I’ve got so many writing projects happening simultaneously that sometimes I just get… jammed. When this happens I try to subscribe to Hemingway’s stellar advice on writer’s block: ‘all you have to do is write one true sentence’

Since nothing is truer than your own story, I’ve decided to stitch together mine one writer’s block at a time. I figure now (before I get too old or too proper to tell it as it deserves to be told) is the time to strike:

*warning - this will likely bore you (some things I write just for me) so feel free to bypass if you’re short on time.

I was born in a small town in Texas in 1968. JFK was already dead, Camelot dismantled, and Richard Millhouse Nixon was on the fast track to becoming the 37th president of the United States of America. Millions were protesting the war in Vietnam. Timothy Leary was calling for us all to turn on, tune in and drop out. Draft cards and bras were being burned, and people were demanding that LBJ tell them how many kids he’d killed that day. This was my legacy - my birthright.

Not long after I turned three my father (a violent man with a penchant for drinking & hitting my mother) landed in jail for aggravated assault following a bar fight. His choices were simple, said the judge, enlist in the army or spend the next 4 years behind bars. Dad was a lot of things (none good) but stupid wasn’t one of them. Before leaving court that day he’d signed on the dotted line, and our family soon prepared to relocate to Santa Barbara, California, where my father would complete his basic training.

I’d like to think I remember my time in Santa Barbara but, truth is, I don’t. When I look at snapshots I see a shy little girl, with deep tan lines and pigtails, splashing in a cold blue ocean. I see my father in army green, severe crew-cut, serious and scowling. I see my mother, still beautiful then, smiling and friendly behind the counter of the drug store where she worked part-time. I’m sure to the casual observer we were the perfect snapshot of a young American family - Norman Rockwell couldn’t have painted us better.

It would be decades before I discovered both my parents were arrested for the distribution of pornography (illegal at the time) during our stint in Santa Barbara. I was placed in foster care until they were able to prove, with the help of the U. S. Army, that they were fit parents. I’ve spent an ungodly amount of time through the years imagining how different my life might have been had I remained a ward of the state; but that wasn’t meant to be. A few weeks after my return we boarded the first of three flights - end destination: Heidelberg, Germany.

… more later

On this day..

• You think you know until you find out you don't know what you thought you knew - 2006
• Hello darkness my old friend. - 2006