whirled around like a scorned demigod having to clean the staples of Augeus. Blaming others and events for one’s plight is easy. Its simple and agreeable. I can’t do [pick a goal] because of [insert obstacle/ excuse] so therefore I won’t try. But my morbidity ran deeper than that. I cherished my anger and cultivated my jealousy for others who have done better with such intensity that the discontent had grown Architeuthisian around me. I had morphed into a bitter giant squid. Kafka be praised, The Metamorphosis was complete when recently a doctor told me I might have several slipped disks in my cervical vertebrae. Now what? See my prophecy of doom has come true. I can’t workout, I can’t get my book sold, I can’t find a decent apartment in a nice area for less that the price of a seat on the last mission of the space shuttle; I just can’t.Of course my friend rallied to my side. With platitudes and maxims they came, shinning like little beautiful beacons of hope to brutalize me into further despair. I think I wanted to feel bad. I compared myself first to this one then the next one. Ready at every turn to beseech God on why he had given me so many burdens with so few rewards; why he had given others so much for so little work. Didn’t I have to work TWO full-time jobs? Didn’t I have to help out my mother who in recent years fell to the same plight as millions more? She suddenly at 83 found herself jobless and at the bottom of a well of bad financial decisions. Didn’t I put on a happy face and grab a shovel and try to dig her out? At one point in 2009 I thought the walls would tumble in on me, crushing me under this mountain of responsibility. I suffered through wage reductions/ slashed hours at work/ repealed benefits. I was tormented by both bedbugs and ConEdison—due to a short in the electrical wiring of my apartment my electric bill was literally four times higher than it should have been. Even the four ConEdison technicians who checked it out couldn’t explain why I was being charged $527 a month for a one bedroom apartment in Marble Hill. 2010 dawned with the promise of relief.
And indeed there was peace. The summer was radiant and I was on the brink of finishing my second novel The Goddess of Light. Of course there were a few minor setbacks after using some bad software but still things were on the up. Little did I know that Loki was waiting in the wings. A wicked little fucker poised like a fifth grade bully ready to steal my lunch money. Things started going gray in November and by New Year ’s Eve my life was, once again, in full tempest. Here in stanza 35 of the epic Norse poem Poetic Edda Völuspá, Loki shows his ass again.“A ship journeys from the east, Muspell's people are coming,
over the waves, and Loki steers
There are the monstrous brood with all the raveners,
The brother of Byleist is in company with them.”
Indeed Loki had arrived. With his monstrous brood he smashed and dashed what little I had left. And like it says in this comic excerpt when Loki broods—let all who live BEWARE!
I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. Broke and disgusted. I felt like Charlie Brown and life was Lucy with a football. Good Grief! So here I found myself back once again at this fount of pain and disappointment. I folded into my sorrow and started to read. I found an old young adult novel entitled A Hero Ain’t Nothing But a Sandwich in my closet and thought at 126 pages it wouldn’t kill me to read it on the subway. The story was about the struggles of an inner city thirteen-year-old boy who very quickly became a junkie strung out on heroin and the chaos that became his life. The story is told in alternating chapters by Benjie and those surrounding him like his mother Sweets, her common law husband, Butler and a motley collection of relatives, pushers, teachers and friends. The book was written by the critical acclaimed playwright and novelist Alice Childress. The novella was made into a not so well received movie staring Cicely Tyson and Paul Winfield. In the book Benjie’s principal speaks about poverty.“One gradually learns begrudgingly to respect the poverty-stricken: They have endurance; they push their vitamin-starved bodies on and on from one day to another; they continue to stand up under humiliation and abuse.”
There it was: Leaping off the page at me; the horror that I faced everyday. I didn’t want to live like that. To propel myself through the murky ether of a dead-end job waiting for the death knell of my dreams. I was sanguine once, purple and swollen on my own arrogance to think that somebody would want to read my words. This was a sharp bitter thing to confront. I had truly hit my bottom. So I mopped. It was over. I was done. All I could see was me in some rancid fetid unflattering future, a bloated lonely curmudgeon like Max Jerry Horowitz in the animated film Mary and Max. I didn’t want that future for me but it seemed pre-ordained. A subject I discussed in an earlier blog here. But then something extraordinary happened. Now I’m not one for self-help speeches and the such, even thought The Mastery of Love by Don Miguel Ruiz changed my life, but I came across a small bit of advice from Russell Simmons of all people. In his new book Super Rich: A Guide to Having it All, Simmons discusses the five rules of getting super rich. You can find them here. The one that stuck out to me was #2 Relentlessly Pursue Your Goals Without Appearing Needy. So I sat there on Saturday ready to be mournful and said to myself: Have I been relentless? Certainly Solstice the protagonist in my books was relentless. She stopped at nothing to become ruler of the world. But he also said don’t chase paper and if you do what you love it will come back to you. How many people can say they do what they love? My mother always told me you can never be truly rich or happy working for somebody else. I guess Russell and my mother have it right and my robust control over these meaningless things such as tee-vees, overtime and Gucci loafers ultimately are unfulfilling and unrewarding. When I write I am literally lifted off the earth and feel transcendent.
When I create I see and feel everything as if there are electrical insects buzzing on my skin. It makes me want to be more and better. It makes me want to live without a life of misery and unhappiness. It makes me want to shine brightly and shower my friends and family with love. It makes me hope that when you read these words you feel the connectedness that I have with them and in a little way we become connected too. I want you to be transported, when you read the story of Solstice to a world where women are powerful and that children born in all the shades that we come in can see themselves in Newel. Solstice seemed to learn Russell and my mother’s lesson. She had riches and power beyond belief but it took a ten-year-old boy near the end of her life to truly make her realize that love and friendship and giving made you whole. That was the precious cargo we carry. Helping each other through the rough times. That being a Bodhisattva or a Good Shepherd of this earth is the only way to live. When you become nothing you gain everything. So now I will go forth with these harsh merciless lessons life has dealt me knowing that these lashes on my metaphorical back do not define me; they do not hinder me; they do not stop me. They help me to go forth and be fearless! And that’s all I needed to do in the first place.
