"It's the fear that drives us."

   "I lost all that mystery when I was on drugs. Drugs will steal you like a crook. Spirituality over. I could no longer see the things I used to see in my peripheral vision. No periphery, no visions" (p.17).  "One night my childhood ended. I passed it up, but then I got curious. I don't know if it was the smell or the romance, but eventually everything that I did was illegal, immoral, or fattening" (p.29-30).
   I probably shouldn't start here, but the one time I felt high was when I was in labor with Jacob and I was given a narcotic for the pain. Had I known what it was, I would have passed. I thought it was less harmful that the epidural...which I soon got after the narcotic didn't to squat for the pain. But, it did do something. In a way, everything seems more simple and clear from my end and everyone else seemed like a bunch of time wasting idiots. There was a nurse that was asking me questions she could have asked my husband who was just standing there laughing at me. I didn't want to answer her stupid questions because it seemed illogical. I wasn't into conforming and being polite just because it was my expected role. I was like, Whatever. Then I asked my Dr. how much longer this was going to take and she started going into this long drawn out thing about the ins and outs like she was a lawyer or somebody I would sue if she gave me the wrong info, so I asked again, "Ok, so, how much longer will it be then?" Then everybody laughed at me. Great. I just wanted an answer like 10 minutes to 3 hours is my best guess. How hard is that? So then they thought I was the idiot and they lied to me about my epidural being in the room. I was in the tub and it was helping and I did not want to get out until they were ready and in the room. When I got out,  he wasn't even in the hall. Then they said that they didn't think I would be able to get out that quickly. Idiots and liars.
     So I liked seeing things that way, but I hated the feeling of loopy-ness.
     On page 31 he talkd a little about being lonely walking home in the dark and abandoned when his friends would leave in September. he said that it's rough stuff when you're young. He wondered if he would be like some crabby adults he knew when he got older and that he's still so much he's not sure of and that it's the fear that drives us. It's the fear that drives me CRAZY.
      I remember feeling sad as a kid about the possibility that I wouldn't have much control over being like the adults I knew.  If, as I had heard frequently, that all kids are the same, then the natural progression is that eventually we..I was going to turn into...one of 'those.' Of course as I went along I did whatever I could think of the stop that from happening and I still get bummed when I think I have failed in any part of that. I think it must be because of laziness and I just have to try harder, because it's just too easy to be a pain in the ass.
    I loved reading (p. 32) how he will never forget the moment he had when camping with a friend and a couple of girls. They hiked in the dark, pitched a tent, drank and made out. "We woke up in the morning to someone shouting, 'FORE!' We were on the 3rd hole of a golf course. Naked and hungover, we grabbed our stuff and ran like hell.
     Now that's funny. I am desperately trying to think of something funny that I have done to try to beat this, maybe something will come to me in a few days. For now, the Oreo story will have to do. I have to admit that my sense of humor got me out of quiet a few messes as a kid. It's a fine like to walk to know if you can crack a joke or even try to be funny or if silence or apologies is better. So, I'm about 7 maybe and I'm living with my Dad and God bless him, he likes candy as much as I do. He got these cookies, not technically Oreos, just cheaper. Well, I wasn't exactly crazy about the cookie part, but I loved the cream filling. You can see where this is going.  My dad made his lunch to take to work every day. 2 sandwiches and a handful of cookies in a baggie. I still thank GOD to this day that he was in a good mood that day, because this could have come out badly, I will never forget the day he came home and had this total smile on his face with his eyebrows raised and he looked down at me and asked, "Vicky, did you eat all the cream out of the cookies?" Crap! red handed, but I blushed, smiled up at him and said, "Nooooo." It felt like a moment, so I went with it. He thought it was a cute kid thing...thank goodness. I think he picked me up and said that he had to smile to himself when he got to work and started eating his lunch and he could see that I had licked all the cream out and then stuck the to cookie parts back into the cookie jar. He asked me not to do that from now on and I said OK. Now THAT was good communication!
     OK, p. 33. I like how he (ST) says, "I thought that through the power of song, God was there. It was the energy rolling through those hymns." That's why he thought God was in church, because of the music. I like how in the music he liked and in his own that it makes him feel close to God. It's all about feeling moved emotionally and he gets that through music. That's cool. I get it and feel moved emotionally through music and that's why I like him, but his is on a much bigger scale that mine. Why he's a rock star I guess. "...That's as close to God as we're going to get, short of a mother giving birth."
      He does not go chronilogical, but it still has an order to it. He talks about this huge rock he wanted to climb on top of. It was 30 around and 7 feet high, he thought, "If I can get on this rock and stand where no other human has ever stood...I can communicate with aliens. This raised some eyebrows among the other eight year olds on the playground." He was talking about a rock his kids climbed on and then went to this story, I like his sense of humor, even though it's all true, which makes it all the better and funnier.
     He carved his initials and thought one day they will come and "they will know that I was here and wanted to make contact, and that I was one of the humans who wanted to live forever. That was my kid thought."
     I really like reading (and thinking about my own) about the things that people remember about their childhood and how they can see the sweetness in it now. I want to live forever too. Just me and Steven maybe? He could sing to me and I could massage his feet. He sings to me now I guess.
     I used to think smoke stacks made clouds, that if I threw my vitamin C behind the couch that they would never be found, that Mr. Rogers loved me and I was his favorite, Dandilions were the best kept secret because they were free and beautiful and then magically turned into those puffy things that occupied me forever, and that even though my Dad told me that Santa was not real, if I believed in him, then he would be to me.
     There's something, freaking Santa! All these stories. I talked about Santa to my kids but whenever they asked if he was really real, I couldn't bring myself to tell them yes. Even though I know they wanted me to. I would tell them the story about how the 'legend' of Santa began and we could still believe in the spirit of Santa and giving, just like with Jesus. At the time, I didn't want them to see those 2 things as the same. Santa and Jesus can not be seen, and one is real and one isn't? Maybe they are both not and it's all just stories? OK, like church, when a group of people all go and believe in the same thing, there is a power there and they all claim to feel it, but I think that can happen in many different areas. Kids feel that with Santa. Anyway it was bittersweet. Lizzy still clings to the Tooth Fairy with a passion.
    P. 36, "That was my childhood. I read too much. I fantasized too much. I lived in the 'what-if?' You can't go home again; you go back and it's not the same. It's all crazy, small. Gives you vertigo, trying to go back. Like if you went to visit your mom, walked into the kitchen, and she had a different face."
     I remember driving to my grandma's house with my Dad when I was about 9 and I was looking out the window. He said, "Look at everything and take a mental picture in your mind. Someday all of this will be gone or so different that you won't recognize it. I hate change, but it still happens. So put this in your memory and save it." What a powerful moment that was for me. I get choked up now thinking about it. He made such a point sometimes to really teach me things and be a good father. I appreciate that so much.
     I had gone back to MN after being gone for about 10 years or more and it was so different. The house I grew up in looked so old. All the plants and trees and even the fence had been ripped out. My Dad worked so hard putting it all in when I was little. We went to "Frank's" 3 or 4 times in one day just to knock it all out. It was a big deal whenever he spent money and worked hard on something. He was so proud of it. I see it in my mind. Never thought to take a picture of it. I really did think it would always be there. Who rips out trees for God's sake? Everything was smaller and older or replaced completely. That was probably the first real time that I felt my Dad's words so deeply. I visited everything I had loved and experienced and realized that I would have to rely on my memory because it had all changed without me.
     Chapter 2! Listening to Elvis was like being bit by a radioactive spider. Chubby Checker's the "Twist" was such a big hit, even your parents wanted to see him. It's fun for me to read about all the things that moved him and remember my own. He hadn't had sex yet, but he heard it in the music, all the feelings. It makes sense to me now why he is such a good judge on American Idol. He can appreciate all kinds of music and like his mother, he can accept all the kinds of people that sing it. "I had been zapped by a tractor beam and it was pulling me toward the mother ship."
    He loved playing the drums. He started teaching himself by buying a record to teach him how to do it. I love that he knew what he wanted to learn and went after it, he took it. I love that. He said his songs were his way out. I'd like to know more of what he means by that. If he is or was really ADHD then I'm sure sitting around and thinking of doing some boring job that normal people do, that thought might have driven him completely crazy with nowhere to aim his creativity, no outlet. That would have probably been really depressing I bet.
    Man I love to write! This would be great if I could do this for a living. To love what I do and get paid and appreciated for it. Hmm. I am loving this and I am not writing about every little thing. When I go to the bookstore and see all the books, I think that if I did write one it would just be 1 in a million, it would be nice if people liked it though. Even a few, I would like that.