When I'm Sorry isn't Good Enough

When “I’m sorry” isn’t Good Enough

Prologue

William Shakespeare wrote in his treatise on the human soul, The Tempest, that: what’s past is prologue.

History influences the present. 

That’s what it means.

This begins with the present.

She is dead.  Her body interred.  No longer will she walk.  No longer will she love.  No longer will she be present.

Dead from cancer.

There will be no happy ending here.  Cancer consumed her; it took her spirit, her vitality, her love; her motherhood.  It took her life.  Nothing good has come from her death.  Parents torn.  Father gone.  A child without guidance.  Friends scattered.  A sister in pain. 

She is dead.

Chapter One

Lance rides in his saddle, rocking back and forth, rhythmically; his movements are hypnotic like staring at a metronome, he doesn’t stop.  Back and forth.  Back and forth.  He pushes with the thickness of his legs.  Tree trunks.  Well-shaped pistons.  Up and down.  He gasps over and over again.  He is sore, but doesn’t complain.   His lungs struggle to breath.  A side effect from his long day.  His master screams, he responds.  Up.  Up.  Up.  The mountain rises even higher. 

He can’t finish.

Cancer.

In the lungs. 

In the brain. 

Everywhere.

You will die.  You are more than half-dead.  Sixty percent chance.

Chapter Two.

Her body is withered, but her smile is ubiquitous.

Head bald, spirit bare.

Yellowed skin, shallow eyes.  I’m in pain seeing her.  But I smile.  I hope for her.  I know she will die.

We have dinner, but her husband is absent even though he sits by my side.  Her daughter is four, and every bit a young girl.  She squeals.  Her father scolds.  She giggles.  Her mother applauds.  The apposition of attitude is obvious: the father is tired, the mother absorbing every moment.

I can see death around her, surrounding every inch of her frame.  I can smell it.  I can taste it.  It makes me afraid.  It makes me feel small.

She rides like Lance.  She never misses a day when able.  Her time on the bike measured with each beat of her heart.  It pounds.  She rides.  Each revolution of the crank is one completion to her last. 

The Tour of Hope.

At Lance’s side she rides, a moment where death doesn’t hover.  A moment pure.

The chance for a picture with Lance.  Skin on skin.  She absorbs him.  Together they ride, she forgets about cancer.  Life is what she sees; life is what he has.

The miles were painful, the best she had ever felt. 

That’s what I tell myself.

Chapter Two

Chemotherapy.  BEP.

Lance said “no.”

Instead, he chose a second path, a second opinion.  How many get that option?  Dr. Lawrence Einhorn filled his veins with Cisplatin, a procedure that he pioneered.  Few get the sought-after hands of the famed healer.  Lance did.

“Save my lungs.”

“Save my life.”

Dr. Einhorn did both.

“Keep Rooting for Lance Armstrong!” was written in October of 2012 (Robert Lipsyte).  Lance was cured and Robert went out and bought his “first good bike” after Lance had won his first Tour de France.

His celebrity was like the baize canopy of the Amazon’s forest: it was thick; it was everywhere, spreading from one coast to the other.  Untouchable.  Strong.  Impenetrable.

Mr. Lipsyte chanted “LanceArmstong, LanceArmstrong,” as he pushed himself up the hills.  Kinship.  A shared cancer.  Chemotherapy: “LanceArmstrong” continued to spill over his lips.

What did my friend chant?  It torments me as I wonder.  I will never know.

Chapter Three

My wife walks to her door, wondering where she’s been.  Calls go unanswered, emails ignored.  A missed get-together that went unexplained.

She brings a gift to her door.  The husband answers.  His eyes are cast downward; his words are weak.  “It hasn’t been good lately.  She’s taken a turn for the worse.  We are going to need a lot of luck.”

The door closes.

My wife is confused.

"We are going to need a lot of luck."

My wife is haunted still by those words.

Another surgery failed.  This one was the last.  Moments in her husband’s arms as he carries her from the bed to the bathroom and back again.  There is no sleep.  Eyes gaze distant.  Breaths that tell of the last.  A daughter unsure if the woman in her mother’s bed is the same that she knows.  Parents hovering; squeezing each other in one last bit of desperation.  A sister shaking her head not yet ready to believe.

Dead.

Her family is ripped apart.  Her husband is gone.

The pain was so fierce, her death so quick.

He failed to attend her memorial.  I’ll never know why.

The wails of her mother and father.  The absence of her beloved daughter, their grandchild.

The whimpers as her sister eulogized.

Friends in disbelief.

Your lies.  At least she didn’t know, Lance.  At least she didn't know.

Chapter Four

Celebrity.

Status.

Money.

Wealth.

Fame.

We gave it all to you: a life billions will never have.  My last visit to India, a boy, crippled from disease, held his hand upward for a few rupees.  His home was the pavement, his future measured in months.  Another man made his home underneath a sliver of blue plastic held up by four sticks.  A rock was where he laid his head.  Children in the streets.  Screaming for coins.  Scars.  Tears.  Nothing.

You have it all, a life blessed.

The world gave to you much that nearly most will never see.

You stole from us.

You gave back false hope.

The best medicine at your fingertips; the chance afforded to few.  Your doctor pioneered your treatment; he saved your life.

You live because of your celebrity.

You live because of your fraud.

In your veins a needle is thrust.  It saves your life.  It helps you cross the line.  The drug flows inward and brings with it a cure.  The drug flows inward it brings with it your victories.

You smiled.

You scolded.

You defended.

You cheated.

You lied.

My friend is dead.

She believed in living strong; she believed in you.

Stephanie.  That was her name.

Stephanie.

Saying “I’m sorry” isn’t good enough.

Epilogue

Lance: how do we punish a man like you?

A question that cannot be answered.

You are a man of ego, unquenchable solipsism.  That’s what drove you.  We believed it was your cancer, your insatiable appetite to win.  No.  Definitively, no.  It was your ego.  As simple as that.  You beat cancer because of your celebrity.  Your celebrity is because of your cheating.

Stare at the face of your children; tell them you are good.  They won’t believe you – not always, anyway.  One day, the truth of your deceit will mold their image of you.  Their father a lie.

You have been given more than most men will ever receive in their entire lives.  You have been afforded status, unspeakable wealth, honor and prestige.  Men and women step aside as you walk forward.  A king among kings.  Untouchable.

No longer.

If it were left to me, men like you would be stripped of your wealth – every dollar down to the last penny.  You would be left with no status.  A Scarlet Letter, I suppose.  I wouldn’t allow you the life that comes from carrying your name.

Shamed forever is how it should be.

No profit should come from your name, from your image, from your words.

A life forged like the average man, with average skills. 

Sit alongside me.  Be like me.  Fight traffic.  Be anonymous.  Struggle for tomorrow.  Worry about the future.  Work for every dollar.  Work for every opportunity.  Live from week to week.  Start your life like the rest of us: with nothing.

What’s past is prologue.  History influences the present.  A man who cheated in life should not be cheated from a life ordinary.

Made to be average.

That’s how you should be punished.

An Eye for an Eye

Prologue

“Hi, this is Jasmine, I’m not able to take your call right now; leave a message and I’ll call you right back…bye!”

I smiled when I heard the last word – it was the way that she said bye! – it was so sincere, so energetic. 

It was sweet, almost with a melody.

I dialed again.

“Hi, this is Jasmine, I’m not able to take your call right now; leave a message and I’ll call you right back…bye!”

This time I didn’t smile.

A small tear filled my lower eyelid.

“I miss you,” I whispered as I began my message, “I want you to come home.”

Instantly I felt foolish.

Jasmine won’t come home.

She can’t.

She’s dead.

Killed by a man who didn’t know that his last drink should have been the one before the previous five.

Chapter one

He drank.  Now there’s a drink is in my hand.  There really shouldn’t be.  That’s how she died.  But something has to numb how I feel.  Everything is so dark, so heavy.  I want to jump from the roof of a tall building.

The sadness is resolute.

Unbearable.

Oppressing.

It’s an unseen weight lowering down on my body - slowly, heavily.  I want to push it back.  I can’t.

It’s so strong.

I want her to be there.  To be lying in the spot on the left side of the bed.  Her side.  I still haven’t touched her pillows.  I can’t sleep on her side.  I can’t sleep on my side.  The bed is cruel to me now.  It reminds me of where she should be.  Where she isn’t.  The hardwood floor next to the bed is as far as I’ve reached.  It’s where I curl up each night. 

I’m like a dog. 

I’m loyal. 

I’m silent. 

I’m pathetic.

A little girl’s cry fills the air.  It’s near two in the morning.  She’s screaming for mama.  Only 16-months old and somehow she knows: 

Mama’s gone. 

Mama’s dead.

“Mama!” she screams again.

What am I supposed to do?

Her screams started the night of the funeral.  They’ve been relentless.  Endless.  They’ve been coming every night. 

Two months now.

Chapter Two.

The coffee shop is buzzing.  It’s the nicotine I guess; maybe it’s the people.  The cup of espresso I’m nursing has long gone cold.  I don’t care.  I sip at it anyway.

In the corner, I watch as a man plays with his daughter.  She’s really beautiful.  I guess she’s about the same age as my daughter, maybe a month or two older.

I’m reminded of how it used to be.

His wife is striking.  I felt guilty for even thinking the thought.

Jasmine was beautiful: the way she smiled, the way her hips swayed so invitingly when she walked, her whispers into my ear, the smell of her skin.

Everything.  All of it.  All of her.  Perfect.

I close my eyes and try to see her face.  It’s a struggle.  I was warned of this.  I’m angered that I can’t make her face appear clearly in my mind.  It’s almost fuzzy as if I’m trying to create her.

It shouldn’t be this way.

I sipped my cold espresso and looked again at the family across from me.

I can’t take my eyes off of them.

They smile at each other. 

Their little girl holds out to her side the tiny piece of cookie she’s been given.  The cookie hovers above the floor and in her hand.  The little girl cocks her head to one side and smiles at her parents.

They both want to tell her “no,” but can’t hide their smiles.

She’s just so darn cute.  She reminds me of my daughter.  We had those moments to; that is, my wife and I had those moments with our daughter.   Why can’t I see her face anymore; why is it hard to hear her voice?  I feel for my phone.  It’s in my pocket.  I’m going to call her voicemail again.

The little girl antagonizes her parents for a moment longer.

Her mother puts her right hand on her hip as if the little girl should know that it’s a clear signal, a warning telling her not to do it.

She does it anyway.

She drops the piece of cookie to the floor.

Instantly, a shrill laugh fills the coffee shop, as the little princess can’t help but find more humor in her devilish antic than is expected.

Her parents try not to laugh, but they are doing a poor job keeping it bottled.

The little girl claps vigorously and spits out a few syllables that I think intend to be the word “more, more!”

I look at my coffee, there’s one more cold sip.

My wife is cold; she is beyond cold.  She is part of a different world now.  She’s not in mine.

I set my coffee cup down and wonder if that happy, little girl’s dad knows that I’m the husband of the woman he killed.

Chapter Three.

I look at my watch.

The large hand moves to the top of the hour.

Any minute now.

And like clockwork, a garage door opens and he backs out from the garage.  It’s a different car, not the one that he was driving when he killed Jasmine.  He replaced it, helping him to rid the memories of when he ran her down.

“No chance,” the doctor had said.

The words had caused a sliver of ice to run down the entire length of my spine.  My knees had gone weak, and my body crumpled to the hospital floor.

They wouldn’t let me see her.  “Too much trauma.”  Those words had come from the same doctor.

I lowered myself in the car as he drove past.  He was predictable and nearly followed the same schedule and same path each morning on his way to work.

It was the same at lunch: the same place, the same meal, the same time.

It had been this way for three months.

But today would end differently for him.

Chapter Four

Night fell and it was time.

I took a long, slow breath and asked myself if I was ready.

I was.

I had parked the car a few blocks from his home.

Out of it, I stayed in the shadows and watched for the unexpected neighbor, or the occasional car.

There was neither.

At his front door, I didn’t hesitate.  I pushed the tiny, oblong doorbell.

Soon, it was followed by the sounds of footsteps.

The door opened.  I had thought of this moment countless times. 

What would I say?  What would I do?  Would I freeze?  Would I run?

“Yes,” he answered, “can I help you?”

It was then that he noticed the gun in my hand, hanging at my side.

I raised it; the barrel was barely an inch from his nose.

“Inside,” I said.  Not loud, not soft, but firm: I was surprised by my own voice.  It didn’t sound like mine.

I closed the door with my free hand and motioned with the gun for him to sit on the couch.

“Call for your wife,” I commanded.

He hesitated.

I cocked the gun.

“Now.”

His lips moved but no words came.  He tried again after swallowing.  “Sophie.  Sophie, come here.”

Down the hall she shuffled.  When she saw me she froze.

“Sit down next to your husband.”

She didn’t hesitate and complied.

But sitting wasn’t easy for her.  She started to shake just as she reached the couch and nearly fell onto it.  Her husband reached for her, helping her.  “It’s going to be okay, Sophie.”

“Is it?” I asked.  I don’t know from where this response came.  I didn’t know if I was asking myself the question, or him.

“What do you want?”  I could tell that his confidence was coming back, that he was moving past the initial shock of a gun pointed at his head.

“You don’t recognize me?” I asked.

“Should I?” he replied.

I thought about this for a moment.  Why should he recognize me?  There had been no trial.  No charge of murder.  He had one of the best attorneys East of the Mississippi.  He pleaded no contest to a reduced charge of involuntary manslaughter.  Six months in jail, sentence suspended upon completion of probation, and a $5,000 fine.

That was it.  My wife’s life, my pain, my daughter’s pain reduced to the cost of a half-running used car.

And me: I was sentenced to a lifetime without my love, my wife; with a daughter who will never know her mother, how much her mother loved her.  I was handed despair, grief, and unending loneliness, and he was handed a bill.

“No, I suppose you shouldn’t recognize me.  My name is Abbott – Abbott Bradford.”

At the utterance of my last name, he tilted his head knowingly.  He knew.

His wife knew, too.

The room went quite cold for them both.  I could see in his wife that her fear had moved to outright fright. 

He slumped.  Perhaps it was from the guilt of getting away with murder.  Perhaps it was from knowing that the sentence he should of received was about to be carried out.

“You killed my wife.”  Again, I surprised myself with the ease in which the words spilled over my lips.

“What are you going to do?”  This time the question came from his wife.

I smiled.  I don’t know why I did, but I did.  I think this unnerved them even more so, as both husband and wife shifted awkwardly on the couch.

She grabbed her husband’s hand and squeezed.

“I sleep on the floor.”  I don’t know why I said this, it wasn’t how I had prepared and certainly wasn’t any of the words that I had rehearsed incessantly.

“I sleep on the floor because I can’t stomach the thought of sleeping in our bed.  I haven’t since she was killed.  We have a daughter, you know.  Almost the same age as yours.”

“How do you know we have a daughter?” he asked.

I ignored his question, and continued, “Do you know what it’s like to hear your daughter scream out at night, over and over again, shouting mama, mama?  What it’s like when you try to comfort her, but she pushes you away because you’re not the person for whom she screams?”

I can hear my voice start to rise; I can see their fear increase, too.  I don’t care.  I continue:  “Do you know how painful it is that I can’t comfort her!?  What am I going to tell her!  What am I supposed to say to a child!?  Your mother was killed by some drunk asshole!” 

I straightened my arm so that the gun was pointed closer to him.

I inhaled deeply and then let the air hiss from my lungs and through my clenched teeth.

Tears are streaming down his wife’s face; his own has gone white, the blood drained from it.

“Have you any idea the pain that I feel.”

“No,” he whispers.

“You will now.”

Slowly, I move the gun from his face and point it at hers.

Say it ain't so, Joe!

Prologue

I was ten.

The room was dark and the night was late.

Quiet filled the house but I knew that soon the floorboards would creak.  He always tried to keep his footsteps light, trying not to wake me.

But I wasn’t asleep.

I couldn’t sleep.

And then they came.

The wood planks were old and unforgiving, letting out long groans with each of his steps.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

I prayed, “Please don’t come into my room tonight, not again.”

I balled my fists; maybe I could fight back.

But I knew that I wouldn’t.

The shame began to wash over my body again.

The bedroom door slowly opened.

I held my breath.

Chapter One

Joe Paterno is a revered man, a walking saint in the eyes of many.  His life has been blessed with a success few of us will ever obtain, and accomplishments that as youngsters and adults alike we dream about.

I’m not a college football fan, but I can certainly respect and even admire a man who has worked diligently and persistently to achieve at the highest level.

More Bowl victories and appearances than any coach; the only coach to have won the Rose, Orange, Sugar, and Fiesta Bowls; two National Championships; five undefeated seasons; and one of the 50 greatest coaches of all time – that’s in all sports.

On his way to work, he walks by a statue of himself everyday.  Spread out along the wall of the campus bookstore is a Da Vinci like ubiquitous and elaborate mural with Joe at its center.

So what.

Chapter Two

He walks in and whispers my name quietly.

I pretend to sleep.

My body starts to shiver. 

It always did.

Before going to bed, I cocooned myself in the blanket, hoping that it would offer some protection.

It never did.

He peeled away its layers.

A tear trickled down my cheek.

Chapter Three

Joe Paterno was fired today; relieved of his duties as Head Coach.

His illustrious career has ended in a dark cloud of thundering controversy.

“Fire him!” many shouted.

“Don’t fire him!” responded others.

But fire him they did.

Some rioted.  Cars were overturned.  Emotional outcries poured from shocked fans.

In 2002, a Graduate Assistant told Joe that he witnessed the former Penn State Defensive Coordinator – Joe’s employee – performing a sex act on a ten-year old boy.

He witnessed it.

He reported it.

Joe’s employee molested a child in Joe’s locker room (this next sentence is not for the faint of heart); On Penn State’s campus, in the athlete’s showers of Joe Paterno’s locker room, Jerry Sanduky was having anal intercourse with a ten-year old boy.

I am physically sickened just writing that sentence.

Joe reported it to the Athletic Director but not on that day: Joe reported it the next day.

Not to the local police.

Not to Campus Security.

He reported in only to the Athletic Director; to this day, we don’t know what those exact words were and if they included all of the graphic details of the incident.

My assumption is that Joe told the Athletic Director everything; that the Director would take the reins and notify the authorities.

But the man didn’t.  He did nothing.

Instead of being arrested, charged, and convicted, a retired Jerry Sandusky, continued to enjoy his emeritus status on campus and used the facilities as he pleased.

He used them to continue molesting his prey.

Nine years passed from the first molestation report, and Jerry Sandusky was arrested and charged with 40 (40!) counts of sexual abuse of young boys over a 15-year period, Sandusky acknowledged at least 8 victims – 8!

It is believed that at least 20 (20!) events took place at Penn State.

And those are only the ones to whom he admitted.

Sandusky is 67 years old, molestation by a man on a boy doesn’t start at middle-age, at age 52; it is an act that begins much sooner in the predator’s life; it is an act that continues unabated until that predator’s own demise or capture.

Believe me, there are far more victims than the 8 to which Sandusky has been charged with molesting.

When the news first broke, I wanted to side with Joe Paterno, I really did.  After all, he was a man to be admired not only for his career, but also for his professional demeanor, his focus on the academic process of his athletes, and for his commitment to both community and family.

Joe Paterno has five children.

What if it had been one of them?

Would you have taken a different course of action, Joe?

I really would like to know.

Chapter Three

The visits to my room went on for a few years.

Eventually he would turn on my brother, too. 

Over that time, I became angry, violent even, and lashed out verbally and physically at school, at home, and in the public.

I was labeled as a bad kid.

For decades, I had tremendous difficulty trusting anyone, particularly men.

I wanted to be alone.

I despised affection.

Rage.

Fear.

Hatred.

Shame.

Deep Shame.

I met my molester through the “Big Brothers” program.  Growing up without a father, my mother thought it best to provide me with a male role model and enrolled me in the “Big Brother” program.

His name was Mark Smith; he lived in a suburb of Minneapolis.

It was 1984.

Like Mark Smith, Jerry Sandusky worked in a youth program “giving back” to the community, but truly used the guise of working with young boys as a means to surround himself with an array of potential victims from which he could choose.

A predator does not wear a sign.

A predator works harder to blend into the community.

A predator overcompensates for his need to abuse by becoming that man that no one could possibly see as a predator.

Joe Paterno is old enough, wise enough, and mature enough to know this.

Joe Paterno was the leader of an organization: head coach, CEO, commander-in-chief; it doesn’t matter.  One has the obligation to manage an organization in all matters relevant when one holds the position of authority.

Expectations for our leaders are higher than those are for others.

That’s why leaders are paid more, sometimes exorbitantly more.

That’s why they receive perks the rest of us never will.

Joe Paterno’s employee molested – raped – a boy on campus, in the athletic facilities: Joe Paterno had more than a moral obligation to ensure that the matter was investigated and by the appropriate authorities: he had a legal obligation.

When I first heard of the allegations, and the calls for Joe to step down, I wondered if we were judging Joe too quickly and seeking to vilify him, as our society tends to do.

And then I gathered the facts.

Joe, you made a mistake.

A really, really big one.

I understand that your life is football; your profession football, and that every ounce of you is football.

No one ever wants or expects to be a part of something as heinous as this.  But you were, and when you were, you had tough choices to make.

That’s the role of leadership.

Because of your conscious decision to wipe your hands clean of a very dirty matter, others were molested; more boys have suffered in despair; a few will live in the dark pit of self-hatred and for their entire lives.

Some may even continue the cycle of abuse as it has happened to them.

Some will have troubles with intimacy.

Some will turn to alcohol, others to drugs.

Some may never see the light of a life beautiful.

Am I reaching here?

Maybe.

But I don’t think so.

Joe Paterno enjoyed a great and admirable career.  He made a mistake and that career has ended because of it.

Was it too harsh?

No.

Should he have been allowed to coach the final game of the season?

No.

Some mistakes require severe and swift punishment.

It is not the way his career should have ended.

Far from it and I truly do sympathize with him.

But it did.

A small part of me still hopes that one piece of information is still missing; one piece of knowledge that will vindicate Joe.  I want to see Joe on a float in a parade celebrating and being celebrated the way a man of his stature should have been.

Screaming fans under confetti, ribbons, and streamers is how it should have been.

I want to point to him and tell my son: That’s a role model, that’s how you should be.

But I haven’t seen that missing bit of evidence that would clearly vindicate Joe; I don’t think that I will.

Please, just say it ain’t so, Joe.

Just say it ain’t so.

Epilogue

To those youngsters that have inexplicably found themselves the center of that disgusting and unexplainable side of humanity: you are not alone; your pain is real; you are suffering, but remember that you can make, you will make it.

Reach out.

Tell someone.

Fight back.

And when it’s over, you can overcome it.  You can grow into a beautiful and wonderful human being.

You are normal.

Don’t be afraid.

It’s not your fault; it never was.

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Steve Jobs's Last Breath

Prologue

When I was a Special Operations soldier, I was satisfied.

Putting a bullet dead center from greater than 500 meters away, that was my life.

Finely tuned and lethal; I could be underwater for hours in a Rebreather, or in the mountains with my face painted and unseen; I could traverse a desert solo, or survive in a jungle with my wits.

I was a trained killer.

I loved every minute of every day.

But it wasn’t Nirvana, and it was far from enlightenment.

Chapter One

It may not have been my Nirvana, but it was close.

My favorite moment in Special Operations was when I jumped from a plane into the inky, black darkness of the unknown.  A red light would turn green, bathing the inside of the plane with a warm glow.

It was the signal that sent the first stream of adrenaline ripping through my veins.

It was the signal that it was time to go.

 

The cargo ramp would open with a long, metallic groan and a torrent of air would fill my eardrums no different than if it were a train rushing by.  My heart would race; sweat would drop down the spine of my back.

Anticipation was my only drug.

Fear was my chaser.

The first step was always the most difficult.  The first step separated my body from the plane, from anything physical, from all things real.

My body would plummet at near terminal velocity toward the earth, an earth that I couldn’t see in the midnight skies.

The cold from the high-altitude, night air would scratch my face, and the icy droplets of the cloud that I fell through would wet any exposed skin.

It was as close to enlightenment as I’ve ever been.  It was how I imagined Nirvana should be: the world was quiet; my body was weightless, and all thoughts were gone.  It was just the planet and I together in a poetic dance with physics.

I didn’t tumble.

I didn’t fall.

I just existed.

God only knows how much I miss those days.

Today, I am like most of you: I work in an office to earn; I work toward retirement.  I get up and put on a pair of dress shoes to adorn the business casual attire required for any standard workplace.  I fight traffic instead of enemies.  I run on the treadmill instead of running through mud.  I used to carry one hundred pounds on my back and a weapon in my hands, now I carry a diaper bag, an infant car seat (with the baby in it, of course), and my workbag.  Instead of studying a tactical operation order, I plan out the best way to change a diaper, get a bottle of milk ready, and keep my one-year-old daughter amused while fighting traffic for the one hour it takes to drive to the day care. 

I’m a trained expert in many weapons, but the only weapon I yield with any proficiency today is my 7-iron.

But I’m still chasing enlightenment.

Chapter Two

Life can be quite painful; it can be as equally rewarding, too. 

I’m nearing forty and have much to be thankful for in this life: great experiences; a great education; a fantastic wife, my best friend; a wonderful career, two extraordinary children, and not much for which I desire.

When I was younger, I had the energy to be an expert in Special Operations; I had the ambition to be at the top, to be better than the rest.

I’ve few regrets in life and a few things that I still seek.

But my life is still a journey.

Today, I read about a man whose journey is now over, whose life has ended.  I read his eulogy and before its finish, I was in tears.

I think you would be too.

Before his death he had learned that a certain beauty in life was his highest value.  To him, he believed that love happened all the time, and – I presume – that to love love is the most beautiful of things to do, the most beautiful quality to obtain.

And then he learned that he was going to die.

Chapter Three

I can’t imagine what facing a certain, and calculated mortality must feel like; what it must do to a man.  It would break even the hardest among us; it might break me.  Most of us have the luxury of not knowing when our last days are going to be.

He didn’t.

He knew that death was close.

If one were to taste the bitterness of death, I believe that all of those things that once distracted us; that angered us; that burdened and annoyed us would suddenly become excess noise, unimportant, and trivial.

As well, my hunch is that those things that once inspired passion in us; those things that we no longer appreciate each day – the forgotten beauty in a piece of artwork; the magnificence of a setting sun; the smells of freshly fallen leaves; the bond between father and son; the smile from my wife when she plays with her hair; the way that she holds my hand; the way that she loves our daughter; the way that she loves me – suddenly become accentuated, central, and important again.

My mind drifts to those first moments when I met my wife to be.  Her hair was much longer, but her smile is still the same.  I remember the way that she looked at me from across the restaurant, the way that I felt the first time we went out on a date.  I remember that subtle, nearly coquettish, sway in her hips.  I remember how it held my stare, making me want to flirt back.

I remember those long hours in sub-zero, arctic-like weather as we sat in her black Volkswagen with the engine still running and the heater on high not able to say goodnight to one another even though the next day was only hours away.

I remember loving love then.

I remember that it was the only thing I cared about.

Not money.  Not ambition.  Not success.  Not status.

I just loved love.

Chapter Four

It is nearly twelve years later, and our life together is wonderful. 

Friends.  Family.  Success.  Status.

We have it.

So here I sit writing about this man’s life, reading about the things that were most important to him.

He was an accomplished man; he was a man that will be remember beyond generations; a man that accomplished more in his too-short-lived life than entire populations will accomplish in aggregate.

He has won awards.  He has been enriched.

But he still made it home for dinner every night to spend that time with his family.

He made the time to take walks with his wife.

He worried about who his daughters would date.

He worried about what kind of clothes that they wore.

He worried about his son’s graduation.

He was a man who sat with Presidents; a man who required foreign dignitaries to set an appointment; he was a man who could understandably not be interrupted when one of his children or his wife called him at the office.

But he always took their calls.

Chapter Five

I’m a writer, not by profession – not yet anyway.

I write thrillers in the Sterling Novels series, and by most of my reviews I’m a reasonably good one.  The problem, however, with writing is that it takes quite a bit of work to create just one book much less a series and, of course, without pay.  That requires a writer to find an income elsewhere.  Like most of you reading this, I have a career that pays me a salary, a career that has rewarded me well.  As I mentioned a few chapters ago: I get up, I fight traffic, and I work.

The work that I do is rewarding and is certainly fulfilling; it is very possible that I will be with my firm until I retire – in twenty years.

As thankful as I am to be in the position that I’m in, writing is where my heart is.  It is one of my great loves, it is where I find an unspoken beauty; it is where I seek enlightenment.

Earlier this month Mr. Steve Jobs passed away.

I was shocked by how his passing has affected me.  Like most of you, I was physically saddened.  The world lost a true innovator, a lover of many things.  He was passionate about his love for his family more so than that for his career.

But it will be his career how the world remembers him and rightly so: what his career has given to this world cannot be quantified with any number, or conveyed adequately enough.

It is beyond our understanding.  

Schools use his inventions to teach our children.  Doctors use his inventions to heal our sick.  Hollywood uses his inventions to entertain all of us.  The Internet was created on his machine.  His work has touched nearly every facet of our lives as well as having become the standard for others to reach and attempt to pass.

He was unique and apart from most of us, not because of his wealth, his status, or his incredible genius, or the value that he brought to this world in his far too short of a life, but because he could accomplish all of these things and still clearly see that it is to love love that is the greatest thing to obtain.

Mr. Steve Jobs was a renaissance man: a dreamer and a traveler.  When younger, he traversed through India seeking, what I can only imagine was, some form of enlightenment.

His sister reported in her eulogy of him that on his deathbed, he gazed from each of his children to the next, that he locked eyes with his beloved.

His last words were: “Oh wow, oh wow, oh wow.”

And then he spilled his last breath.

I believe in those moments as he balanced on the edge of his last moments, as he etched into his eternal thoughts the face of each of his children, the beauty of his wife, of his loves, that Mr. Steve Jobs did find his Nirvana, that he did taste the sweetness of enlightenment.

If we all could be so lucky…

Epilogue

“Don’t waste your life living someone else’s.”

-Steve Jobs


Posted by: Joseph Nagle, Author of the Sterling Novels
Books 1 & 2:

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Beaten by a One Armed Man

Prologue

I wanted him to die.

It’s a horrible thing to say.  I know.  But it’s true, and I’m not going to lie about it.

I wanted him to die.

Chapter One

I was ten years old and had been staying with my Grandma for the summer, my sister too; she was a bit younger.

Next to our Grandmother, we curled up.  I was on one side, my sister on the other; she stroked our heads.  My sister’s cheeks were washed with streaming tears; I couldn’t force any out.

“Ed was in an accident; his motorcycle crashed.”

He was drunk, I thought.

“They say he’s not going to make it, he is going to die.”

At least he died drunk, my thought continued.  Now, my mom can get a nice boyfriend.

I may have been young, but I wasn’t stupid. 

Far from it. 

I remember all too well the drunken rages; the sharp, ceaseless lashes of the worn leather belt, the one that still had a rodeo buckle on it.  Broken brooms.  Wooden spoons.  Pieces of metal.  Fists coming in flurries.  Boots in the back.  Forced in the basement for weeks.  Made to sit in a corner for thirty days straight.  The singe of a hot cigarette on the skin.  I remember the thrown knife that barely missed and stuck in the wall, reverberating in a mocking fashion, as if laughing at me. 

I remember the strewn bottles of Bacardi, some clear, some brown.  The Jack Daniels.  I remember his favorite mixer: Diet Coke.  (Really, Ed, Diet Coke?)

“Joseph, are you doing okay?” my Grandma asked.

“It hurts,” I lied.  What else was I going to say: Yeah, Grandma, I’m doing fu*king fantastic!  I couldn’t have wished this day to come sooner!  Maybe now I won’t have to worry about spitting up blood, and being used as a d*mn punching bag every other night!  All I want to do is get up and dance with glee; I want to party like its god-d*mn 1999!  (It was 1984; there’s a good chance Prince’s hit song hadn’t come out yet, but you get the point.)

The man that lay dying in a hospital bed abused the youth out of me.  I lived in complete fear; every day. There was always something for him to hate about a ten-year-old:  I was lazy.  I was ugly.  I was a big-mouth.  I was weak.  I was nothing.  And to prove it, that six-foot-two, thick knuckled, blue-collar, always-half-in-the-bag-ready-to-jump-in-another, man, took the pain of his life out on me.  He was quite creative too, I’ll give him that.

Chapter Two

A few days later.

“He’s going to live!” shouted my Grandmother.

Crap!  I thought.

Chapter Three

For the next year we nursed him back to health.  All of us: kids included.  We had to help him with everything.  A hospital bed was moved into the house.  We fed him, even holding his utensils and cleaning the dribble from his lips; his right arm was useless. 

Dead, said the doctor. 

They had to amputate it. 

We put his clothes on him; bathed him, changed his soiled undergarments.  That’s right: the man couldn’t use the bathroom.  Eventually, we taught him how to walk again; to use the toilet, too.

“Joseph, make me a drink!” 

That didn’t take long, I thought.  But make it, I did.  I knew the precise measurements.  Half Bacardi, half Diet Coke.  Four cubes of ice.  “Don’t f*ck it up!” he always shouted.

I was on the floor; Ed was in the chair sleeping – scratch that – passed out.  The drink was emptied.  The glass on its side.

A horrible sound split the air; it wasn’t a cackle, and it wasn’t a shout, it was somewhere in between.

Ed’s eyes shot open, I turned at the least opportune moment.  Inhaling deeply through his nasal passages, a baritone inhale sucked everything that clogged that nose of his; and collected in the back of his throat.  With the force that only a camel can appreciate, that man spat whatever ungodly mess he had gathered and right at me.

His laughter was unending; tears sprang forth from his eyes as he pointed at me with the index finger on the hand attached to the one arm that he still had. 

I got up to clean my face.

Why didn’t he die?

Chapter Four

School was over.  I was in trouble.  I always was.  I walked home slowly.  I always did.  Maybe he’ll be too drunk to notice that I’d come home.

Reaching slowly for the door handle, I let out a slow, uneven breath.  Maybe he wasn’t home. 

Looking over my shoulder, I saw it.  Out in the street, his dirty, green pickup truck was parked just where it had been that morning.

The door handle was barely in my hand when the door flung open.  A single hand grabbed me by the neck.  Spinning in a world of terror, my mind was clear.  I readied for the blows.

And they came: again, and again, and again.

On the floor I was slumped.  I was eleven.

He sized me up as I lay there.  “You aren’t going to school tomorrow!”

The bruises and cuts must have been a bit worse than normal.  Usually I’m told to say I was playing football with some friends if anyone asks.

Chapter Five

I’d been in the basement for about a week.  I couldn’t come out of it.  I had to eat there; I had to sleep there.

An electric cord hung from the ceiling.  I could wrap it around my neck.  I stared at the small, ground-level window.  I could fit through it…if it weren’t for the bars over them that were anchored into the concrete.

I buried my face into the meat of my hands.  I cried.

I hated life.

A knock came to the front door of the home.

Ed answered.

“Sir, I’m Lieutenant so-and-so, this is my partner.”

Muffled words; some louder than others.  Feet scuffled across the floor.  The door to the basement opened.

“Joseph, get up here!”

In the kitchen I sat with two detectives.  They asked questions.  I said nothing.  Ed hovered nearby.

“Would you feel better out in our car?” asked one of the detectives.  I remember her being really pretty.  Her partner, however, was a brute of a man; he seemed quite tense. 

I nodded yes.

They put me in the back seat, where the criminals usually sat.  It was dirty and smelled.  The Plexiglas divider was scratched with the pitiful frustrations of society’s worst.

I was never more comfortable.

I was never happier.

Ed ran outside; he shouted something at me.

The detective jumped out of the car; three arms flew. 

A loud crack; I could hear it through the window.

The detective stood over the one-armed man and willed him to get up.  I could see it.  He wanted Ed to rise so that he could knock him on his can again.

I smiled. 

I couldn’t help it.

Chapter Six

I would like to say the story ended happily here, but it didn’t.  The following years, until my 18^th birthday, I lived in a number of shelters, group homes, and foster homes.  I went to three junior high, and seven high schools; I have no friends that I can name from those years; no family to speak of that I care to keep in my life.  It’s not the life any child should have, but it was my life, and I embraced it.  It was the closest thing to peace I had ever had. 

Later I would learn that Ed tried to rape my sister.

He was drunk of course.  She was fifteen, and he made her drink.  She was passed out.

Now you see why I wanted him to die.

Epilogue

I learned that survival would become my father, and that knowledge would take the place of my mother.

To the young ones that find themselves in a story similar or worse than my own: set the bar high, and when your reach it, set it higher.

You are not alone.

You can make it.

The Sterling Novels: Book 1
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