In my dream last night, there were several people lying in a big bed watching a movie on television. I was in the middle, Maggie was to my right. I had my arm around her and she was holding onto my hand with both of hers and watching this movie. I get the feeling it was rather serious or scary, because she had that singularly occupied look on her face that I have come to know so well. Shane was to my left, but he was laying with his head half in my lap and his legs up against the wall behind me. Now and then I’d look down and every time I caught the sight of him, he would be looking at me with crossed eyes or with his face contorted into something equally silly, which kept making me laugh.

When I woke up this morning, I could still see him in my mind. It was the first time in months I had a dream where he wasn’t being serious and could see him being himself when he was goofy.

There are times when I think my grief is immeasurable. Times like now when I feel it but it isn’t consuming me. Now and then I’ll see Cole in a certain way that makes him look JUST LIKE Shane and it nearly brings me to my knees. I have no doubt that if he were still alive, then I would have a better grip on my life. This summer will be two years that he has been gone, and I will relive every single moment of that day again as I will for the rest of my life. Staci’s suicide was on June 28th, Shane died on June 30th. It makes no difference the number of years between. I hate that entire month now.

Sometimes I am so inspired by Maggie and how much she has gained in life since Shane died that I think it is possible to live again completely and not be caught up in grief. With Daniel I got a taste of that, and when he left me that was just one more thing he took away that I needed more than I knew.

Today I feel my grief and losses profoundly and I don’t want to see or talk to anyone. Today is a crying day, one that I probably need despite my ludicrous feelings about tears, and one in which I alternate between feeling deep sadness and incindiary rage.

Fuck people who name children after alcohol brand names and cars.
Fuck yippee little dogs that can fit into a handbag and the sad bitches that own them.
MOTHERFUCK Mariah Carey.
Fuck Televangelism.
Fjuck Norwegian people.
Fuck parents who let televisions raise their children.
Fuck Jerry Springer - how stupid do you have to be to get elected Mayor and lose your job because you paid a hooker with a goddamned CHECK?!??!?!?!?
Fuck anyone who needs drugs to make them interesting. Life is tragic enough without an altered state of mind.
Fuck Ticketmaster.
Fuck Rush Limbaugh. “What?” - Rush Limbaugh
Fuck Abercrombie & Fitch, you lose IQ points wearing those clothes.
Fuck the Male dominated Pro-Life Movement. Tell you what, GUYS - next time YOU get cramps, I will personally buy the Midol. Man, do I HATE a stupid motherfucker.
Fuck the Easy Way Out.
Fuck fashionable Buddhism.
Fuck Tommy Hilfiger.
Fuck the tree that killed the best part of Sonny & Cher.
Fuck Miss Cleo - betcha didn’t see THAT coming, did ya Mommy?
Fuck Martha Stewart for needing to GET fucked. Fold all the napkins you want, you’re still just a skank from Jersey with flat hair.
Fuck anyone who was connected with the movies “How High” and “Kung Pow”, and anyone stupid enough to pay money to see that bullshit. Your complete lack of sensible taste and practicality merits the death penalty. Be glad I’M not in charge. Yet.
Fuck the Adoption Industry for failing children everywhere and being a disservice to approximately 65% of would-be parents.
Fuck the Amish.
Fuck Mick Jagger.
Fuck women who enable these assholes in epidemic proportions.
Fuck being a doormat.
Fuck not asking for what you want. How will you ever GET anything? All they can do is say “No”, in which case the appropriate response is “Alright then, Fuck You!”
Fuck the Klan.
Fuck pro sports.
Fuck pseudo intellectuals.
Fuck thinking being in the military legitimizes you being an asshole.
Fuck being inconsistent.
Fuck Virginia, I ain’t meeting the bitch.
Fuck Dr. D. L. Gold AND Direct Optical Center for their commercials. Snivelling bastard.
Fuck loving your parents and liking them at the same time. Earn it, no one gets a free lunch - you said so yourself.
Fuck the Seminary.
Fuck Beyonce Knowles.
Fuck White Trash and White Power. Wait a minute, that’s a mighty fine line.
Fuck being ashamed.
Fuck belittling some to make yourself feel better. If that applies to you, you are LESS than nothing.
Fuck insomnia.
Fuck the “Club Lifestyle”.
Fuck whoever knows the cure and isn’t saying.

Fuck men that legitimize the beating and raping of women with stupid statements like “The bitch had it coming”.
Fuck people who discriminate based on weight.
Fuck the Middle East for fighting over a piece of land that no one has a FUCKING DEED TO.
Fuck this intangible, child murdering, virgin raping, deadbeat father sky fairy that people base their entire lives on because someone else decided the lie was legit, and fuck that dead Jew on a stick he has for a son.
Fuck any preacher who drives an expensive car.
Fuck the Spice Girls.
Fuck the US Government for not sending John Walker to Guantanamo Bay with the rest of the Taliban smegma.
Fuck the Pope for breathing.
Fuck homophobes for having an opinion.
Fuck Enron for their greed.
Fuck people who bring young children into movie theaters - Hello, if you cannot find a babysitter, stay the fuck at home.
Fuck anyone at the front door who interrupts my busy transfer of oxygen to carbon dioxide to tell me about Jesus OR Jehovah.
Fuck me.
Fuck people who drink and drive.
Fuck stupid people, it’s a damned shame that stupidity isn’t painful.
Fuck people who bitch in baseless assertions.
Fuck your image.
Fuck computers that call your house and have the gall to put you on hold.
Fuck all of the people connected with daytime television.
Fuck the cowardly.
Fuck Shakira, if for no other reason than for copycatting Christina Skankilera - is there a lower depth of misery?
Fuck being sad and depressed and lonely and angry and having no outlet for frustration.
Fuck money for never being enough.
Fuck Liam Gallagher.
Fuck straight guys for being so damned goodlooking.
Fuck fags for being really bad representatives of the “Gay Community”.
Fuck pretention.
Fuck not taking a stand for something and not getting REAL loud now and then.
Fuck the spineless.
Fuck people who say “I Can’t” instead of “I Won’t”.
Fuck anyone who makes fun of handicapped, overweight, mentally challenged, or otherwise disenfranchised people.
Fuck Fundamentalism.
Fuck being horny and not having a partner to have wild, nasty, hot monkey sex with.
Fuck the academy.
Fuck boring, brainless, judgemental, moronic TSYS employees who think they’re cool simply because they’re TSYS employees.
Fuck your ego.
Fuck Cory Jones. Your father should have pulled out early.
Fuck melodrama.
Fuck Eiffel 65.
Fuck Jeff Buckley for going swimming in the Mississippi River.
Fuck people who steal the innocence from children.
Fuck anyone who harms animals, and fuck PETA. Cows, fish, and chicken are not animals - they’re food. Fuck off and eat some granola with soy milk, you fucking hippie bastards.
Fuck Raspberry Pop Tarts for being packed full of yummy goodness.
Fuck people who start shit and then back off to watch it all go down.
Fuck all of you backstabbing bitches.
Fuck ths bullshit that you think is so important, NEWSFLASH!… It’s just not.
Fuck people who can’t take the hint.
Fuck people who are unkind to service personnel, especially in the foodservice industry.
Fuck being a victim.
Fuck people who get paid even though they don’t earn their fucking jobs.
Fuck censorship.
Fuck guys in their 40’s who divorced perfectly wonderful women to go off and pay some nobrain slut to pay them attention and appear as though they REALLY like them, and drive a Corvette. Nice car, sorry about your penis.

(This post is a work in progess)

Today started out well enough, I spent the day with Maggie going to doctors appointments. The baby was being very active this morning, and I could feel her kicking around in Maggie’s tummy at the doctor’s office while we waited. Every time I put my hand over her stomach, Avery kicked me. I couldn’t quit laughing in the office, because the OB director had this hilarious scrolling banner as the screensaver on her computer that read “To everything that has breathe, praise the Lord!” Maggie pointed it out to me and we were laughing so hard that tears were shed and snorting occurred.

I cannot wait for this baby to be born, I am so ready for a new baby to help take care of. I cannot wait for her baby smell, and that little sigh they make at the end of a yawn, and the feel of her lying on my chest when I hold her.

We went to lunch after the doctor’s appointment (all is well, she’s expected to be here April 30th - but we want her sooner) and then to look at fabric to have her baby blanket made. Coming out of the store I was laughing and being my usual silly self with Maggie and Daniel walked right in front of me. He was walking out of the restaurant next door and getting into a car with some guy I think he works with, but am not sure. I don’t know if he saw me or not, I cannot imagine how he couldn’t have, but I stopped dead in my tracks and grabbed Maggie by the arm. Not to make her stop so much as to kind of steady myself. She asked me “What’s wrong, honey?” I whispered his name to her and stood there, not knowing whether to stand still and become invisible, run back into the store, or just keep walking. I walked with her to the car and we got in and left just as they were pulling out of the parking lot.

I knew I would see him sooner or later, but I wasn’t ready for how seeing him made me feel. I still love him in whatever way it is that I do, but he doesn’t make it easy on me knowing that I worry about him and that I have no idea how he is. Does he care enough to keep me from worrying myself sick about him? Noooooo… It’s like he dropped off the face of the earth and I feel strange and haunted and tainted. And no matter how hard or often I scrub, it just doesn’t wash off.

Looking out the door I see the rain fall upon the funeral mourners
Parading in a wake of sad relations as their shoes fill up with water
And maybe I’m too young To keep good love from going wrong
But tonight you’re on my mind so (you’ll never know)
I’m broken down and hungry for your love
With no way to feed it
Where are you tonight? Child, you know how too much I need it

Too young to hold on and too old to just break free and run

Sometimes a man gets carried away
When he feels like he should be having his fun
And much too blind to see the damage he’s done
Sometimes a man must awake to find that, really, He has no one…
So I’ll wait for you… And I’ll burn
Will I ever see your sweet return, oh, or will I ever learn
Lover, you should’ve come over
Cause its not too late.

Lonely is the room the bed is made
The open window lets the rain in
Burning in the corner is the only one who dreams he had you with him
My body turns and yearns for a sleep that will never come
It’s never over, my kingdom for a kiss upon her shoulder
It’s never over, all my riches for her smiles when I sleep so soft against her…
It’s never over, all my blood for the sweetness of her laughter
It’s never over, she is the tear that hangs inside my soul forever
Maybe I’m too young to keep good love from going wrong
Oh… Lover you should’ve come over… ’cause it’s not too late…

My boss, “The Legendary AL Haynes”, is the program director here at the station and one of the few people I would willingly solicit advice from. Al is one of those people that I’m just genuinely happy to see everytime he walks in the room. He is seldom without something that makes me feel better.

This morning he came in during my show and asked me how I was doing, that he’d heard about me and Daniel and was wondering if I were okay. Al is one of those people that is just so easy to talk to because he’s always on your side. I gave him the cliffs notes of the situation, and his response was “How can a person live life that? You either live a lie, or you live the truth - either way, what is he supposed to do in order to be happy?”

I told him, “I know, Al, but what am I supposed to do?” He responded, laughing, “Well, I’ve been married twice, once to a white woman, had two children out of wedlock, and I’m probably not the best person to ask!” So of course, I was cracking up. He also told me a story about an old friend of his that was related to my current situation. His friend made a comment to him one day about him being the whitest black man he ever met. AL told him that wasn’t true, only his white friends thought that he was a white man. Which is kinda funny.

I always believed that he was worth any effort I put forth towards him, even if I wasn’t sure of what I needed to do, that if nothing else he would know that he was important to me and that I was there making the effort. So why is it that I wasn’t worth that same effort?

Life is wierd right now, I feel very out of place. I want it to feel normal again.

everybody loves you
and they want to know your story
you go riding out a mystery
concealed in all your glory
but when it comes to flesh and bones
you remind me of shallot
only made of shadows
even though you’re not

i remember how i spent
all my energy and time
with affected conversation
trying to pry inside your mind
you are as beautiful as truth
and as empty as a shell
and i came to you one night
and it made me feel like hell

oh to reach through all your surface
just to find an empty pool
and to suffer all your pride
as i lay down by your side
and you swallowed up my heart
and left me a fool

everybody loves a hero
an image to create
the antithesis of everything
inside ourselves we hate
but you’d better close your eyes
when it’s time for them to die
because you’d hate to think the life
you’d built upon them was a lie

oh to reach through all your surface
just to find an empty pool
and to suffer all your pride
as i lay down by your side
and you swallowed up my heart
and left me a fool

i resign myself to silence
i will never blow your cover
no one ever has to know
who the hero took for lover
but it has come to mind as you blaze on
as brilliant as a star
how many you’ve left behind
how many casualties there are

oh to reach through all your surface
just to find an empty pool
and to suffer all your pride
as i lay down by your side
and you swallowed up my heart
and left me a fool

For over a week now I have been agonizing in my heart and mind about Daniel and what was to become of him, of me without him in my life possibly, of “us”. I ripped out my heart and smeared it over these very same keys I’m typing on right now in a last ditch effort to try and help him. I even told him that I loved him, I talked to counselors on the phone and supplied him with numbers to call, and reiterated to him his promise to me - that he would go into therapy and have someone to talk to and be honest with for once, and learn to accept himself so that he may one day have a conception of a happy life. He promised me. I had to email him again to get him to acknowledge that he read what I had spent so much emotion and energy writing.

So what is the response I get for this hell he has consigned me to for more than a week, when I was to the point of not eating or sleeping and wondering (literally) if he was still alive?

He didn’t even mention ANYTHING, not ONE FUCKING WORD of what I had written him so desperately. Didn’t make mention of my love for him, of his promise to me, of regret for putting me through this in the first place, nothing.

Instead what I got was him explaining to me how he “could accept the fact that he likes guys IN ADDITION to girls as a fact of his life that he could not change”. That his sexuality was too “relationally insignificant” to the world he knew, he just couldn’t let it impact something so big - that being his “world”. Like I never mattered in the least, like what I feel for him and the extent of my loyalty and compassion never existed. I’m just the dirty little secret he wants to sweep under the rug apparently.

That his offer of friendship to me wasn’t just a cliche, that he would one day like to “hang out” with me once his emotional stability was in check or words to that effect.

He once told me that he never felt accepted for who he truly was until he met me. Told me that he didn’t believe us meeting and having this relationship was an accident. That he looked forward excitedly to a future with me.

Maybe I’m just caught up in my anger and confusion and COMPLETE hurt right now, but I feel like I have been totally scammed. I feel like he’s now trying to lie to me just like he does to everyone else in this “world” he seeks to protect so much and hide anything real from.

How could anyone do this to me or to themselves, especially him. I am hurt beyond belief right now and I want an apology that will probably never come, unless I were worth it to him. But if that were the case this never would ahve happened to begin with.

I suppose I’m just not worth fighting for in his eyes. I feel robbed.

So lately, been wondering
Who will be there to take my place
When I’m gone you’ll need love
To light the shadows on your face

If a greater wave shall fall, it’ll fall upon us all
With those dreams that are set in stone
Could you make it on your own?

If I could then I would
I’ll go wherever you will go
Way up high or down low
I’ll go wherever you will go

And maybe I’ll find out
A way to make it back someday
To watch you, to guide you
Through the darkest of your days

If a greater wave shall fall, it’ll fall upon us all
Then I hope there’s someone out there who can bring me back to you

Run away with my heart…..

I know now just quite how
my life and heart might still go on
In your heart, in your mind
I’ll stay with you for all of time

If I could turn back time
If I could make you mine
I’ll go wherever you will go

Hang around, I don’t have to make this one so heavy
Stick around, could I challenege or dare you to stay?
I just don’t know what it is that makes me this wonderer
All I know is I was put here to be in love
and I want to remain that way

I am tired of this bile that fills up my belly
and even more of this fire that smokes in my eyes
All I want is a moment of peace
Peace without boredom
and to forever remain breathless

Could you for once say it even if you aren’t sure
you’ve got the balls to stick it out?
Could you stop sticking to this plan
when you never have one day in your life?
If for nothing else, grant me this moment
to breathe, expand and let go
and to forever reamin breathless

You say “Trust me, trust me, I know when the time is best”
and I try my damnedest to make my voice sound like a smile
I swallow hard and I lie to you “Yes”
Because my heart is so full that it’s pushing its way
Through these two ribs in my chest
But for now I’ll force it to remain with my hand clutching my breast

Could you for once say it even if you aren’t sure
you’ve got the balls to stick it out?
Could you stop sticking to this plan when you never have
One day in your life?
If for nothing else grant me this moment to breathe, expand, and let go
and to forever remain breathless