Member Blog Post

When I was a kid, I use to know this guy who's father was an x marine...Real badass...Always beating on the kid..."Gonna make a man out of you." That's what he always said.  Wouldn't let the kid do nothing, never got to go anywhere...Kids life pretty much consisted of ass whippings, yard work and haircuts....By the age of 12 the kid starts running away from home...The other parents in the neighborhood knew how this kids father was, so a lot of them would help the kid out, or hide the kid out , being more the case...He still went to school, made good grades, good at every sport he ever played, but it was never enough for his father....I remember one baseball game he went 4 for 5 at bat and drove in the winning run with his last base hit...He was so excited, he knew his father would be pleased..All his father did was admonish him for not going 5 for 5 at bat..."Why did you miss that one", he scolded the kid...He knew then, that no matter what he did, it would never be enough...He soon stopped trying...Soon, the beatings didn't matter, the groundings didn't matter...nothing mattered to the kid anymore...

At 13, the wonderful world of drugs was discovered by this kid...It wasn't long after that when the world of law enforcement was also discovered...Posession charges, assault, larceny, just one thing after another...By this time, the kids no longer living at home...The kids father kicked him out long ago...He's living on the streets, hanging out with friends and staying in trouble....He moves in with his girlfriend at the age of 16, she's only 14, but her mother realizes that there's something special going on here, even if they don't..Mom later tells her daughter that she was going to be with this kid for the rest of her life...How she knew baffles us to this day...They made a dollar here and there selling pot and pills to their friends and acquaintances, and things started to snowball...At 18, he was one of the biggest drug dealers around...They were bringing in 3000, 4000 dollars a day, had them a beautiful house, couple nice cars, just living the dream...But, like all dreams, you just gotta wake up...

A terrible habit had developed between the two, and they had made the mistake of underestimating the power of addiction...What had started as a nice little way to make some spending money, had snowballed into a full blown heroin habit...But they were convinced that they were the two people on this earth that could handle it...No big deal...They had it all under control...Idiots...They were very wrong....Supplies ran out, people were getting robbed, everybody was getting busted....He turned into an evil person...Constantly fighting people, guns, knives, baseball bats, it didn't matter...As long as he got what it was he was after, it didn't matter what the cost was...Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead....Living in this manner, it's a matter of time before Johnny Law comes knocking at this kids door....

May, 2000-Organized Crime Unit, D.E.A., and Metro Police kick this kids door in at 5:00AM, tear  the entire house apart...Finally, 2 hours after their arrival, the smoking gun is found...A tray,sitting on top of a box, under the floorboard, back in the back bedroom of the house...On the tray, 6.5 ounces of uncut black tar, Mexican heroin...Inside the box,15,000.00 dollars in 100 dollar bills...The party was over...It was time to go away for a while....

Posession with intent class A narcotic-8 years imprisonment Tenn. Dept. of Corrections...House-gone...1999 Chevy Malibu-gone...1994 Chevy Corvette-gone...Foreclosure on the house, 156,000.00 dollars in debt, not to mention the 25,000.00 dollar fines and court costs..During time spent incarcerated,this kids family, literally kidnapped his 4 year old daughter, poisoned her mind against him and her mother, who also received 8 years in prison, refused to let them so much as speak to her for almost 6 years...The mother gets out before the father, and has to endure almost unbearable abuse at the hands of these kidnappers, in an attempt to regain custody, they use every trick they can think of trying to get her sent back to prison...Calling her job, lying, pretending to be a parole officer, doing their best to get her fired and her parole violated...All to no avail...After almost 2 years of this, they call out of the blue, and say you can come get her next month...

By the time this all takes place, the father is preparing to come home...During his lengthy stay, both his parents die, his sisters steal everything of his they can get their hands on...He heard that when this first happened, his family was running through his house like they were shopping at Home Depot...Upon the deaths of his parents, first his father, then his mother 4 months later, his loving sisters decide to write the warden a letter begging him not to let this guy attend his own parents funerals...He graciously agreed...For years in prison, this guy is filled with so much hate, and so much rage, that he explodes every chance he gets...If he even thought somebody was a child molester, he'd beat the brakes off them...He literally spent three and a half extra years in prison just because he stayed in so much trouble...

Finally, the day arrives...Release day...The first day of the rest of his life...No longer on drugs...No longer filled with hate and rage, after years of spiritual battles, he finally manages to get a slight grip on the demons that posess his soul, his wife and daughter are waiting outside the gate....Ready, willing, and able to get on with our lives....Start fresh and anew...That was April-2008...They thought it'd be easy...No problems...Little did they know that come july-2009, he'd still be looking for steady employment....He gets some odd truck driving gigs, but they need something more substantial...After 1500 job applications, he's realized that everybody runs background checks...Shot down by every reputable trucking company around...Even Waffle House said no thanks...And every time he hears the words," sorry, but we can't hire you because of your felony record", he knows, he's been tried and convicted all over again...

But, this guy I use to know will never give up...He's too strong for that...He refuses to let them beat him...He's too smart for that...And he won't go back to his old ways, because he's not that stupid...He knows that it's just a matter of time before everything turns around...Then he can live up to the responsibilities that he knows are his...Taking care of his wife and daughter like they were meant to be taken care of...

I use to know that kid, but he's no longer around...But the man that came out on the other end of all that, well, he's gonna be all right...peace and love to all my friends-zigzag