Happy Nations Have No History - Albert Camus

“What I'm sure of is that you can't be happy without money. That's all. I don't like superficiality and I don't like romanticism. I like to be conscious. And what I've noticed is that there's a kind of spiritual snobbism in certain 'superior beings' who think that money isn't necessary for happiness. Which is stupid, which is false, and to a certain degree cowardly.... For a man who is well born, being happy is never complicated. It's enough to take up the general fate, only not with the will for renunciation like so many fake great men, but with the will for happiness. Only it takes time to be happy. A lot of time. Happiness, too, is a long patience. And in almost every case, we use up our lives making money, when we should be using our money to gain time. That's the only problem that's ever interested me.... To have money is to have time. That's my main point. Time can be bought. Everything can be bought. To be or to become rich is to have time to be happy, if you deserve it.... Everything for happiness, against the world which surrounds us with its violence and its stupidity.... All the cruelty of our civilization can be measured by this one axiom: happy nations have no history.”
― Albert Camus, #otw #Ows #OccupyTogether. #OneRevolution #WorldRevolution #OccupyEarth


**And this is why we protest today because the #1 percent can afford all the time in the world. They can afford to lay their heads down in a dozen houses. But the #99 percent just want enough money to buy some time to breathe...and be able to enjoy what time they have**

Truth and Falsehood -- Albert Camus

“Don't lies eventually lead to the truth? And don't all my stories, true or false, tend toward the same conclusion? Don't they all have the same meaning? So what does it matter whether they are true or false if, in both cases, they are significant of what I have been and what I am? Sometimes it is easier to see clearly into the liar than into the man who tells the truth. Truth, like light, blinds. Falsehood, on the contrary, is a beautiful twilight that enhances every object.”
― Albert Camus


**In Camus' absurd view of the world, this scenario, while absurd to the 'normal' man, is normal to the 'absurd' man.**

Friendship Is Less Simple - Albert Camus

“Friendship is less simple. It is long and hard to obtain but when one has it there's no getting rid of it; one simply has to cope with it. Don't think for a minute that your friends will telephone you every evening, as they ought to, in order to find out if this doesn't happen to be the evening when you are deciding to commit suicide, or simply whether you don't need company, whether you are not in the mood to go out. No, don't worry, they'll ring up the evening you are not alone, when life is beautiful. As for suicide, they would be more likely to push you to it, by virtue of what you owe to yourself, according to them. May heaven protect us, cher Monsieur, from being set upon a pedestal by our friends!”
― Albert Camus, The Fall


(As I have been tweeting tonight exclusively upon the works of #AlbertCamus, the most preeminent philosopher of his time and a loving student of the human condition in all it's grandeur and despair, I wish to continue to inspire you with some of his longer quotations. Camus was a quiet and private man. His father was absent and his mother was deaf and mute. Camus grew up in a spartan home in almost complete silence. Nothing but he, his mother and, as he liked to say, "Nothing but the sky, the wind, the earth and the water." Almost a footnote in philosophical history, he, the father of the philosophy that all of life is absurd, would rejoice at the turn the world has recently taken. Many are dismissive of him or are completely unaware of the magnitude and influence of his work and how current it is to the spirit of revolt and revolution of ideas in America and other countries around the globe today. Camus would be proud. Enjoy the rest of the evening with me tonight from time to time).

The Final Punishment

"I came upon a child of god. He was walking upon the road. We are star dust, billion year old carbon. We are golden and we have to get ourselves back to the garden. Can I walk to beside you? I feel to be a cog in something turning. Life is for learning." Joni Mitchell, 'Woodstock' (excerpts)

On Twitter, I am a big, fat, Greek Atheist best known for my famous rants. I wasn't always this way. I used to be a meek, obedient, good Greek girl who went to Greek School & the Greek Orthodox Church every Sunday. Yup. The little Medusa...


People have been asking me why I am an atheist. This one is for you @Cin_Le2! You asked...
*************************************************************************************

The Short Version

My dad caught me when I was 11 or 12 with one of his gold coins in my room. I had it to show my friends. This was back in 1972ish. He didn't believe me. Everything was taken out of my room except for a bed, desk, one chair & a dresser. This gulag type of existence lasted for six weeks. (Remember. I was a felon at 11). All I had left was the Greek cross my YiaYia (grandmother) had given to me. It comfortably hung by my bed, reassuring me that I would see her again in the summer, the happiest times of MY life. The cross was given to her by her grandmother. It would be well over 100 years old now. If I still had it. 

But I don't. 

Because, after I got done packing up all my things -- including my 600 volume library of which I was so proud -- and had had dinner, and I was in bed waiting for my father... He came in with a an angry, red face. Huffing and puffing with strained breathing like he was restraining himself from attacking me, he took the hammer in his hand and pulled out the nail that held that cross to the wall, and then looked at me and said:


"YOU, you little shit are a thief. And thieves don't deserve GOD." 


With that, he turned around and left. We never spoke of the cross again. 
We never went to church again. My Grandmother could not convince him to return the cross to me as that was her wish.


I received my library back after 6 weeks and began reading all sorts of philosophers, wise men and women...anything and everything to decern a "GOD" and did not. I spent DECADES. I have made my decision based on what I have learned & can prove. What I cannot prove, frankly, I don't worry about proving whether or not there is a God. I got a life here to live. He can fuck with me later. I just don't have the time for him now. 


Kind of like he, in his omnipresence, didn't have time to intercede into the mind of a mad man and save one of the most innocent of his beloved flock...a child. Me. 


I have not spoken to my father for over 20 years. He has Bipolar disorder 3. Untreated. He is 83. He is a lunatic. 


So, to Christians, I don't expect you to understand why or how I became an atheist. But you have a better insight into my personal choice. Barring this, you'll have to buy the book. I took many paths to 'spiritual' enlightenment, or whatever we're calling it today: Dogma d'jour! I respect your right to believe. Please try and use my story to understand how SOME people may have 'become' non-theists.


We all have to live on the planet together in peace. Whatever that is.

Our Common Ills

#Our Common Ills, World Population & Politics:

*The most prescient problem in our world, on our planet, is an over abundance of human beings and a rapid depletion of resources. There is, a mass migration of immigrants from third world countries into industrialized nations. Because it seems that those nations have an abundance of resources. And certainly, recently, this has been proven to be true.

In America, for instance, it has been said that 95% of the entire country is in the hands of the wealthiest 1%. How can this be? That is easy: Politics. But, when the 'immigrant' arrives looking for abundance, there is none. They become angry and want to change the system. They learn the laws of their new land and change them. This is democracy at it's core. And we call these people criminals. Illegals. How can a person be illegal.

It should be illegal NOT to feed the hungry, no matter how they got that way.  "How can our common ills be SHAMEFUL to us?" said Euripides. He cries further, "If any man should fall, support him with your HANDS." These are just not quaint ancient Greek quotes from obscurity. They ring true today.

"The human lot is a HARSH one without being made STILL harsher by one's 'friends," said R. E. Meagher (fr. The Essential Camus). And yet we kick them when they are down and they keep coming. And they will keep coming  because industrialized nations pillaged their countries throughout history. For centuries. So now they turn to the most 'powerful' countries for aid: To America, to Russia, to Europe, naming but a few.

Perhaps it is time for a world government. All I know is that the city or country which forgets how to care for their 'strangers,' has forgotten to care for itself. And now watch it all burn. Because we have forgotten to care for each other. And it is long past the time necessary to set it all right again. What do we do now? 

Put down your weapons and pick up a plow.

Follow this link: 

World population clock w/ diagrams: http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

Toodles, I've Lost My Marbles

     I never thought I'd be this 'down' i my entire fucking life. If it were not for my mother, my son and I would be living on the streets. Truly. My 'spawn,' as I affectionately refer to him, has only known poverty. We live on about $500 a month and that has to cover food and all bills. That breaks down to $369 in food stamps and about $170 in child support. The streets are just outside though. Waiting.

     You see my husband used to be a big time drug dealer. He is 61 now. But in his misspent youth he dealt cocaine. He has a hole in his nose where the septum has worn away from YEARS and kilos of use. It drips blood in the mornings. I could put a ring in it. But I'm the gross one because I've put on a few pounds after having three kids. I have never expressed this to anyone. I'm so down I don't know which way is up.

     My parents bought a house for 'us,' when my husband was with the family. He has his own home. But 'we' can't live there as a 'family' because that was where the home invasion robbery happened. Joshua hasn't been back to that house since the night the robbery happened. Luckily I had the other house from my parents. My husband hates my parents. They put down $120,000 as a down payment...half the value of the house. My husband put down $35k towards the down payment. Now he wants his money back. Or at least my mom should loan him some money. That bitch, he said. I don't know why he hates my parents. But then he struggles to understand why HE HAS no friends or family. They can't stand him. This has been a life long problem for him. Hmmm.

     But I'm the bitch that ruined his life. During 20 years together he has had five or six jobs. He got himself fired 'on purpose' with a dirty drug test because he didn't like the boss. Yeah. I know how to pick them. He turned down a Postal job to sell knives door to door. He was 'laid off' from a job in a boat yard...he's a stellar carpenter...but he said he heard thru the grapevine that the boss said he didn't fit in. He quit his last job as an insurance salesman because he was .... sad and depressed. His shrink told him to quit. 

     I too was sad and depressed but got up and went to work every day. Hmmm.

     I was the family earner, throwing myself into the burgeoning nursing industry. Kept us in high style WITH benefits. I paid extra money out of my paycheck to up our medical insurance to cover his #Hep C treatment. But I've fucked up his life. 

     My parents just bought me a laptop and a new car. They pay my rent, most of my bills for Josh and I. My husband pays $170.00 per month. That is it. It barely pays two bills. What's left over is used for luxuries like soap and toilet paper. But I'm the bitch. 

     I have stayed at home with my son since the day the robbery occurred. I was fired a few weeks after the robbery because my gem of a boss decided I needed to spend more time with my family. It was her way of saying I was spending too much time on the phone talking to shrinks, doctors, security firms, Josh, my ex. Maybe she was right. It still was a dirty deal, but that is life, right? And Nick did not understand that he had to take a more active role as a parent if I was to work and Josh needed to be homeschooled and taken to his activities. That was all too much for Nick. 

     Think my ex would pick up the torch while I acclimated myself to being a stay-at-home mom, get the hang of homeschooling & learning medical billing so I could work from home? By that time, my ex was not working. This was all during the time immediately after the robbery. All of us were diagnosed with #PTSD. We were each given 20 shrink visits a piece. What a learning curve that was. Got lucky, though, and found one who was raised in Compton, California. He knew gang violence, guns, robberies... he was perfect. My husband hated him. 'He's a quack.' Oh, I see, he can actually communicate with our better than you, because he is a professional, but that makes him bad and you hate the man.

     He wanted to change Josh's shrink. I fought like a hell cat and won. Only problem was I had to kick down my husband's bedroom door and tell him to get out of the house. @a_okafor007 would appreciate that detail! 

     Well, my ex did sort of pick up the torch. He 'made me' make him a website. Which he was convinced was going to magically make boat loads of money. AND, he moved back in the house.  In the mean time he took over the education of our son which basically consisted of, "You idiot." "What's wrong with you, the other kids 'get it!'" "Are you stupid or something? We just went over this!" "Fuck. All your friends get this shit." 

     I had to listen to that while I wrote copy about a particular friend of my ex's. His name was Greg. And my husband thought this guy was so cool because he and his #gf DIED after smearing each others body with cocaine and over-dosed. I just snapped. I knew it was going to get a lot worse before it got better. For him, not Joshua.

     My brilliant solution, because you know I'm perfection personified and never make mistakes, was to start smoking clove cigarettes and drink a lot of vodka. Vodka is so versatile. It goes with everything and you can cook with it, too. Brilliant crap, that vodka. As you can imagine the POlice were at our home frequently. But I was the caller usually. 

     The vodka and cloves, though delightful, had to go. 

     You see he had two guns in the house. I had to stay up at night. One night we had a very violent argument. In my mind, this thing was just the right excuse to call the cops and have them take the guns. He hated me for that. I prefer to think I was acting responsibly. 

     When his website went up, my adoring son came and said to me that dad said I had to loose a lot of weight so I could go to those fancy art parties. You want to talk about Medusa. He barricaded himself in his bedroom (he snores), but I still managed to kick the door in. Without the vodka. With a kick my son taught me! Sho Shu!

     He was kicked of therapy by our shrink for being difficult & non compliant with therapy. Well, all that did was throw more gas on a huge fire. He was even more against Dr. Lewis. All he could talk about was how much he hated that doctor and how famous he was going to become as an artist. It's been five years. No one has bought anything because he over priced everything. Not that I cared. By this time our son was old enough to be embarrassed by his fathers 'occupation.' His dad wasn't like the other dads. His dad slept on the couch all day or in his bedroom watching TV. 

     That was the end. He had taken another loan out on HIS house, $24k, rather than look for a good carpenter's job. It was just too hard. 

     That night I thought of all the times at night when he did not get up and nurse our precious infant son; the times when he was too busy growing his dope than to find a 'legal' job or bond with his son; all the school lunches that never got made; everything that he missed in this child's life...for nothing. Josh wanted him to go. I always defer to my son. You're only a kid once. I am ashamed that I was part of a lifestyle that left my son with less of a childhood than his father and I enjoyed as kids. 

     I was working on Joshua and myself. So when he called me to talk, I told him to get a shrink. I wasn't 'smart' enough to fix him. I was busy trying to 'fix' our son's life. And he asked to come back...

     He would call me all the time to argue or to beg. But when I'm done with you, that's the end. You might as well be made of stone. I have said I've always been the Medusa. I meant it literally. He tried to get back at me by stop paying all the bills at the Lodi house, the one my parents bought for us. He was trying to force 'us' out so we would feel as bad as him. Because, little narcissist that he was, no one could suffer like my ex.

     Never a thought to what he was doing to his son. 

     One night my brother in law, his brother called and told me that my ex had never wanted a kid or to get married. When confronted with what I always knew, my ex called his brother a liar. Which he may have been. How was I to know. For the record, to date my parents have contributed almost a quarter million dollars to 'raise' my son and keep off the streets and off the public dole. 

     My parents shell out over $1k a month to keep Josh and I afloat. But Nick, well, he still hates my parents, my mother, specifically. He's mad because she won't loan him any money. His family has contributed almost nothing by comparison. You see after my ex's mother died from pancreatic cancer, truly a saintly woman, the boys went bonkers in different ways. Tony, her spouse of fifty years waited a scant two weeks after we planted her in the ground, to call me and ask ME FOR PORNO. Why? Those two years of chemo were hard on my sex life. I wanted to vomit. 

     Did I mention that my husband hid 20 kilos of pot in the family wood shed. That was a splendid argument. 

     But I 'left' my ex after only 9 months of marriage. The growing, the selling meth and using, were things he kept doing after we left him when my son was 2 years old. But Nick kept following us around. Asking for second chances like they pass out 2 dollar bills. Not a lot of effort was put forth by him. Or he'd get it right & then fuck it, Josh, up again.

     The news is not ALL bad. Now that Nick has quit his LAST job to draw pictures of animals and children I feel so much more secure. Because ... darn it, Josh and I may be barely scraping by, but NICK IS HAPPY. Nick is fulfilled.

     Our son. Still struggles with abandonment issues, depression, his #PTSD, nightmares. He has fallen behind in school because all he can think of now is finishing the divorce. He is the driver of that issue. He feels he can't move forward and feel secure and happy if I am still married to my husband/ex/Nick. Josh is so tired of being broke. But I can't go back to work until after the divorce, because Nick, darling that he is, will seek alimony from MEdusa! Him and what army. Of course, I want to be free again. On paper.

     There. Those are the contents of my mind. I don't care if anyone reads this. I doubt it will help anyone. I don't know if it even helped me. I just know that the next three weeks can't go by fast enough for me. The final hearing. It's already turning into the longest three weeks of my life. 

      I hope getting this out of my head will at least make me feel better. Maybe I can become my old self again on Twitter. It has been my only source of social connection for the last 2 1/2 years. Thanks to some very loyal followers.

     Efahisto, my babies. Kalimerimerimerimesi! Oopa! To your health xOx #TheMedusa 

     

I'm Still Afraid of the Dark Rant

When I was a child, I had horrible night terrors. Dreaming I was in a home in which people
were murdered. Or I was in a home that was being robbed, but I kept looking for something. 
I was looking for my son on the night of the robbery. I dream about dead people. Like my father's 
mother, my YiaYia (Greek for grandma), because SHE understood his rages.  My father
was bipolar and had about 200 guns and ammo. I say the wrong word to set him off & I'm a 
dead girl. He was always up at night.


We used to go camping at Death Valley every year. Several times a year we went shooting 
with my Uncles's. 1 Marine; 2 Navy; 4 Airforce and one in the army, as well. Demolitions.
As my father became sicker, I relied upon these men to keep me alive. It was a pretty regular
thing for my dad and I to disappear for a couple of weeks in the desert ...by the bombing range.
From time to time, I thought my mother was trying to get me killed by sending me off
alone with my looney dad, with guns, no GPS then, and she would stay home. A nice gig
if you can get it. He could've wasted me and left me out in the desert, telling mother that
"She just wandered off, Joyce." or "The .45 misfired, she's 'gone' honey." How would she
know with all those pills, brandy, TV and bad novels?


Now I'm always up at night and mostly throughout the day, as well. You see people break in 
throughout the day. Small noises, big noises, medium noises...anything that doesn't sound like
it belongs to the daily going's on of this house is immediately suspected. So you hear this alot 
in my home, "Noise"; "It's ok, it's just me." "It's your mother." But it happened to us at night. 
until the sun is up. I'm awake by that time after a nap and ready to patrol the fortress while 
he sleeps. 


Josh, after seven years, still has nightmares about the break in. I think of the two #Petit girls 
and what they had to endure. How does a child's mind recover from such horrors. Sometimes
I think that you should be awarded with death to spare you from the memories of the trauma.


My son and I both sleep in the same room. We have a TV, a mini fridge  & two day beds & three authentic 
Kitana's. And several other noxious sprays, a variety of blunt objects. If someone tries to
break in again, they're in for a rude awakening. My mother thinks that's totally weird. But what she
doesn't understand is that Josh cannot just get over this trauma. We tried meds, therapy. I re-
fused to admit him to a hospital for observation. He'd still be there. When he sees me in the 
room with him, he can sleep. But by way of example, he didn't sleep at all last night because I and
my bad back slept on the couch. 


Parents, people, professionals don't understand that you can lead a teenager to therapy, they can
pretend it's good for them, but it's not working, and they're faking it. And they will harbor
a deep resentment, as you betrayed to a 'stranger' all their deepest, darkest feelings without 
their permission. According to teens, that is unforgivable. When they want therapy, they will
ask. You, the parent, have to learn how to be patient and wait. Perhaps for years.


What else have you got to do other than raise children. And I'll tell you that the stygma-
tization of the mentally ill has got to stop. I had to take my son out of school to home school him
because the teachers said there was something 'wrong' with him, but couldn't pin point it.
Once it was pointed out, though, it became as plain as the sun rising in the east.


My bottom line is this: Make sure your home is safe; trust no one, not even your relatives; you'll either make it out of this mess with your little family intact or you will come out of it with a 
family that resembles none like it on this earth. 


I wish his dad had just taken 13 seconds to shut the front door. Kids are so intuitive these days. We should 
listen to them more often. 'Paranoia' is really that inner voice so strong in kids. So listen to them when
they feel scared. What's the worst that can happen? Nothing? Or something & you stopped it.

It's been some time since I last posted anything to my blog. Kept it hidden for my own venal reasons. This will be the third and final post to my blog on the topic of home invasion robberies. Since my last post there was a horrible crime committed in Connecticut. The Wm. Petit family was murdered, raped & set on fire in the sanctity of their own home. Men with guns. How I hate those words. Moral men with guns is one thing. We call them cops. But just 'men' with guns has every American endangered. 


The damage a #HIR wreaks upon a family is sudden, loud, violent, bloody, surreal, you are terrified for your kids & spouse. But even if you survive, the damage is just as real as death. I wish there were a 'god' to help us. But there is not. If we are made in 'his' image, then 'god' perpetrates these violent acts upon 'his' people, whom he loves above all else.


They asked Dr. Petit if he was glad he was alive and he gave the pat answer, but the real answer was in his eyes. He'll never feel safe anywhere for a long time. I don't even feel safe in a new home, in a 'god' fearing small town, a quiet neighborhood. No. I still have a .45 on the premises. And I ditched my husband. Now I practice with that gun. I want to be ready. If it happens again, I will be ready. They will drop in the house. They will not get away. it is self defense. My home. Their bad. I'll flip the tables on the perps.


So it follows that i trust very few people. When I was in hospital for a month getting ready for my kidney removal, it was very hard to even trust the nurses, doctors, priests, parents, friends. I felt like I was finishing up the dying part of the breakin at the hospital. "You want to give me the last rites, mom? Ok fine." "Any priest will do, right," my mother tentatively inquired. "No, mother. We're going to give these people a show. Get me a Greek priest."


It was, even though an atheist, a magnificent bit of theater. Incenses, holy water, saintly relics, purple, lots of purple and that strange tongue. He circled my body several times. It was mysterious. I didn't know what was happening, really. It made my mother happy. It would've been a rotten time to ruin it for the audience and scream from the mountain top that I was a big, fat atheist. By this time, in #ICU, no one was listening to me unless I ASKED for a holy man. I should've asked for a Rastafarian. Imagine that.


I hated my husband for years. After all the robbery happened because he didn't shut a door. That's sneevy, though. There are plenty of other things to be mad at him about. A home invasion robbery is like a hurricane, a tsunami, an act of god. You know your life will never be the same. We had a 9 year old son. After everyone was patched up at the hospital, had it not been for the apartment I had in Lodi, my young son would've had to spend the night where the trauma began. But he was spared that.


NIck, my ex husband stayed a few safe, peaceful, blissful days in Lodi, but had to go back to the Stockton house where he dope was growing. And I think that is where the fissure occurred. Josh would never be able to VISIT his dad at his dad's home anymore according to the my son's shrink. 


We tried to make the marriage work with two different homes. But that didn't work out. As the 'season's' of growing require the adamant attention of the gardener. As my son grew, he saw this as a choice his dad made because he did not want to see him. So Josh decided not to see his dad. 


I was just all fucked up forever. Energy. I barely have enough to get out of bed, do the housework, cooking, teaching, cleaning the yard, shrinking my son. He is 16 years old now. Today his dad was over with some art he made for me to look at. There's no one else in his life that know that much about art. Josh had not spoken with his dad for 2 years. My son just has trouble with males in his life. Any male. The one male who was supposed to be able to save him from ANYthing, his father, was over come, pistol whipped, shot, beaten, dragged ... but TODAY, he invited his dad to Xmas Dinner. 


That's the trouble with psychiatry and children. Until their brain ages to 25 years old, it is very difficult to treat them: with meds and or therapy. 


My husband and I are not reconciling. Josh will always be suspicious of men, because of the 'men with guns' who broke in. And me. I have serious trust issues. And they make me feel safe. And this is the first time in my life that I've felt this way. 


(conclusion, Part 3)

Home Invasion Robbery - Part 2 - Loss of Innocence

(What follows is a blow by blow account, from  my son's perspective, of what went down the night of the invasion...from start to finish. He would never be the same innocent child afterwards. A cautionary tale for anyone who believes they are safe in their own home...)

It was a balmy evening in May. As usual, the Northern California nights had become hot and muggy. Those who had air-conditioners used them as springs' barometer for-told a scorching summer to come. 


My husband Nick, had custody of my 10 year old son, Joshua, on this night. Though he had an air-conditioner, he chose to leave the front door open, with just a rickety old wooden screen to separate my son from the chaos that was swiftly approaching, albeit, unbeknownst to them.


I had warned Nick: "When you have Joshua, close that fucking front door. Use the air-conditioner, you effin tight-wad. We're talking about the safety of a kid, our kid!" Nick never was a very good listener...(if you sense anger in me towards my ex-husband, you are dead, bang on).


As I've said in Part One of this Blog series, the neighborhood that Nick lived in was notorious for all sorts of crimes. Drug dealing, prostitution, gang 'activity,' drive-by and random shootings, and home invasion robberies, but all 'that' had happened to 'other' people, it had missed us...until this night.


Nick was watching the end of the NBA Playoffs, as usual, and it was time for Josh to go to bed. It was approximately 9 p.m.. Joshua's bedroom light was on, as he was getting ready for bed. Once finished, he asked his father TO CLOSE THE FRONT DOOR. Nick told Josh to get into bed, and that he would be with him in a few minutes. That decision would forever change Joshua's life.


The clock having been set for disaster, it exploded without warning:


The sounds of heavy footsteps were heard by Nick, storming up the switch-back wooden front stairs. Both he and Joshua said the noise was 'paralyzing.' Time slowed down. They were frozen upon hearing those sudden, violent thundering footfalls. The skin on their bodies became moist and prickly with heat. Heart pounding. Breathing rapidly. Their amygdalla's were working at full throttle. #Fight or #Flight reaction had immediately set it. That reaction is much different for kids, than adults. Kids feel completely helpless. Adults, we feel completely helpless to protect our kids. It's a no-win situation that would later drive father and son apart for over the next five years. 


In a New York Second. BANG. Nick's up off the couch and reaches the front door in time to close it on the arm of the Skinny Guy who was randomly firing shots, trying to hit Nick. 


All the time Nick had to help Joshua, before he rushed to the door, was to motion for Joshua to hide. Josh went into his bedroom. The door was wide open and his lights were on. 


Back at the door, Nick didn't know it yet, but there was a second perpetrator, (heavy set), behind the first. The second one pushed from behind, over-powering Nick, and forcing their way into the home. They are wearing dark jeans. They have dark masks on. They are wearing T-shirt #Hoodies. Other than one being skinny and the other 'fat,' they were indistinguishable and indescribable. 


And they have guns.


THEY ARE IN.


Ten at the time, and equipped with any survival skills we may have taught him, Josh was crouched on his bedroom floor and saw these guys pistol whip his dad. There was blood on the walls in the entry way. There was blood in the living room. There was eventually even blood in the kitchen. Think of it: Blood, yours and a strangers, all over your home and you have no weapon. Your kid is home. You are powerless. Stop for a moment, close your eyes, and pretend it's you, not an action flick on Pay-Per-View.


Joshua told me that they were yelling something to the effect of, "Get down, get down! Where's the fucking money, man? Get down! You got it! We know you got it here." (frm. Joshua's recollection. Nick remembers very little of the conversation and his version, at time's contradicts Josh's. Such contradiction are normal in a eye-witness accounts of crimes). 


Joshua backed up around the end of his bed, and saw these men drag his panicked, pleading, weeping, bloody #Father who was under the complete control of these men with guns. Let me tell you something about your kids: They think, up until the early teens, that their parent's are pretty invincible. A parent's always 'in control.' This is natural for children as at Josh's age. He still had a notion in his innocent mind that 'dad' could protect him from anything; he was completely safe when he was with him. And kids SHOULD be able to BELIEVE that about their parents. I believe it is a right. But too often might wills out over right... 


Joshua became aware, again instantaneously, that his father could not help he through this horror. His dad was incapacitated and, obviously in complete control of these men. So, Joshua said that he crawled all the way around his bed, away from his bedroom door. He crammed himself as best he could, under his bed, which wasn't very high off the ground. It provided minimal cover. 


There were some dirty clothes, and towels by that side of his bed. He used these to cover himself up with. And remained motionless. Not frozen, he says, but, as he puts it, "I felt too alive to move." 


Nick had told these guys that he had some money in the kitchen. He actually did. So, The Fat Guy stayed with him in the kitchen while Nick got the money, and The Skinny Guy went to roam around the house...


Fuck. He walked into Joshua's room. Stood there with the rifle and looked around. The Skinny Guy said that he had the money. And the guy left Joshua's room.


They fled the scene. End of story. Nick got a few stitches. Joshua was 'unharmed.' No one died.


Happy ending, yeh? Let me tell you something, my heart friends: You can reset a broken leg; you can sew up a cut; you can bandage a scuff; you can even, sometimes,allay those night tears.


How do you bandage a wound to the mind? 


For children with wounds to their minds...There are worse things than death. 









(to be continued in Part - 3)

May 27, 2005 - True Account of a Home Invasion Robbery - Part One, The Robbery

(Note: What follows is an event I wish upon no one. It is not a short tale. It will be blogged in four parts of which this is the first. It will be a very detailed account, as I want the reader to feel as much of the terror as Joshua did. This is the first time I have ever spoken of it, other than with my psychiatrist and family doctor. This is also my first pertinent blog post. If I stumble. Forgive me. I can feel the tears welling up as I type this now. I would like to dedicate this post to @godlessblogger, because Jake has been my strength and a love-able nag about getting me off my ass and blog. Jake, you will always have a special spot in my heart, Love Medusa).

It was about this time, today, five years ago, on May 27, 2005, that an Unforeseen event shattered the life of my son. He was the victim of a home invasion robbery. He was ten years old at the time.

It was an ordinary day. My son, Joshua, and had recently been taken off restriction. My sweet, silly, innocent boy had thrown all his homework away a month previously to try and hide some poor grades. Kids: Do they think their parents are morons? Well, some parents ARE. Anyway, for this transgression, I took his PlayStation away for a month. When I took it away, I really took it away: I unplugged the damn thing and locked it away in my closet. I am by no means a "Gamer," and was unable to hook the damn thing up again! Shit. Josh was flipping out. He asked if I would call his Dad, my 'X,' Nick, to see if he could spend the night.

(Note: My X-husband and I have been estranged since Joshua was 18 months old. He was a Meth addict. But that's a post for another day. Suffice to say, I absquatulated with Josh when he was an infant to get him out of that environment...)

In Northern California, where we live, it is now 8:34pm, PST. It was at this precise time, five years ago, that I loaded Josh, jammies and his favorite games to take him to spend the night with his father. Nick lived in a very shady, (and I don't mean lack of sunlight), neighborhood. Really, NO where to raise a child. There is a park, kitty corner to Nick's house, called Webber Park. It is south of North Van Buren Street.

It is notorious for everything from drunks, urinating in public, pimps, prostitution, drug dealers, users, junkies, thieves and gang bangers. One summer some nut with an AK-47 fired off a blur of rounds in the park. When I ran to see what happened, everyone was on their stomachs, mothers covering children, the elderly and miscellaneous miscreants. The gunman was easy to spot: HE was the only person still standing.

Another advantage of Webber Park is that it has a perfect view of the houses on North Van Buren Street. A person can sit in the park and watch the comings and goings of the residents of the homes and apartments on the block. Which is apparently what happened only two days, at Nick's apartment, just prior to the home invasion.

A couple of days earlier, when my husband returned home from 'work,' he was startled by two men running down the stairs from his tri-plex. It was broad daylight. Two guys had broken into a second floor bedroom window, in the apartment my husband lived in. The apartment my husband owns is a tri-plex. There are two 'Shotgun' apartments downstairs, and Nick lived on the top floor on top of both shotguns. Built in 1906. He had renovated it. But as far as security went, well, there was none. So, when they heard Nick come home, they knocked him down the stairs, as they fled.

All right. That was a scare. In retrospect, it should have flipped a switch in my brain: DO NOT TAKE YOUR PRECIOUS SON OVER THERE UNTIL SOME KIND OF SECURITY MEASURES WERE PUT IN PLACE. I think on this a lot. For the last goddamned five years. Every day I think: I could have prevented this; I should have known better; I was not vigilant enough; I was an idiot. Everyday I have these thoughts. All the time. I take A LOT of meds to shut those thoughts down. But they don't work.

When I got to work the next day I told a co-worker of  mine about the 'mini-breakin.' She and her husband were welders. And the very next day, FOR FREE, they began to weld an iron gate and other grating to bar any intruders from the house. But, unknown to all of us: it would not, could not, be finished in time. But that's the bitch about the Unforeseen: You never see it coming...

Digression Break: When Nick and I lived together at the Van Buren house, way before Josh was a twinkle in anyone's eye, I had a reoccurring nightmare: Two men would break-in the bedroom window, (the SAME one they had broken into two days before), and in this dream I was trying to protect someone. But I could never SEE who that 'someone' was. I had this dream over and over again. Now I KNOW who I was protecting, but at the time, Nick just told me, "Its just a damn dream. Get over it. Nothing will happen." SO, ...

That evening in May, it was very warm.  My husband usually kept the front door open, with only a rickety, rusty old screen door as a the only barrier between 'just a normal warm evening,' and 'chaos; the Unforeseen. (I've always been more 'paranoid' than Nick).

This was a bone of contention between he and I. When we all lived at the Van Buren house, all doors and windows were shut and I did not give a damn how fucking high the AC bill is. I had that dream in my mind. And I had figured out that the person in my dream I was supposed to protect was my son. My husband, on the other hand, didn't seem to worry about that. That was a colossal goat fuck of a parenting dispute that I would ultimately be 'right' about. But there's no consolation in being right, my friends.  

______________________________________________________________________________

May 27th, 2005: After dropping Josh off at his dad's house, I went home to my apartment in Lodi.
Later I would be so thankful that I had that apartment.

At about 11:45pm, as I was going to sleep, my phone rang. On the other end was a cop: Officer David Abrose. He told me that two men with guns had broken into my husbands house. A home invasion robbery had occurred. I had to come immediately. And he hung up. I did not even have the chance to ask if my son were ALIVE. And that was a unknowing obsession shredding my psyche. In my mind, the fact that he had said NOTHING about my son meant Josh WAS dead. The adrenaline immediately hit my system like a prickly, itchy, fire all over my body. I felt like my entire being was on fire.  My mind was on fire. On the drive down to Stockton, my mind was racing with thoughts of my son, dead, in the middle of a crime scene.

And those were the thoughts racing through my mind as I was speeding towards Stockton.  My dream had come true. WHO would have imagined that? How could you? And there was nothing at the time that I could do or say or effect in any way whatsoever to 'control' the unknown fate of my son. My mind kept repeating a cruel mantra: "You are driving to a crime scene. Expect the worst. I don't believe in hope. I have no God I trust or believe in that can comfort me. It wouldn't make me feel any better if there were, because what kind of god would let this happen?" (God and I have never been on very good terms. He's got issues).

Home Invasion Robberies happen everyday. I'm not going to rattle off the dismal statistics. It's too depressing. But they happen every minute. All over the US. Home Invasion Robberies have the ignominious distinction of being almost impossible to solve. Because the perps are not in the home for a long period of time, they leave less evidence behind to aid in their capture and prosecution. 

But the worst aspect of a Home Invasion Robbery is that a victim's chance of making it out alive are very slim. 

________________________________________________________________________________

I arrive at the house. Cop cars, lights, fire trucks, an ambulance, all scattered around the house. I go upstairs and this is what I saw:

Blood, copious amounts on the floor and splattered on one wall. Bullet holes in the Murphy bed I spent 856 hours restoring, shattered glass, detritus of a most violent nature.

The Officer said my husband was at Dameron with undisclosed head wounds.
I asked him about Joshua: :"Is my son alive?"
Yes, Josh was alive. That's all I could think of at that time. To be honest. I wasn't concerned about my husband at all. Think what you will.

I caught sight of Josh when I saw another Officer coming out of Josh's room, helping him gather some things to take home, because he would never set foot in that house again.

By this time, it was almost midnight. I gathered up Joshua and went to Dameron Hospital, to wait for Nick. He had been pistol whipped about the head, and only required a few stitches. I took Joshua home to Lodi, and Nick returned to Van Buren to get some things, because he was coming to stay at my apartment for awhile.

He would, however, eventually have to go back to North Van Buren Street. This incident was not a 'marriage fixer.' It was an incident that would turn into a ganglion cyst that would separate a father from his son forever.

I end Part One at about the time, 12:30 to 1am, PST, that I brought Joshua back home to the safety of our home in Lodi.

Post Script: Since that night 5 years ago, my son has never been back to Stockton, or the home of his father, in which the invasion took place. He has not seen his father in over a year, and never wants to see him again. The reasons for this will be continued in Part Two.

To be continued...
End Part One

My First Blog Post. Test Run.

I am so excited, primitive though it may be, that I am "scata-ing" dolmathes! Any comments on format, or content, suggested content, HELP ;/, would be greatly appreciated. I am a virgin again!