s who YOU are or because that’s who YOU want to become. Try not to do nice things because you expect something back. The favors we give are rarely matched by what we get back. But that’s okay because we become happier people by loading that scale with our good deeds. 

Also. Also. Don’t be an “I told you so person”. 

I say this to my boys all the time and can’t end this article without at least mentioning it here. All of you can do this. “You’re not like the others. You’re from a whole nother world—a different dimension. You open my eyes…and I’m ready to go. Lead me into the light.” 

Yes…Lauryn…I did just quote a Katy Perry song. Feel free to bite me if you think that makes me lame. Or, as Katy says in that song…kiss me. You’re free to choose. Did I just make things awkward? Oopsy. My bad. Lol. 

Have a great break everyone. I’ll talk to you all on New Year’s. 

Sincerely Yours, with love, Mr. J

WEEKLY QUESTION FOR REFLECTION: 

“We become happier people by loading that scale with our good deeds.” Be honest. Do you agree with this statement? In your journals explain why or why not. Fill a page!

The Teacher’s Playlist: 

E.T. by Katy Perry 

“They don’t understand you.”

*

(End of Chapter 19)

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