My world is made a lot better by my best friend Cricket and the boys in our lives.  Here they are, in no particular order:

 

  

  

  

Back in February of 2006, I had a little accident.  Recently released from a psych ward, I shouldn't have been driving.  (Cricket and I now have a policy in effect).  That said, I recall that day with a clarity that some ascribe to 9/11.

I was driving my Explorer.  The brake pedal had no rubber pad on it.  I was wearing Red Wing boots.  Stopped behind a beater car at a red light, on a slight slope, my foot slipped off the pedal and I rolled into the back of the car in front.

Of course I got out to check that everyone was okay.  The driver and passenger freaked out.  They went on about how much money they'd sunk into the car.  Clearly they'd failed to take care of their sagging interior roof material and the yellow primer used on cars of a certain era that flashed.

The police came and my truck was towed:  My license had expired the month before, on my birthday.  A year later, a handsome man was on my stoop as I walked home.  He served me the papers, which claimed that I'd ignored weather conditions (cold and clear), drove recklessly (y'know, at a stop light), that I ruined his health, back, neck and another page of charges.

We were supposed to go to arbitration last year, but the "victim" had to go into rehab.  For his Heroin addiction.  In fact, he was driving with his friend to the Methadone clinic when I tapped him.  He will likely win some money from this suit.  Arbitration is a process where lawyers in the biz of suits weigh the case.

I don't think that I should express my true feelings about this situation.  That would be indulgent.

Today I went back to Miss Carol's house.  I'm painting it for a nominal fee.  She is African-American with, she told me, Native American and White blood.  She was upstairs watching the programme, as I listened to NPR.  When I heard that the ceremony was running past time, but that Bush was no longer President, I cheered.

Miss Carol came flying down the stairs, all sixty-seven years of her, when Obama was sworn in.  She was giggling, laughing, fighting tears and so overwhelmed.  I was so happy, I grabbed her and hugged her.  We were both aware of this incredible moment, both proud, amazed, nervous and so very hopeful.

Miss Carol couldn't shut up.  She stayed with me as I sweated and rolled out her walls.  She talked so much, we missed the speeches.  She wore me down, to be honest.  I'm having a bit of a tough time.  But you know what?  I wouldn't trade it.  Seeing that lady turn into a young girl full of hope was the greatest gift.

My neighbour Junior has some issues.  I could list them, but I don't want to bring you down his passive-aggressive/aggressive-aggressive path.  Even if we have never met, I wish to spare you of his histrionic dramas and manipulations.

Lucky for Cricket and me, we will be spending my birthday evening with Junior, somewhere in Chinatown.

My day was off to a bad start.  Junior left a message about our dinner plans, with gentle threats.  He claimed to have come by when he knew we were home, yesterday.  I'd spent most of the day 12-Stepping some one, so I may have missed his knock.  When Junior knocks, it is clear it's him.  It often follows unanswered calls.

He knows that I have mental health issues and takes umbrage if I cannot appear at a time set earlier.   In fact, we were supposed to go out for Cricket's birthday last September, but I got sick.  Angered, he told Cricket that he hadn't eaten all day.  Nice.  Today, I ran into him as I went to walk Griffin.  He kindly threatened me, saying if I wasn't up to it, he'd come and get me.  That I'd just need to get over it.

Lovely.  I'd spent the day enjoying a feast of panic attacks.  Now tomorrow, the one day where you get to celebrate being you, I'll be with Junior, making sue he's happy.

Thank god Cricket will be there.  Saves me from myself.  She also said that this is our last time with Junior.  We have brought him to the shore for Christmas, taken care of him during his prostate cancer issues, moved his furniture up and down his house.  In fact, Cricket pointed out that I have done all this.  The man can smell a sucker!  But we'd both agreed to invite him for Christmas.

This year, we had a wedding the Saturday after Christmas.  Junior wanted Cricket to drive him down on Friday.  She has no fear.  She told him we were leaving on Wednesday and returning on Sunday, having a wedding on Saturday, so no way.

Junior works me.   We move furniture within his house; large pieces.  I've spent hours stripping church candle stands.   We've shared food; he thinks I've missed my calling.  I haven't.  The man likes to eat.  He also cooks up some fierce food himself.  His country ribs are to die for.

All this went on but got worse.  He had prostrate cancer.  I even brokered a family reunion when his estranged relatives came to his bedside.  One aunt thought we had something going on, from the way I whispered to him, caressed and kissed him.  I just wanted to let him know he was not alone.

So, tomorrow, I will go out to dinner with the woman who has supported me regardless.  We will be joined with the man who threatened to find me, if I were too ill to attend.  Nice.  Gets it off to an easy start, right?

Hello Jack,

Look at me using fancy fonts and colours!  Nothing like blogging to make you learn useless stuff on the fly.

Wow, sounds like you are up to your knees in it.  So sorry.  I have a couple of ideas to throw your way, for what they are worth.

I am working on a big ole house up the street.  The kid (19) helped Doug Pxxxxx out quite a bit.  Doug has been using him where possible, also thinking to send him over to Steve at Kitchen Sink.  Anyway, he's a warm body at $10 an hour.  He's also a HS dropout with teenager issues.  You would probably like him.  But I digress.

Ya, we really haven't talked in a bit.  Warn your clients that one of your previous employees has papers and has just been released from the State Mental Hospital.  That she is grateful that you stood by her in her time of need, unlike her parents.  That she is unpredictable when upset and seems disturbed that you aren't getting paid.  Feel free to use my name and number.  Hell, I'd give you my green card number too, but it is still being replaced....eleven months after I filed.
 
I knew not of the duplex, but am happy to hear about it.  I guess you'll rent out the house until you find a better market?  As to your impoverished tenants, there are a couple of options.  In Philly we have something called Tenant/Landlord Action Bureau.  I suspect that you have something similar in Media.  Call them to chat.

Also, we have a friend Terry, who lost her job at one point.  Having left her slob of a husband and with two kids to support, she sprang into action.  She worked THREE jobs, all of them shitty.  Like WaWa, but with cooties.  I think it is admirable that you care for your tenants, but they need to return the favour.

They need to start paying some form of "good faith" rent to you, say half of the rent.  You'd need to draw up papers for this with your TLAB for everyone's protection.  I'd chat with the TLAB first, to see what they think, then approach your tenants.  I believe eviction takes at least two months, so you should move on this to avoid further potential losses.

Also, can they trade work on the duplex for rent?  Do they have family that your lunatic ex-employee could start harassing with a disposable phone?  Have you considered calling in the Evil One?  Margaret could have them signing away their first decade's bonus sign-on checks in under an hour.

This shit is serious.  The Big M may be your best option.  But don't take my word for it.  My father may be a banker, but I have yet to balance a check book.  Go get yourself one of those Magic 8 Balls, if yours has broken or been nicked.  It's going to tell you what you need to hear, scientifically.

Also, this is an unfailing way to know where your true heart and mind is.  First, get yourself a coin.  Second, flip it to make decisions about any of the above.  If you chose to make it Best Out Of Three, when it was only Heads Or Tails, you'll know where your gut tells you to go.

As to me, thanks to Cricket signing a loan, I am going to become a dog-trainer.  Hopefully in a year from now, the only painting I'll be doing will be in our house.  I have a show coming up on the first Friday of Feb, and I'll send you the info.  I did learn a couple of things last year:

How to retrieve a broken blade from a jig-saw.

How to drive stick-shift.

How to hack HTML.

How to change from a litter mate to a pack leader.

How to find the prison pod that I was holding an AA meeting in.

I did also make my bank crap available on-line, but still haven't figured out what I'm s'posed to type in as my ID.  So this year, starting this week, I am trying to keep track of my money.  You know, like every day and that.  Cocoa Puffs, right?

I think also I should revamp my American Sign Language and start seriously learning Spanish.  If I do end up working with service dogs, these will be useful.

Anyway, do give me a jingle.  I'll pick up for you, unless I'm driving, up a ladder, or socializing.  Hey, if you guys are super bored, Cricket and I were going to this School of Rock show on Saturday.  It's an awful program in that they encourage tone deaf kids to sing, but the music is good.  My friend Natalie's daughter, a Gory elfin, plays base.  She's in the first few sets, which means an early exit for once!  Cricket is coming because they are playing punk.  She has no idea.  One of the sick songs little Lydia is playing is by the Misfits.  They'll make Sid proud, that no-talent wonder!

I'll shut up now.  My number is 215-555-5555

Be sure and tell Michael about all this.  It'll drive him crazy that I didn't talk to him.

But only if you want to.  You can always flip the coin.

May your days be a paradise of love, light, butterflies and kisses and your nights filled with stars, passion, beauty and garden slugs.

Love, D

This title is pretty loaded with insinuations, inferences and ignominious associations.  In fact, it makes me a tad nervous to even address it.  But this year I learned to start to create boundaries.  It's a new beginning for me, spineless sycophant that I am!  Anyway, the reason why I'm writing this, is due to my friend "X".

X was my second sponsor in a 12-Step Program that I'm in.  My first was a male friend, so when X (a female) became available, I switched.  At the time X had about fourteen years or so sober, but it was her presence that drew me to her.

Within a few months, she was having a full on melt-down.  She exhibited behavior that I would never have tolerated in a "regular" friend.  It became so that I was her mental health sponsor and she was my incredibly needy sponsee.

I helped her move in with her fiance, packing up her house, carrying it into my van and bringing it into their new place.  As I unloaded my van, she sulked in a chair, angry at the man she was moving in with.  Did I mention that I'm not so great in the conflict area?

Despite being hospitalized for months at a time over the past decade, X visited me just once in lock-down.  The last time I was in.  She wanted to show me the new engagement ring she had.  Such a nice thought for a suicidal person on a locked down ward just after Christmas.

I'd given her the link to this blog some time back.  I wrote a post about her struggles with depression, which she sent to friends and family.  Heck, some of them might be reading this right now.  But I know X isn't.  How do I know?

Well, a couple of months back I got tired.  See, X only calls me when life isn't rosy in her world.  Given, X has some terrible health problems.  Like cancer.  But she wields her illness like a white flag.  Everything that has happened, or will, is under the flag.  She is above judgement, beyond reproach, excused and accounted for.  Her behavior is untouchable.

Her trump card is cancer.

The other day, she left a message on my phone, saying that she hadn't heard from me.  That she was worried.  That she was angry at me for not calling.  X said that she thought maybe I was in hospital, that maybe Cricket would call her.

It is true I haven't called her in the past four or five weeks.  Frankly I was burned out.  She was improving medically, so I wasn't so worried.  I needed to take care of myself as I crashed and burned after the death of Hello Newman.  So many of you, my virtual family, have offered support in my times of need.  When I had to put Hello Newman to sleep, I was moved by the compassionate and caring comments.

X has no idea about Hello Newman.  Although she linked my blog to family members when I wrote a couple of posts about her depression, she clearly doesn't read it.  Else, she might have a clue.

And here is the telling part.  If you are truly concerned about a friend, you let them know it.  You don't tell them that you're pissed.  That just makes the pissed on person dig in deeper, to avoid the spray.  Call me silly like a smiley, but implied threats of anger and guilt make me want to run away screaming like a little boy.

My current sponsor, with over twenty-five years of sobriety refuses to let me DTMFA (thanks             Dan Savage), saying we in the program are all each others appointed friends.  Others, like a previous sponsor, said that some are here to help you learn a skill like Patience, Compassion, Understanding  and Tolerance.  Fecking fabulous.

I just need the skills of Spine, No-fear, Up Your Bum (no, silly, it's a figure of speech)!  and emailing all the Xs out there.  Can I dump my sponsor for being so annoyingly right?  Can I DTMFA myself?  Just asking.

It is the worst of times and the best of times, (thanks Chuck).  A time to regret the old year and experience hope for the new year.  In the U.S.A. we will likely watch the Tiffany (!  I just found that out and can you fecking believe it)? ball drop in Times Square.  Or the enormous "Peep" somewhere else in this great land.

Writers will try to sum up the year, with lists, points and endless "I told you so!", etc.  Critics will make their best and worst lists.  The musicians have already cashed in over the holidays, so are free to booze it up, or make appearances at Industry parties.  Perhaps only painters and other visual artists are excused this annual feeding frenzy.  Theirs is private communion between their hearts, minds, souls and their medium.

It is constant like the tides of the sea, the light of the day and the turning of the seasons.  All continue regardless, ebbing and flowing, fading and lighting, dying and returning.  We who are given the gift of expression must obey only one rule.   To use it to the best of our ability.

In that I have been remiss.  I have written rather than paint.  I would like to embrace both in the future.  Starting now.  I'm off to work on my self-portrait.  In a bit.  I just found some lovely things to watch, when I was pootling around for links.