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Time is a Fickle Little Bitch
Imagine that you were born in 1970. Your grandparents on both sides were business owners. You had big wheel bikes, dirt bikes, and lots of woods to play in. Your father opens a gun shop, at which point he too becomes a business owner.
As the years go by, you're introduced to bands like def leopard, Queen, ac/dc, picked up your first roach, and understanding it was a half smoked marijuana cigarette.
In 1981 you discover porn magazines, learn how to build forts and river rafts, and in 1983 you take your first hunting trip and manage to pull an 8 pointer out of the woods.
In 1990 your High school days are over, and as you look back, you miss nothing of it but a girlfriend you had 2 years prior.
The year 2000 rolls around, and after being denied enrollment in the Army in 1991, your thankful they didn't let you join, knowing how you would have never had the child you are now a father to had they accepted you.
Year 2020, after you lose contact with you parents, one of which you had to bury 5 years prior, and not much left of the life you once knew, you look back with happiness in your heart that your life was so well lived, even through the rough times.
Imagine now that same boy born in the same year to the same family. Everything the same, only this time using a different perspective.
The neighborhood was a rough one in our town. Lots of drugs, lots of fights, and lots of blood spilled, although not typically witnessed by me. The few rememembered involved pool halls, broken pool cues, and at age 10 nearly witnessing the rape of a young girl.
The other fights in our area involved knives and missing fingers, and our home broken into more than a couple times.
I watched the brother of the girl nearly raped get beat down ending up with missing teeth for defending his little sister.
With detectives and survalence present, unkown to some, yet at age 11 I still somehow knew.
My mother was involved in a few car accidents, one of which her car was totaled no more than a few blocks from where we lived, and in another she ended up sinking inside her car in a pool at a motel.
Myself, well I was a troubled child with a troubled childhood, and my attitude no less troubling.
I learned to fight as a young boy, given the nature of our neighborhood, and I learned to like it.
My first halloween there, walking down the street at age 10, my brother and I end up with pillow cases over our head.
I get tied upside down by a tree limb no more than a year after, and left to hang there for a only a few minutes, yet long enough for the rope to dig into my ankles until they bled.
1985 and forward, after moving to another town, Im forced to defend my little cousin against 4 bigger boys. The altercation was small as there ended up not being one, but I remember the fear I had very well.
I didn't tell him about it until I was over 40 years old.
I never graduated from High school, and as a High school dropout twice over (I tried going back) I didn't have much confidence left in me, so I decided to join the military when the first Iraq war started in Kuwait.
I was denied, after which I move to Miami after Hurricane Andrew. It was a rough time and an even rougher area is all I'll say about that.
I moved back to Kentucky, married a woman, had a child, and lost them both in the blink of an eye. Divorced, broken, and lonely I turn to hard drug use, which turns into the very thing that defined the rest of my life.
2016 my mother died, no relations with my father for 10 years, and as if I never existed at all, I end up homeless without any support.
Four years clean and sober at that point, my drug use still defining my character, I fight just to survive. Jailed 18 times, jumped twice, and a fight in jail coupled with a few altercations in various areas in Kentucky, I've grown into a more hardened type man.
So, when I look back at my life I choose to remember the good and pleasant things as I listed them above.
Now imagine that same boy, same life, same story, in yet another perspective.
With the big wheels and dirt bikes as a youth, and with all the forts and rafts made, from the one shown in the newspaper at age seven to the more intricate one formed over a lifetime , he with pen and paper, writes about life, in both prose and rhyme, then on to stories and books.
The development of websites, message boards, and even a couple video sites, then on to developing social networks all of which were created to satisfy both boredom and creativity.
The jobs held throughout his life were but mere stones along the way, supplementing his life monetarily to help himself and his family endure, if not live a better life.
The people he's known, the discussions, and all the great minds who helped educate a High school dropout twice removed are the mentors who helped keep him alive during those years of drug abuse.
The families who raised him responsible for his interest in both law and religion, but he himself responsible for his own life.
Known by many names across the globe differently than he's known at home, and his life now reaching a critical point where a difficult decision must be made.
"To write or not to write, to leave or not leave, to pursue his passion or settle in and relax?"
Two published books, over 10 websites, two social networks, and a global family who knows him by his character and understanding of life being part of his resume.
A son now a man, a family who have lives of their own, and a restlessness unknown by those who know him, calling to him as if its the only thing he hears.
His heart in turmoil, torn between life at home and adventure, he waits patiently for an answer that may never come.
Love comes in many forms, but the greatest love I've ever known is the kind that only wants happiness for those loved.
Known by his reckless drug use at home, the opportunity to succeed far too small to bear.
The sacrifice to be made no less burdensome as this man attempts to determine the course of the rest of his life, and all he keeps thinking about is "wasted time" looking back at the fortress built over a lifetime and the nest he sleeps in at present.
Time is a fickle little bitch and there is no greater love.
© J.P Belt
As the years go by, you're introduced to bands like def leopard, Queen, ac/dc, picked up your first roach, and understanding it was a half smoked marijuana cigarette.
In 1981 you discover porn magazines, learn how to build forts and river rafts, and in 1983 you take your first hunting trip and manage to pull an 8 pointer out of the woods.
In 1990 your High school days are over, and as you look back, you miss nothing of it but a girlfriend you had 2 years prior.
The year 2000 rolls around, and after being denied enrollment in the Army in 1991, your thankful they didn't let you join, knowing how you would have never had the child you are now a father to had they accepted you.
Year 2020, after you lose contact with you parents, one of which you had to bury 5 years prior, and not much left of the life you once knew, you look back with happiness in your heart that your life was so well lived, even through the rough times.
Imagine now that same boy born in the same year to the same family. Everything the same, only this time using a different perspective.
The neighborhood was a rough one in our town. Lots of drugs, lots of fights, and lots of blood spilled, although not typically witnessed by me. The few rememembered involved pool halls, broken pool cues, and at age 10 nearly witnessing the rape of a young girl.
The other fights in our area involved knives and missing fingers, and our home broken into more than a couple times.
I watched the brother of the girl nearly raped get beat down ending up with missing teeth for defending his little sister.
With detectives and survalence present, unkown to some, yet at age 11 I still somehow knew.
My mother was involved in a few car accidents, one of which her car was totaled no more than a few blocks from where we lived, and in another she ended up sinking inside her car in a pool at a motel.
Myself, well I was a troubled child with a troubled childhood, and my attitude no less troubling.
I learned to fight as a young boy, given the nature of our neighborhood, and I learned to like it.
My first halloween there, walking down the street at age 10, my brother and I end up with pillow cases over our head.
I get tied upside down by a tree limb no more than a year after, and left to hang there for a only a few minutes, yet long enough for the rope to dig into my ankles until they bled.
1985 and forward, after moving to another town, Im forced to defend my little cousin against 4 bigger boys. The altercation was small as there ended up not being one, but I remember the fear I had very well.
I didn't tell him about it until I was over 40 years old.
I never graduated from High school, and as a High school dropout twice over (I tried going back) I didn't have much confidence left in me, so I decided to join the military when the first Iraq war started in Kuwait.
I was denied, after which I move to Miami after Hurricane Andrew. It was a rough time and an even rougher area is all I'll say about that.
I moved back to Kentucky, married a woman, had a child, and lost them both in the blink of an eye. Divorced, broken, and lonely I turn to hard drug use, which turns into the very thing that defined the rest of my life.
2016 my mother died, no relations with my father for 10 years, and as if I never existed at all, I end up homeless without any support.
Four years clean and sober at that point, my drug use still defining my character, I fight just to survive. Jailed 18 times, jumped twice, and a fight in jail coupled with a few altercations in various areas in Kentucky, I've grown into a more hardened type man.
So, when I look back at my life I choose to remember the good and pleasant things as I listed them above.
Now imagine that same boy, same life, same story, in yet another perspective.
With the big wheels and dirt bikes as a youth, and with all the forts and rafts made, from the one shown in the newspaper at age seven to the more intricate one formed over a lifetime , he with pen and paper, writes about life, in both prose and rhyme, then on to stories and books.
The development of websites, message boards, and even a couple video sites, then on to developing social networks all of which were created to satisfy both boredom and creativity.
The jobs held throughout his life were but mere stones along the way, supplementing his life monetarily to help himself and his family endure, if not live a better life.
The people he's known, the discussions, and all the great minds who helped educate a High school dropout twice removed are the mentors who helped keep him alive during those years of drug abuse.
The families who raised him responsible for his interest in both law and religion, but he himself responsible for his own life.
Known by many names across the globe differently than he's known at home, and his life now reaching a critical point where a difficult decision must be made.
"To write or not to write, to leave or not leave, to pursue his passion or settle in and relax?"
Two published books, over 10 websites, two social networks, and a global family who knows him by his character and understanding of life being part of his resume.
A son now a man, a family who have lives of their own, and a restlessness unknown by those who know him, calling to him as if its the only thing he hears.
His heart in turmoil, torn between life at home and adventure, he waits patiently for an answer that may never come.
Love comes in many forms, but the greatest love I've ever known is the kind that only wants happiness for those loved.
Known by his reckless drug use at home, the opportunity to succeed far too small to bear.
The sacrifice to be made no less burdensome as this man attempts to determine the course of the rest of his life, and all he keeps thinking about is "wasted time" looking back at the fortress built over a lifetime and the nest he sleeps in at present.
Time is a fickle little bitch and there is no greater love.
© J.P Belt
