Sometimes things get put into proper perspective and it's like a slap in the face or a good swift kick in the ass.

Hurricane Katrina is a good case in point. I've been griping and whinging for the last couple of weeks about what a major pain in the ass it is to move with just a few days notice. Well.

At least that notice didn't come with a hurricane of epic proportions backing it up. My stuff, my home, my family, all are safe and dry, thank you, God.

Unlike so many people, including my 15 year old eldest son (step-step son, actually. Son of my husband's dead wife), who lives in Slidell, LA, and whose home has been flooded out. His personal effects, except for what he was able to bring with him, are destroyed. And he and the grandparents he lives with are among the lucky ones. They had somewhere to go. A ranch near College Station, TX, a house in Innis, TX, and several other plots of real estate.

Currently, the grandparents are on their way back to Slidell to assess the damage, and UserSupport (my pet name for him because he calls us at 3 AM with stupid user questions) is staying with us for at least a week. The boy is traumatized and losing it every time he thinks about the last thing he saw on TV: the recognizable body of one of his friends from high school.

Or take the way I bitch and complain about the three sons who live with us on a regular basis, the trouble they get into, the headaches I get.

I met my new neighbors yesterday, Lance and Pam. They have a thirteen year old son who suffers from Cystic Fibrosis. A few years back he had a double lung transplant, and now his body is rejecting the lungs. He's on the waiting list for a new set.

But that's not all. Pam and Lance had a daughter once. She died a few years ago, right around the time their Sean had his lung transplant. You guessed it, Cystic Fibrosis. And now it's looking like their son may go, as well.

This puts it all into perspective for me. Yes, I have had a hellacious move. No, my family and belongings are not dead or destroyed. Yes, my kids are little creatures from Where The Wild Things Are. No, I wouldn't trade that to have them laying in a bed gasping and fighting for every single breath they take.

So many little daily hassles in life, who would have ever thought that I'd be grateful for them? But I am.

I am truly grateful for a safe home and healthy family.

I am utterly heartbroken for all of the dead, dying, wounded, hurting people out there.

But me and mine, we're alive. That means that for us, there is always hope. Thank you, God.

It's been a long time since I last showed my big ass around here. My path has led me in a few circles since, and I've found myself forced to let go of nearly everything I ever loved or cherished or clung to, but I still love E2, and the love of human expression it stands for. My hiatus began one night in a hotel room in some nameless city in Indiana, where I was pacing the cold night away, worrying about my dubious future as a radical Christian youth leader in a town where the most intelligent people were already done living. My thoughts went something like this...

I can't do this any more. I can't stand there in front of those kids every Sunday morning and sing songs I don't comprehend, sit in church services listening to a pastor shouting things he doesn't comprehend, tell the people I love that I stand for things that I can't even understand... How do I tell my family that I don't believe all that stuff anymore? They think that rejecting their way of life would send me to hell. Even the small children talk about bad people going to hell. I can stay here in this small town, wash dishes for a living, and read Charles Dickens and the Sugar Creek Gang until time has silenced the unrest inside me, or I can tell them to take their crap and shove it back where it came from.

Unfortunately, my emotion prevented me from seeing the path that lay between those two, and my immaturity naturally brought me to the crap-returning alternative.

My path next led me to a white picnic table behind the no-name restaurant I worked at. It was sometime around midnight, and I was shivering under a tiny flourescent lamp. Opposite me on the other side of the table was a 50-year-old chef named Louis. Lou Dog was the type of guy who has seen it all, done it all, and still cries into his beer every time he hears a touching George Jones song. He and I were in the dubious situation of being in love with the same bonny lass at the same time, and said bonny lass was heavily in favor of the old man. I'm pretty resilient... it hadn't really come between he and I (it still hasn't... he's one of the few people I'm still in touch with from around there), and we were enjoying a decidedly odd discussion about the object of our affections, he over his Miller High Life, me over my fourth cup of coffee for the night. I think I was in a state of coffee-induced hallucination, because at that moment I had an overwhelming feeling that the old drunk on the other side of the table from me was the wisest, most understanding person on the whole damn planet. I still wonder if maybe he is... anyhow, I stopped him mid-conversation and told him about the dilemma I had come up with in the hotel room. He said something like this.

Well, Josh, it looks to me like you need to get the fuck out of here. I almost think of you like one of my kids, and I'd really hate to see you go, but this is no place to live your life.
I'm an old fucker, and there's no reason for me to leave this place, but somebody like you has a lot left yet to experience. You have to see it for yourself. I can't tell you what's out there, I can't tell you what a pussy feels like, I can't tell you what a beer tastes like, or what a good acid hit does to your mind, but I can tell you that the shit you're growing up with isn't all there is. I can tell you that you're too fucking good to waste your life here, and this shitty job ain't worth what you're putting into it.
I always say there should never be such a thing as an 18-year-old virgin, and I feel damn sorry for you, not 'cause you are one, but 'cause you didn't have no choice in the matter. Get your ass out of here before you get too old an' fucked up to move.

I wasn't about to unconditionally agree with that, although I nearly do now. Anyhow, I followed the main jab of his advice and moved in with my grandparents here in Garland, Texas. It was hard as hell to tell the kids in my church goodbye, I love every damn one of them, but I got over it eventually. Now I'm getting a new footing on a lot of things I thought I had all figured out. Most of all, I found out I didn't know shit about what life is really about. Sucks to be wrong. It's not been a really easy ride, but it's been worth it, for damn sure. I've done a few new things since then... I've discovered Pink Floyd, had a taste or three of some very good things that good Christian kids don't drink, read a few awesome books that godly youth leaders don't read, and even kissed a girl (oh yeah).

I wonder what's next...

My mother died on this day, one year ago.

I have not written much about this before. It is too personal, too fresh, too painful. It is my pain, not for upvoting, downvoting, C!ing or whatever. But Mother's death is what eventually led me here, so I felt I should write it.

Mother spent her entire life moving around this big state. She reached the end of her life at the age of 76 in a cozy little home near where she grew up. She was a lady of surprising inner strength. While she could be judgmental, bigoted and sometimes cruel, she was also strangely loving and sweet. As an adult, I carefully learned to befriend the woman who had given birth to me as the strange and complex little person that she was.

You see, I was not too fond of my mother until I was in my teenage years. My parents had a great deal of strife and I always wound up on my Dad's side. It was only much later, when I began to reason more like an adult, that I realized that a lot of what I had thought about my mom was erroneous.

My father, who was 24 years her senior, died in 1995. Soon thereafter, Mom moved out of Dallas and back to her miniscule hometown of Brownwood. I went to visit her almost every month, despite the eight hours of driving.

As the years ran on, the Marlboro cigarettes mother had smoked since the age of 15 began to catch up with her. Her breathing sounded more and more like a gurgling steam engine. When she walked from her tidy little kitchen to her cigarette-scented, but neat-as-a-pin den, she would huff and puff and wheeze and groan. This was what inspired me to quit smoking cigarettes. It took three tries, but I haven't had one in over two years. Emphysema eventually claimed her life.

---

Friday (September 3), Suzi and I had gone to Mother's home. Mom had been in the hospital for a long time, and was finally home, in the care of her handyman and friend, Clayton. It had been sad to see her in that sterile hospital, a weak, frail old lady with tubes in her nose and mouth and a horrifying collection of catheters and IV tubes. At home, she was peaceful, quiet, serene. A lifelong Christian, Mom felt that Jesus was coming for her, to re-unite her with her long-lost parents and friends. I kissed her head as she lay sleeping. She awoke briefly and told me not to fear, she seemed to finally have been at peace.

Saturday night (Sunday AM, actually), mother slipped away peacefully, she went gentle into that good night at about 4:00 in the morning. Clayton called me, awakening me from a deep sleep. It is funny how certain moments in a life are blasted into the mind in high relief. They are packed into long-term memory forever, while others fade. The neuroscience nerds call this "consolidation," if I remember my neuroscience nerd days correctly. The funeral was held on that Monday.

I never wanted to be one of those people who regret all the things they never told their dead parent. Over the last few years of her life, I made sure to tell my mom everything that I wanted her to know. I harassed her into making peace with her feelings for my significant other, I told her the regrets and joys of my youth and I told her that I love her ... many times.

I held it together, there was some grief, some crying, but nothing cataclysmic. Then, one night, as I was driving around, doing my part-time delivery job, I heard an old favourite, the song Purple Heather, Rod Stewart's version, on a CD. The dam burst within me. All the pain, all that loss, it all blew out like a floor that could not hold another gram when a heavy item is thrown upon it. I discovered that, as an adult, crying doesn't go "boo hoo" or "wah" ... Crying is a shouted gale of profanity and curses, expletives and so forth. Scattered among this torrent of invective, a stream of incoherent nonsense and a thunderstorm of tears. It hurt like hell. It felt good.

---

Sometimes, I thought I heard her comforting whispers in the dark as I was in that weird liminal state between sleep and waking ... the hypnogogic state, I think they call it. Auditory hallucinations? Probably. One time I awoke and smelled her perfume—it was that weird Chanel smell that always was in her home. Another time, I dreamt that mother and my deceased cats and ferrets were with me. Mom did not like animals much, but there she was—cuddling them and saying comforting words.

A month or so later, our little ferret Indiana died. It was not an easy year for us.

After my dad's death, I changed my career. He had spent 92 years on earth doing some very prestigious jobs, but he told me that he was never happy with them. I knocked around until I found a career I could truly love. When Mom died, I wanted to make another change, but I could not afford an around-the-world vacation, and I lack the grit to do something drastic like run away to a foreign land.

I have wanted to be a writer since I was a child. I wrote short stories and attempted to write a science fiction novel in high school. Writing did not come easy for me, though. I had a rough time mustering the spirit to write for some reason. I knew of a place on the Weird Wide Web which I'd been visiting for years. A place that I might be able to pass muster, even if it meant taking a few lumps.

And that is how the death of my mother brought me to this magical place where I am writing a lot every day, improving and enjoying the hell out of it.

Day 2 begins. It's now 4:15pm. I haven't really felt like writing about it today. I woke up again at 8:30am, and felt pretty much okay. My stomach was growling and I was hungry, but didn't feel sick.

I was very sleepy last night by 10:00pm. Unusually sleepy. I drank my herbal laxative tea around 10:30pm and went to bed after a little light reading. I woke up in the middle of the night with an urgent need for the toilet.

My morning salt wash of my intestines went easier than yesterday. Most of my bathroom time was done by 10:00am yesterday, but today it lasted past noon. I was fairly alert and energetic for most of the morning. This afternoon I have had a hunger headache aching right behind my third eye.

I have had 4 of the drink mixes today so far. I changed it up a bit and had limes instead of lemons. I find that it's easier to juice the lemons, but the limes taste better. I also went up to a little more than 2 tablespoons of maple syrup. This makes the drink more filling and easier to get down. I am definitely more hungry today. It has been seriously difficult for me not to raid the refrigerator when I was getting my limes out. A chocolate bar was staring me down. And leftover chili from Friday was calling my name. But I have resisted so far.

Some observations: I never realized just how much I enjoyed eating. The texture, the taste, the rituals of dining, and the companionship is quite wonderful. Even the plain peppermint tea I have been allowed tasted wonderful! It was soooooo good. I have been making mental notes of meals I want to have after the fast is over.

I feel like I have made it through the second day. Day 3 is supposed to be more difficult. We shall see.

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School is starting up tomorrow. I'm all excited about getting the old rhythm back together.

Recently, I've made the decision to become a vegetarian — at least, a milk-drinking vegetarian. There are many good moral reasons not to drink milk, but frankly it's one of the only complete proteins that is available at school on a regular basis. I was impressed with today's menu — faux shepherd's pie made with lentils and ginger. I think I'm going to try to reverse-engineer the recipe as soon as I can get my hands on some lentils from the community market. It was really a step up from last year's carbohydrate-only 'vegetarian' line.

Life is beautiful. I'm in the middle of the country, in a town small enough I don't need a car, surrounded by my peers in the pursuit of knowledge. What more could a scholar ask for?

School starts tomorrow. The last hour of the last day of the last summer vacation of my life draws nigh; I'm a senior.

And I'm sitting here, and I'm getting all hyper and tense about it. I was doing just fine all weekend, but the realisation has dawned on me.

The biggest thing is I'll see Jill* tomorrow and I haven't talked to her in almost two weeks. I called but she didn't call back except once I got her but she was really busy and well ... I guess I should probably start back a little bit..

Jill is one year my junior and rides my bus. I'd never really talked to her until I missed my bus one day and went to Ms Smith*'s classroom to borrow her phone. Jill came in for some after-school math help, and Ms Smith introduced us. This was last Autumn. Aside from the occasional "Heya!" in the hallway or on the bus, we didn't talk much 'till one day in April.

I was sitting in the window ledge outside Mr Johnson*'s classroom during lunch, as I often did, waiting for my friends to tire of the clammer and commotion of the cafeteria and come join me. She sat next to me, talking to a friend. That friend left. She turned to me.

"Your name's Jack*, right?"

"Yeah."

"You ride my bus. You get off at Indian Lake, right?"

"Yeah."

"You used to be in Sci-Ma-Tech, didn't you?"

"That's right."

"You used to have long hair. It was cute. You should grow it out again. I think I saw your picture somewhere."

"Umm, yeah maybe I'll grow it out sometime."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm a stalker."

It was pretty funny. I noticed that she was both chipper, conversational, and very attractive. Very attractive. Where's-your-boyfriend-and-why-isn't-he-kicking-my-ass attractive. We talked occasionally from then on, sometimes on the bus and such. We became friends.

Skip ahead to the last day of school. I almost didn't come; my Psych teacher had already given the final and said that there'd be nothing to do. I decided I'd come anyway, because it was the last day, and because I wanted to see my friends one last time before the summer.

I'd gotten a counsellour's appointment in the morning, so I got to spend an hour partying with the office staff. Then I went to class and played cards 'till the final bell.

I decided that I'd go visit all my teachers, starting with my math teacher. I got Mr Jones* to let me check over my final, and I found a mistake, two actually, two very small mistakes that boosted my final semester grade from a C+ to a B-, and that also precipitated all the rest of this long story.

As I was about to leave, Jill saw me in there.

"Ooh, Jack!! I'm so glad I caught you! You've gotta give me your number so we can hang out sometime this summer!"

So I gave it to her, and she gave me hers, and a sort of awkward sideways over-arm hug. "It was really fun riding the bus with you this year, Jack!" I knew we were friends, but didn't know we were the sort that might hang out over the summer...

When I'd had time to reflect on the foregoing, and returned from a wonderful trip to Mackinack Island, I called her. I had no idea what to say or what we'd do (I didn't know her that well), but I knew I had to call. I figured I could ask her to that latest Star Wars movie I'd heard so much about (even though I had only seen the very first Star Wars Movie, and that, when I was a little kid). I called about six times throughout the day, finally giving up and leaving a message. At half-nine she called me back. She couldn't hang out that weekend, and I was going away (for what I thought would be) two weeks, so I didn't end up asking her to a movie or anything. But I did learn that she's fun to talk with.

Sometime later I called her, and we were talking about our respective nerdinesses. She said she was going to go to prom in a duct tape dress, if she could get anyone to go with her. HEY!! HEY!! YOU DON'T HAVE A DATE?!? WAIT, TAKE ME!! "Umm, I'd go with you..."

So we sort of made plans around that. I made a duct tape vest and tie and such. She came over and hung out with me a couple times. She was pretty busy though; she worked six days a week this summer. Since I hadn't officially asked her to the prom, she took it on herself to do it once when she was visiting. So I'm a nerd with a prom date nine months in advance!!

Anyway, between me vacationing with my family and her working, we didn't have much time together. But she did send me emails with "<3" on the bottom telling me she'd finally looked at my website and thought it was really cool and that my journal was really interesting. And I sent her a postcard and a letter, with <3 written on the bottom, in case it wasn't a heart, you know, reciprocity and such...

Well, one Thursday night (incidently the night I resolved to break my porno addiction -- a resolution I have yet to break) she called me up and said her family was going to a theme park tomorrow and her step-mom said she could bring a friend and would I like to come along?

She got to my house at seven in the morning. I'd brought along a batch of homemade brownies -- at the very least I wouldn't starve. It was a three-hour drive. Somewhere in there, she decided to introduce me to her music collection. I was listening along, most of her music was pretty cool and sometime I'll ask her to let me burn it.

Half an hour later ... "Heh heh. Well now, we call this the act of mating. But there are several other very important differences between human beings and animals that you should know about." The Bad Touch by The Bloodhound Gang -- you know -- "you and me baby ain't nothing but mammals so let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel". I looked over at her with a mix of amusement and shock on my face; I'd never have expected her to have that song.

We spent the day together, going on rides, having lots of fun, eating food. At one point, we saw an antique photo studio -- you know, where you slip on fake suits and dresses and get black-and-white photograps -- and decided to get ours taken later.

We'd established that we each were weird, but I kept telling her that she wasn't scary (I think she likes to think she is sometimes). Well, she freaked me out. We were walking to the ferrous wheel for another go-round, when she turned to me and said, "Jack, there's something I should tell you."

"What's that Jill?"

"I'm pregnant."

"What?"

"I'm pregnant."

Hmm. That's a weird thing to joke about. We kept walking. Wait, Jill, why aren't you laughing? Wait... This is really weird. "How did this happen?" I was going to play along, maybe she wanted me to before she'd tell me she was joking.

"Well, you know what happens when two people have sex..."

She looked so damned serious! Wait... she's not joking!!

"His name's Matt. You don't need to know his last name, but he was in four of your classes last year."

Woah. Still no laughter. This is seriously freaky shit. Okay, so she's pregnant. Wow. This is weird. Umm...

We got on the ferrous wheel. "Okay, I was joking. I'm not pregnant... But I did do it with a guy named Matt. I'm on The Shot**."

"Umm..." I was really freaked out because she's one of those people who sort of exudes innocence. "Are you serious?"

"You tell me."

We did a full circle. "Well? Have you decided?"

"Umm... I'll go with my initial feeling on this ... you're a virgin."

"People underestimate me. Okay I'm just kidding with you."

And so we discussed our relative lack of experiences. She'd sort of had a boyfriend last year but he started ignoring her after prom, which pissed her off, then he went downstate to college. She wasn't sure what they were really, but said her friends said she'd been dating him.

I've never had a girlfriend. Hey, I'm a nerd, okay?? "I'm a virgin. Well, I'm beyond virgin. I'm extra-virgin."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I've never kissed a girl."

"Have you kissed a guy?"

"No. Actually, I'm a recovering homophobic. Well, I've kissed my aunt on the cheek. Does that count as kissing a girl?"

"No. Well, I'm not extra-virgin. I've made out before. With Charlie*. He thought he was a good kisser but he really wasn't."

"Too slobbery?"

"Yeah."

"Well, that doesn't really count. By virgin I just meant..." and I pointed at her vagina (which is how I came to have an occasion to point at a woman's vagina fourty feet up in the air) "Oops, sorry for pointing."

"No problem. So, you've never had a girlfriend or anything?"

"Nope."

Later, I told her that she'd finally succeeded in totally freaking me out. We went and got our antique photo taken: we're standing in front of a vault, me with a machinegun and her with a pistol and a bottle of whiskey and this really awesome dress. We look so like thirties gangsters. It was funny too, because she couldn't stop laughing and we had to look mean.

We went on a couple more rides, then on the Swans, paddle-boats on this little lake with fountains. She steered me under one and got me all wet (I'd dared her to).

When we got done, we were right next to the Ripcord, which is like freefall from the top of a radio tower ... okay, not really, but it's pretty scary. She'd been trying to get me to go on it all day and she had me by the arm and was dragging me towards it. Noooo!! But I pointed out that we had to meet up with her family in five minutes and we should go get some food. We got a bread pretzel and a Pepsi and shared them.

On the way home, we had a pillow fight and she signed the back of my picture:

Dear Jack,
Thanks for a great day.
♥ always,
Jill

We made plans of what movies we were going to watch Tuesday (her day off).

I tried to call her all week, but couldn't get her. She called me back Sunday and said that she'd been camping with her family and was sorry we didn't hang out Tuesday like she'd said she would. It was a sucky conversation because we were both pretty tired: she'd just gotten done with dinner and I was just ready to lie down for a nap.

Then I called her Tuesday (one week ago) and she was really busy and couldn't talk. I called her Friday and haven't heard back yet. So I've sort of been worried. Wow. I'm probably taking it all to seriosuly. She's very busy, works long days, and has school to prepare for.

Well, I'll see her tomorrow so I'll know. Probably see her at breakfast, which will be in six hours. I feel suprisingly better now and I think I'll sleep.

---

One day later: Aaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.... Woohoo!! I'm such a paranoid wacko. Everything's cool. She had just been in Chicago and still likes me.

The best part is that I'd scanned in the antique photo and printed out two wallet-sized copies. I'd written on hers something like:

Heya Jill!
Thanks for an awesome day!!
What can I say, you're fun!!
♥,

Jack

* Names changed to protect privacy.
** I didn't even know there was such a thing as The Shot.