THE JOURNEY:
On the surface, people can convince themselves of almost anything. Yes, they can convince themselves that hurting other people does not matter. Greed is good. Do anything they want and it too doesn't matter. Cold, mean, heartless.
BUT you say, that isn't possible. NOBODY can convince themselves of such things, but when you stop and think about it, at least on the subconcious level we have PLENTY of precedent for that. Adolph Hitler could never have instigated A WORLD WAR without firmly believing in his mind and heart that HE WAS RIGHT. Joseph Stalin the same and Uganda's former dictator Idi Amin as well.
RIGHT NOW, BASHIR ASSAD believes to his toes that HE IS RIGHT...ON THE SURFACE. But I am NOT convinced (and pretty sure to the contrary) that DOWN DEEP, that attitude carries as much weight as it does superficially.
It is harder to fool YOURSELF, way down in your core, than it is to fool yourself on the surface and then others. That is why EVEN IN THE FACE OF OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE TO THE CONTRARY, people will say they truly believe such and such when it is hard to believe that ANY rational human being could believe such a thing. In truth, they more than likely don't believe it either down inside, but it is what they have been PROGRAMMED to believe and say they believe and so they do. The current spate of faux Republicans are a prime example. So are the Islamist Jihadists, at least the ones in leadership roles. The bulk of them are opportunists and far less ideologic and far more self-serving than their rhetoric would indicate.
SO, why DO people convince themselves that meanness, self-centeredness and anti-social behavior (for example) works when they would do FAR BETTER in relationships if they exhibited kindness and benevolence. WHY? Well for one thing, self-defense.
Yes, some people have been hurt or at least they have experienced PERCEIVED hurt and so they build a wall of self-defense. Often at the core is a foundational tool of that defense mechanism known as protective-meanness. They feel protected and invulnerable if they can keep most people (if not all) at a safe distance. The ONLY people they let in most of the time are those THEY KNOW they can control and/or those who think and feel as they do. Like-minded if you will. Unfortunately, they not only keep out in doing this the people who WOULD hurt them but ALSO the ones who would NOT and would only love them and be good to them. This wall of defense unfortunately is NOT very good at discerning which is which so the one size fits all mentality serves as a blanket filter screening out good and bad alike.
Adorning yourself with a cloak of cold detachment and/or meanness is a very poor substitute for being able to experience a happy loving caring relationship with someone. It won't keep you warm at night and it won't love you and keep you safe when in danger, and IT SURE AS HELL won't help you when you get old and frail. ONLY another person who is loving and kind and caring will IF YOU ALLOW THEM TO CROSS THE BRIDGE OVER THE MOAT AND TO COME INSIDE THE CASTLE.
Fair weather friends, drugs & alcohol or gambling or any of the other bastions of the inevitable internal hole-filling abject failure, will NEVER be good for you for the long haul. Not by a long shot, and it is NOT that loving and caring people and relationships are without their problems. LIFE isn't, and so nothing IN LIFE is either. BUT, over the long haul and in the overall scheme of things, they work FAR BETTER than any of those other things you may be trying to fill the container of emptyness you feel inside with. Drugs, booze and gambling will NEVER be a good substitute for love, and ULTIMATELY will end badly. Substance abuse is a destroyer of lives and can and frequently DOES end lives that they have devastated.
SHOCK!
Sometimes relationships don't end well or fare well EITHER...but at least you emerge with some really good memories, and you can rarely say that with narcotics and substance abuse of any kind. Drugs and alcohol prematurely age you and rob you of good health and vigor. They MAY give you a FEELING that you are OH SO KEWL, when in truth you are NOT and that is a LIE. Addictions are the past master of lying to their victims.They also make the victims really good at lying to cover themselves and to the extent of their victimization but all too often this becomes pathological. Lying gets easier over time just as addiction does. Lying to oneself as well as lying to others becomes a habit no self-respecting Nun would ever be caught dead wearing. That serves NOBODY well.
Sometimes relationships don't end well or fare well EITHER...but at least you emerge with some really good memories, and you can rarely say that with narcotics and substance abuse of any kind. Drugs and alcohol prematurely age you and rob you of good health and vigor. They MAY give you a FEELING that you are OH SO KEWL, when in truth you are NOT and that is a LIE. Addictions are the past master of lying to their victims.They also make the victims really good at lying to cover themselves and to the extent of their victimization but all too often this becomes pathological. Lying gets easier over time just as addiction does. Lying to oneself as well as lying to others becomes a habit no self-respecting Nun would ever be caught dead wearing. That serves NOBODY well.
There is FAR TOO MUCH addiction in the LGBT community but to be fair they HARDLY have a lock on this kind of self-destructive behavior. IN FACT, statistics prove that the heterosexual community leads the way in death from addiction and substance abuse...and even worse? What happens to the children of addicts who suffer the most perhaps from the actions of their parents and adult family members and become the collateral damage of this evil warfare being waged against the people they love is terribly sad to say the least.
Just because someone is trying to hide from their own insecurities, fears, and anxieties does NOT make it RIGHT or more palatable when they become seemingly hopelessly addicted. Whether gay or straight, male or female (addiction has no bounds of decency when it comes to victims) adults or youth, old or young or whatever...trying to fill the hole of loneliness or vulnerability or fear (for that is what is going on here), doesn't matter. ADDICTIONS KILL. NEVER BENEVOLENT, ALWAYS MALICIOUS AND ASSUME A MALIGNANCY THAT DOOMS THE VICTIM IN EVERY CASE SOONER OR LATER.
Just because someone is trying to hide from their own insecurities, fears, and anxieties does NOT make it RIGHT or more palatable when they become seemingly hopelessly addicted. Whether gay or straight, male or female (addiction has no bounds of decency when it comes to victims) adults or youth, old or young or whatever...trying to fill the hole of loneliness or vulnerability or fear (for that is what is going on here), doesn't matter. ADDICTIONS KILL. NEVER BENEVOLENT, ALWAYS MALICIOUS AND ASSUME A MALIGNANCY THAT DOOMS THE VICTIM IN EVERY CASE SOONER OR LATER.
ANYTHING YOU DO NOT CONTROL...controls you and does NOT have your best interests at heart. You can for a time fill that yawning hole inside yourself with all kinds of crap, but in the end...THE ONLY THING WORTH DOING THAT WITH ...IS WITH...ANOTHER PERSON WHO LOVES YOU AND LOVES YOU ENOUGH TO STICK WITH YOU EVEN IN THE WORST OF TIMES. SOMEONE who KNOWS the value of your tears, your breaking heart, and your value as a human being.
Getting someone to realize they are not alone, and that there is someone who is with them until the end of time...is not easy. It takes time. Patience, and most importantly LOVE. As I said it is NOT easy.
If you are the loving partner you will more than likely at times be seen as an adversary, will suffer the slings and arrows of substance abuse fighting for its survival and ONLY YOU can convince yourself in times like these that the goal you seek is within your reach and WORTH IT,.. and ONLY YOU can know that FOR YOU...until it becomes part of you deep inside. It is your love that will sustain you when the going gets rough, and it will.
I love my Boo, Joey, without question. He is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing to me ON THE PLANET. I have a ton of interests and things I love to do and obviously writing is one of them, but NOTHING is more important to me than he is. HE IS...the sun, moon, stars, and the center of my universe, and that will never ever change. He is the air I breathe, the nourishment I need to survive, and the inspiration I need to DO what I need to do, well.
I only wish I could get HIM to realize that.
God knows I have tried and to also make him realize that I am the best friend and mate he could ever hope for. I am flawed but I love like I do EVERYTHING ELSE. 100% and if I can't do that I don't do it all. So there was NEVER a time since Joey came into my life when I wouldn't have done just about anything for him...and I did a lot trust me, and I ALWAYS WILL. I will ALWAYS love him without question, hesitation, or reservation.
Will I be his patsy? Nope, but I will offer something better. Will I do drugs with him? No, but I will give him a better way. He has been blinded by his fears and insecurities, but...
If he would only give up this meaningless quest of seeking comfort and solace IN and WITH things where he will NEVER find answers or solutions to his seeking...with the wrong people who only want to go down with the ship and take him with them. He has had a string of total LOSERS who more often than not treat him as an appendage rather than a friend let alone a lover. For YEARS, he has managed to latch onto drunks and addicts (some with money, some not...but many if not most of them just pure trash) and has had one meaningless relationship after another with people who care NOT A WHIT for him when all is said and done. If he will only STOP all that and look to the ONE PERSON IN HIS LIFE with HIS best interests at heart, ME. THEN we might get somewhere. He has others at the moment (as usual) but unfortunately they only want to drown in the same shit he has come so close to drowning in. People AS OR MORE flawed than he is. No one drowning in the same quicksand as you will EVER prove to be your savior. They WILL drown beside you but that is as good as it will ever get.
I know that sounds like I am judgmental and if so so be it. I don't normally judge people by the money they have or don't have and CERTAINLY NOT by looks. I judge by people's ACTIONS...and this is what gets to me. Joey in pics always looks alone or unimportant to these fucks. That is crap. Looks like they want arm and eye candy and not much else. Hard drinkers and probably worse, and Joey is worth SO MUCH MORE than that. But that has been his choice. Over and over that has been his choice. God, I wish I could just erase all that from both our memory banks...but I can't. What I CAN do is offer (and have offered) a far better future than the past he has had. One with substance and caring and real love and success INSTEAD OF one endless day and night of drunken meaningless nothing after another, OR worse. Empty sex, and pure barrenness where there should be meaningful activities that will enhance Joey...not waste him in endless pursuits of phantom bullshit.
AGAIN, REMEMBER THIS: NO ONE DROWNING IN THE SAME QUICKSAND AS YOU CAN EVER BE YOUR SAVIOUR.
I know that sounds like I am judgmental and if so so be it. I don't normally judge people by the money they have or don't have and CERTAINLY NOT by looks. I judge by people's ACTIONS...and this is what gets to me. Joey in pics always looks alone or unimportant to these fucks. That is crap. Looks like they want arm and eye candy and not much else. Hard drinkers and probably worse, and Joey is worth SO MUCH MORE than that. But that has been his choice. Over and over that has been his choice. God, I wish I could just erase all that from both our memory banks...but I can't. What I CAN do is offer (and have offered) a far better future than the past he has had. One with substance and caring and real love and success INSTEAD OF one endless day and night of drunken meaningless nothing after another, OR worse. Empty sex, and pure barrenness where there should be meaningful activities that will enhance Joey...not waste him in endless pursuits of phantom bullshit.
AGAIN, REMEMBER THIS: NO ONE DROWNING IN THE SAME QUICKSAND AS YOU CAN EVER BE YOUR SAVIOUR.
TRUST ME:
TRUST ME!
I will NEVER GIVE UP on Joey. NOT EVER.
I will NEVER GIVE UP on Joey. NOT EVER.
I love him too much to ever believe he isn't worth salvaging...and NO I DO NOT believe that he is a cold-hearted mean-spirited asshole as he called himself the night he left (ostensibly to soften the blow for me that he was leaving. It didn't work). That is a crutch, a defense mechanism and I DO NOT believe it BECAUSE I have seen the OTHER JOEY, the REAL Joey, the one underneath the facade of uncaring and it is beautiful. HE is beautiful and incredibly caring, kind, thoughtful, generous, loving, romantic and I HAVE EXPERIENCED that FIRST HAND...so I KNOW better.
HE SAVED MY LIFE TWICE when I was choking and he did the Heimlich maneuver. He DID that with a broken back and put himself at a lot of risk, but he did so because he LOVED ME and was unwilling to watch me die.
Another time he got me to the hospital when another heart attack threatened.
Right after he got back here the day after I got out of the hospital from the heart attack in March, he just took over and protected me with his love and his competence and I DO NOT KNOW IF I WOULD HAVE MADE IT without him. He means the world to me for all that but SO much more for I loved the fuck out of him before any of that ever happened.
HE SAVED MY LIFE TWICE when I was choking and he did the Heimlich maneuver. He DID that with a broken back and put himself at a lot of risk, but he did so because he LOVED ME and was unwilling to watch me die.
Another time he got me to the hospital when another heart attack threatened.
Right after he got back here the day after I got out of the hospital from the heart attack in March, he just took over and protected me with his love and his competence and I DO NOT KNOW IF I WOULD HAVE MADE IT without him. He means the world to me for all that but SO much more for I loved the fuck out of him before any of that ever happened.
His entire family has given up on him and want NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with him while I KNOW down deep they would do whatever it took to get him to change. But they no longer believe he can or will. I DO. But HE has to want it. Nobody including me can do FOR HIM what he doesn't want for himself. It is a DAMN SHAME for he is SO worthwhile and valuable as a human being. BUT, he seems usually hell-bent on self-destruction and endless meaningless nothing never accomplishing much or accumulating anything much of value, and leaving a string of broken relationships in his wake. His need to control everything because of his insecurities and anxieties is almost stunning. Self-serving to say the least.
A self-serving life is not a bad thing if what you are serving up is good stuff, but sadly with Joey that is not the case. He has little to nothing of his own, for he has lived off others and scrounged and eaked out an existence (not a life) for way too long. TRAGICALLY, for Joey is SCARY BRIGHT, industrious and a very hard worker when he chooses to be. He is TALENTED and creative and capable and has a wonderfully analytical mind. Again, I have SEEN this and been the beneficiary of his incredibly talented intelligence. WE had some GREAT times along with some truly awful times but in truth, the awful had more to do with reactions to fears and anxieties and imagined slights than anything else. Things most of us would just slough off and go on.
Being mixed Bi-polar doesn't help. PTSD doesn't either, along with other anxiety disorders.
BUT...ALL THAT can be managed fairly easily IF one WANTS to be free of it AND LIVE A HAPPY SUCCESSFUL PRODUCTIVE LOVING LIFE. People do it all the time.
BUT...ALL THAT can be managed fairly easily IF one WANTS to be free of it AND LIVE A HAPPY SUCCESSFUL PRODUCTIVE LOVING LIFE. People do it all the time.
BUT, Joey is 31 and as his mother says his life is going NOWHERE...and really never has; There are reasons for that to be sure, but GOD WHAT A WASTE.
C'mon Joey. WAKE UP, GROW UP, and come home. I need you and YOU NEED THE YOU YOU ARE AND CAN BE MORE OF.
PLEASE.
I LOVE YOU MORE THAN LIFE, HONEY.
I ALWAYS WILL. I PROMISE!
Your mother loves you, your stepfather loves you, your grandparents love THE YOU they know and have seen down inside just as I have. They have not given up easily, Joey. YOU DROVE THEM AWAY. BUT you can get them back IF you want them to be. YOUR MOVE, Honey, and make it a move TO the future...NOT the disaster that is your past.
MY LIFE WILL NEVER BE COMPLETE OR WORTHWHILE WITHOUT YOU!
Db
COPYRIGHT c 2015 by DUSTY STARK
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
COPYRIGHT c 2015 by DUSTY STARK
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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