A Search for a Loving God Part Xll
I have wondered many times in my life, why? There have been times, I wished I had never been, & wished I could just fade away into the ethereal. All I could do in times such as these was to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
The summer of 1970 about two weeks before football spring training I came home from a party and my head begin to pound. When morning came and my mother looked in to check on me, I could not sit up. She had to help me to the bathroom, and hold me up. She rushed me to a clinic that was just down the street. They performed a spinal tap, and discovered I had spinal meningitis. I was admitted to a near by hospital, and mom called her brother to come carry me. Sights, sounds, and scents all made me sick.
I went into a semi coma state and all I remember for about three days was floating around the ceiling. When I did return to a conscious state I was still in pain, but nothing I couldn’t deal with. I would get nausea when I ate so they would give me a shot in the rump to ease my nausea. The shot hurt as bad as what I was dealing with, and I’m not sure if it was the nurse or the shot but it bled till my underwear was soaked on my right cheek. I informed my doctor and he says, you don’t have to take it. Next morning when the nurse came to give me the shot, I said no. She leaves, but the head nurse came in and verbally lambasted me. She said if you don’t take the shot I better see you eat everything on your plate. Breakfast took till lunch to finish, and lunch till dinner, but I finished it. Mainly just so I didn’t have to listen to her again.
I was lucky and released on my seventh day, but the doctor insisted I take it easy. He said I couldn’t play football for at least a year, said it was too risky. I lived for football, and not being able to play was devastating. A large chunk of my world collapsed. I didn’t know then a total collapse awaited me just around the corner.
I know my mother was struggling, and it was all she could do make ends meet. She would call it living pillar to post. My stepfather and her we getting a divorce, and that left just her and me supporting. I heard him hit her one night and I sprinted to her room and flung open the door. He had her cornered, but when she saw me she came out of the corner like Joe Lewis. When it was over she had broke his nose and cracked three ribs. She had him down and was just pounding him, and he looks up at me and asked for help. I said, I didn’t come running to help you. This was a man six foot three inches tall and weighed over two hundred forty pounds. My mother was five foot five inches and may have weighed one hundred and twenty pounds. He limped around a couple of day, and then left and never came back.
A few days before school starts my mother tells me I have to move out. She says she can’t afford me. I found a room at a boarding house, and the little old lady that owned it liked me. She put me in the only room that had its own bathroom. Not being able to play football I could work more hours to afford my little room. The room even had a small black and white TV.
I started my senior of school, and felt out of place not being on the football team. I didn’t have to feel out of place long a special messenger came to my drafting class with news. The vice principle came to my drafting class, leaned down and whispered in my ear “You cannot continue school here if your not living with a legal guardian.” I said, I’m eighteen, and he says it doesn’t matter. I sat looking out the window wondering how he knew, and what was I going to do. I lay my books on the desk, step through the large open window, and walked away.
I didn’t know what to do, or where to turn. I decided to join the service. I went down town to talk to a recruiter, and next thing I know I’m testing and taking a physical. I knew Nam was still raging, but this way I could get an education even if it meant going to Nam. When the day was over I couldn’t believe it, but I was rejected. People are burning draft cards, and running to Canada to escape military service, and the reject me because I’m blind in the right eye.
This one of the times I wished not to be. I felt like the whole world had abandoned me. I don’t know that there is a word that can describe the depth of loneliness I felt. I was angry with God for allowing me to be. I screamed “What is it you want of me?” I felt Family, community, my country, and God had all abandoned me, but I blamed God for allowing it. I yelled, “What kind of God would create something just to torture it.” I was not afraid of the meanest person alive, but I was afraid of the unknown that lay ahead.
I believe this is the place many future criminals arrive. This is where true fortitude is tested, and decisions made here can define who you are. I too started down the wrong road, and the same God I was so angry with stopped me and straightened my path. I have wished at times things could have been different, but I wouldn’t be the me I am today if they were.
The summer of 1970 about two weeks before football spring training I came home from a party and my head begin to pound. When morning came and my mother looked in to check on me, I could not sit up. She had to help me to the bathroom, and hold me up. She rushed me to a clinic that was just down the street. They performed a spinal tap, and discovered I had spinal meningitis. I was admitted to a near by hospital, and mom called her brother to come carry me. Sights, sounds, and scents all made me sick.
I went into a semi coma state and all I remember for about three days was floating around the ceiling. When I did return to a conscious state I was still in pain, but nothing I couldn’t deal with. I would get nausea when I ate so they would give me a shot in the rump to ease my nausea. The shot hurt as bad as what I was dealing with, and I’m not sure if it was the nurse or the shot but it bled till my underwear was soaked on my right cheek. I informed my doctor and he says, you don’t have to take it. Next morning when the nurse came to give me the shot, I said no. She leaves, but the head nurse came in and verbally lambasted me. She said if you don’t take the shot I better see you eat everything on your plate. Breakfast took till lunch to finish, and lunch till dinner, but I finished it. Mainly just so I didn’t have to listen to her again.
I was lucky and released on my seventh day, but the doctor insisted I take it easy. He said I couldn’t play football for at least a year, said it was too risky. I lived for football, and not being able to play was devastating. A large chunk of my world collapsed. I didn’t know then a total collapse awaited me just around the corner.
I know my mother was struggling, and it was all she could do make ends meet. She would call it living pillar to post. My stepfather and her we getting a divorce, and that left just her and me supporting. I heard him hit her one night and I sprinted to her room and flung open the door. He had her cornered, but when she saw me she came out of the corner like Joe Lewis. When it was over she had broke his nose and cracked three ribs. She had him down and was just pounding him, and he looks up at me and asked for help. I said, I didn’t come running to help you. This was a man six foot three inches tall and weighed over two hundred forty pounds. My mother was five foot five inches and may have weighed one hundred and twenty pounds. He limped around a couple of day, and then left and never came back.
A few days before school starts my mother tells me I have to move out. She says she can’t afford me. I found a room at a boarding house, and the little old lady that owned it liked me. She put me in the only room that had its own bathroom. Not being able to play football I could work more hours to afford my little room. The room even had a small black and white TV.
I started my senior of school, and felt out of place not being on the football team. I didn’t have to feel out of place long a special messenger came to my drafting class with news. The vice principle came to my drafting class, leaned down and whispered in my ear “You cannot continue school here if your not living with a legal guardian.” I said, I’m eighteen, and he says it doesn’t matter. I sat looking out the window wondering how he knew, and what was I going to do. I lay my books on the desk, step through the large open window, and walked away.
I didn’t know what to do, or where to turn. I decided to join the service. I went down town to talk to a recruiter, and next thing I know I’m testing and taking a physical. I knew Nam was still raging, but this way I could get an education even if it meant going to Nam. When the day was over I couldn’t believe it, but I was rejected. People are burning draft cards, and running to Canada to escape military service, and the reject me because I’m blind in the right eye.
This one of the times I wished not to be. I felt like the whole world had abandoned me. I don’t know that there is a word that can describe the depth of loneliness I felt. I was angry with God for allowing me to be. I screamed “What is it you want of me?” I felt Family, community, my country, and God had all abandoned me, but I blamed God for allowing it. I yelled, “What kind of God would create something just to torture it.” I was not afraid of the meanest person alive, but I was afraid of the unknown that lay ahead.
I believe this is the place many future criminals arrive. This is where true fortitude is tested, and decisions made here can define who you are. I too started down the wrong road, and the same God I was so angry with stopped me and straightened my path. I have wished at times things could have been different, but I wouldn’t be the me I am today if they were.
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