03/06/09

I felt as if he could sense my fear, there seemed to be some sort of nervous tension in the air. I was afraid but I hid my fear under a banner smile. Trying to put forth some sense of togetherness. I had never know anybody who did drugs and so this was a whole new world for me, to do something just to take your mind someplace new I could relate with. But to damage brain and hurt yourself in the process I couldn’t wrap my young mind around no matter how good it might make you feel. I don’t know what else to feel when I am around him now but fear. I don’t want to say the wrong things to him afraid that he might have one of those psychotic breakdowns and try to kill the whole family the way you hear about on the news some tragic nights. I just keep my distance now but the ocean between me and my stepfather hurts. It takes me from one end of a bright and hopeful spectrum to another end and on the other end it is dark and refuses to sparkle at all. I walked on eggshells in my own home trying not to upset anyone but even the best I could do was never enough for him. If someone where to ask him about me he would say that I was in dire need of some discipline and he would be sure to note that he was not going to be the one to instill that in me.
My step father was a paramedic and an alcoholic for years. I can remember coming home from school one day and he and my mother had been in our kitchen fighting and she was bleeding from her nose but I was too small to do anything about it. When my mother saw we were home, she was ready to leave him but she never did. At least not physically, she remained but over the years it seemed like she merley tolerated him as her provider and simply thier she remained. I could not be consoled on the issue I did not consider him to be much of a man and so I acted out. I don't know if it was for the attention or because subconciously I thought he would just leave it I became a problem but there he stayed and throughout the next several years I hated him. He would tell me to do chores and I would promptly ignore his so called authority. I can remember after the first few years he sought sobriety I thought it was all a joke. This in my mind was a madman who used to drink all the time.There was a bottle of Bacardi Rum on top of our refrigerator at all times and the trash can was always full of empty Budweiser bottles. This was a man who was double minded and dangerous. He was a paramedic and certified to train people in Akido, a form of the martial arts. This was a man who wrote poetry and still who could not use words to an affective degree when dealing with my mother or when he was drunk. This was a man who on one side of things wanted to build a family and on the other chose a career that kept him on base for days on end, while we( or at least I) welcomed the break from him.
It had been three years since my father died and in retrospect I never wanted anyone to try and replace him because nobody ever truely could.