(The Movie Review is in the last paragraph, for those of you with limited time. I seriously need to learn to edit. In the meantime…)

Demons are funny little creatures. They like to scare you. They get you when you’re weak and vulnerable. Weak, vulnerable people are ridden with holes…battle scars, gaping wide open. This world is war; there are plenty of gaping wounds through which a mischievous little prick of a demon might enter.

Nine or so years ago I was in a vulnerable condition. I had just taken my children and left my ex. I was an open battle wound. A human gateway, through which any demon might easily enter. I didn’t realize it at the time; in fact, I was quite naïve about my own weakness, as well as the imminent forces of evil that presided all around me, invisible, lurking…waiting for the hurt to open just a nitch more…waiting for the walls of my defense system to break down just enough so that it could stealthily enter, and wreak havoc.

An old friend had helped me move. I had not seen this friend in a number of years. He contacted me out of the blue, right in the middle of my hell, for no reason at all. We quickly became attached to each other. He swept in, picked me up, and helped me move away. As we drove, he talked. During the seven hour drive, he began saying some unusual things. One of the things he said, which managed to lodge itself firmly in my head was, “Everywhere I go, children die…” He seemed to be genuinely confused by this. I was taken aback, but assumed it had to do with the fact that he had gone into the military. Children die in wars, unfortunately. I shrugged it off and kept driving.

We arrived at my destination and he continued on his way. He and I were close. We had dated many years before and were entertaining the idea of getting back together. But before that happened, we both had a number of affairs to settle. He seemed to be an angel, rescuing me from a bad situation…who knows if he was angel or demon. I still wonder.

My children and I settled temporarily in my parents home, so that I could get my feet back on the ground. My friend and I got together often, and began seriously planning our future together. Both of us had children and they all seemed to be perfectly content with the idea of becoming one big happy family. It was a dream come true. Finally, a responsible, good, “normal” man. Things were bright and sunny.

Enter the Demon.

I was lying in bed one night, just falling into that thresh-hold of sleep where you’re floating halfway between this world and the other…and I heard a distinct, clear voice say, “You’re going to die.”

It was loud enough to wake me up fully, instantly.

Now, I talk to myself all the time in my head. I’m one of those people who could be perfectly happy as the last living human on earth. I walk along, intensely engaged in the most specific, detailed and thoroughly absorbing conversations in my mind…with myself, and any number of people who I may or may not have met in my lifetime. There are two common threads that run through all of these conversations:

1. they occur silently, in my head, as thought, and

2. I am the one doing all the speaking, if there is more than one person talking. I am fully aware that it is me talking to me.

But this voice…this “you’re going to die” voice was different. It was actually audible. The room was empty except for myself and my sleeping children. I listened…waiting for more. Silence. I wondered…had I imagined it? Was it a dream? I lay there in bed, wondering if I was going insane. Finally, I began dropping off to sleep once again.

“You’re going to die!” I heard the voice a second time. Loud and very real.

It was harsh and determined. Really audible. Nothing nice about it at all. I was instantly shaking with fear, to say the least. Had I really heard the voice? Yes; I had heard it. It had a distinct vibration that was still resonating in my ears. I pulled the covers up, my arms and legs feeling like lead – an icky horror-feeling in my stomach, my heart pounding loud and barrel-deep in my chest.

I felt a presence. I suddenly remembered what my friend had said in the car, about children dying. Was it him, paying me some weird ghostly visit? Or was it a demon that was in him taking a little time off from him to f**k with me?

I’d never met a demon before but you don’t need to know evil, to recognize it when you see or hear it for the first time. I knew that whatever it was, wanted to get me – maybe my kids. I didn’t know why I knew, I just did. I knew that whatever it was, it was bad. And I was terrified beyond anything I’ve ever known before. I laid there, shaking violently for some time, waiting to see if the voice would speak up again. I began to think how unhappy my kids would be if they were raised by their dad. They needed me.

And then I got mad. Suddenly my senses came to me in a rush. All I could think was, “F**Kyou, you son-of-a-bitch. Who or what ever you are, you can get the f**kout of this room, my head, or wherever you are. There’s no way in hell I’m going to die. If you even think I’m going to let my daughters get raised by their dad well…you are going the f**kdown!”

I bitched that f**ker demon out. I felt crazy doing it, but if this is what my life had come down to, I was going to play, and play hard. Finally, I was too tired to care about the demon any more, and fell asleep.

I woke up in the morning early, feeling amazingly refreshed. I got in my parents car (didn’t have my own) and drove to work. It was rainy. The tires were bald. Hitting that last corner …well, maybe I was going a little too fast. I skidded. Woa.

I put my foot on the brakes. Fish-tailed. Double woa.

I floored the brakes. Everything from that point on went in slow motion. It was amazing. I was sitting in the drivers seat watching the slow-motion world all around me get demolished by my parents car. I felt the thump of the curb as my car roared up onto the sidewalk. I felt sorry for the newly planted baby trees that were torn right out of their home in the ground and went flying away from me, looking like dandelions being tossed on a compost heap.

When all was said and done, I had hit a concrete lamp post sideways, at over 60 mph, busting the light post and turning my parents Volvo into a mess of jutting angles. It was totaled. If anyone had been in the passenger seat, they’d have been pudding. But the damn car kept running. It refused to stop. It growled and jerked back onto the road. It had a mind of its own. The goddamn thing wouldn’t die. It was possessed. The slow motion was over. I was back in real time. In shock I said to the car, “you’re possessed,” and suddenly, out of the blue, it occurred to me that I should turn off the ignition.

I did so, and instinctively hit the clutch and brake at the same time. And that’s when I realized that I had hit the gas instead of the brake when I started skidding. Damn. That’s f**ked up. Especially since that damn Volvo had 350,000 miles on it and was still running good. F*8ked demon. You bitch! You f**king Volvo-killing f**ker !

Can you believe, it was Friday the 13^th? I found that out as I was signing papers in the ambulance. No joke. A short while later they were stitching me up in the emergency room. After all that, all I needed was one stitch in the back of my right hand. One itty bitty little stitch. If I look closely, I can still see the ½ inch slit, two-pin-prick scar. It looks exactly like a mathematical division symbol. The division between good and evil.

“You should have died.”

“Huh?” I’m noticing that I don’t feel anything as they are sewing up my hand. Weird… The sensation of not feeling the needle is so weird that it’s almost profound. Almost as fascinating as the slow motion helter skelter ride into the lamp post.

“You should have died on impact.”

I learned right then and there that I should have died that morning. Something about the way I hit the pole and the velocity or centrifugal force or something scientific like that, and the way my neck should have instantly snapped. So that fdemon was trying to get me. The little bastard.

Strangely, I never saw my friend again – the one who’d helped me move. We were planning to become a family and he had suddenly disappeared back into the blue from which he’d come. Not a sound from him. Nothing. “Everywhere I go, children die…” Had he failed to kill me or my children and left in frustration, to find some other poor, weak soul to mess with? I still wonder if he was an angel, rescuing me from hell, or a demon, trying to take me there with him. I’ll never know. Of course, that whole demon episode could have had nothing whatsoever to do with him, but it’s much more entertaining to look at it from that angle.

I’ll bet you’re wondering how this is a movie review. Well, here’s the review: Demons are real. Watch the documentary, Dear Zachary, and you’ll see another example of how a demon worms its way in and f**kin people up. It is the true story of a demon who kills a really good man, and then has his child. The movie proceeds to show what happens when the grandparents of that child try to save their grandson from the demon. It is some f**ked up tragic shit, it is a true life horror story, and it’s told with gut-wrenching beauty. By the end of it, you will believe in demons. I know I do.

I am so f**king  tired. You – you know exactly who you are – betrayed me. You betrayed my trust. What is wrong with you? Do you have some mechanism built into your genetic code that compels you to destroy anyone who tries to be nice or good to you? To be your friend? You must hate yourself so deeply that you can’t help it. I can’t think of any other thing that would explain it.

Do you think about anyone other than yourself? What were you thinking when you sent that letter? You know it had no business being sent. But you took it and sent it. It’s my fault for writing it. I should have never written it. People shouldn’t have such vile anger in them, but I do, and I put it away, safe in a letter, and I buried it where I thought it would be left alone to dissipate in it’s own good time. But you sniffed it out, and you dug it up and you sent it. You wanted to hurt someone and you used my words to do it, because you have no self-esteem.

You have no “center” to write an evil f**ked up letter like that from. So you take other peoples’ evil f**ked up shit, and you orchestrate it into your own little symphony of hell and you throw it at people. You aim to kill. You’ve betrayed everyone who has ever tried to help you. Your relentless need for bigger and worse and more grandiose trauma, and the hell you’ve created with that need, has destroyed any feelings of kindness or compassion anyone might have for you, any desire someone might have to be in your presence, so you try to “trick” kindness or attention out of them, by f**king with them.

Years and years of this game has destroyed your credibility. You know that, don’t you? You might not admit it, but you know it. You’ve lost your credibility, so you used mine, and my stupid, personal, private letter - my little rage-filled rant - to make one more big f**kng mess that you can star in. Congratulations. You’re back where you belong: Center Stage. You’ve out-done yourself once again.

You are so addicted to trauma and hell, you make a mockery of the words “trauma queen”. You just ended any compassion or desire for compassion I have left. I’m sorry. You f**king don’t know when to stop, do you? You see life and you take your little knife and rip a big f**king hole in it, so that all your hell can pour through it into other peoples’ lives. And when you’re done, after having learned nothing, gained nothing, changed nothing, you just go find another life to rip a hole in. The irony here is that I wrote that letter on your behalf, because I felt that you were being mistreated, but I was wrong. You asked for what you got. I just failed to see the truth. I let my sentiment and compassion blind me to the reality of the whole f**ked up mess. And now I feel nothing. Disgust maybe. Betrayal. O.k. so I feel something. Big f**king wow.

What pleasure can you possibly get from that? Did you think about the consequences of sending that letter? At all? Did it occur to you that there would be repercussions? For a lot of people? I genuinely want to know. Well, I guess I would if I wasn’t too tired of your hellshit and my anger to care anymore. God, I’m a fool. A f**king blind fool. I don’t know. Maybe I’m arrogant for thinking that caring or giving a shit, or anything I thought or felt or hoped for in this whole pile of shit, mattered.

I just walked out of a lot of doors. I don’t know what else to do. I closed them and locked them and I’m not going back into them – the ones that haven’t already been locked on me. I could go knock on doors and beg forgiveness or mercy and try to make things right but I don’t want to work this shit out anymore. I’m tired. It never ends. It’s pointless. Maybe some things you just have to walk away from.

I’m not sending this letter to you. I’m done with you. You can sniff this letter out, if you give enough of a f**k, but I know you don’t. I suspect that the only way this letter might mean something to you, is if you see an opportunity to use it to manipulate or f**kwith someone. As far as that other letter goes: you can take it, and you can frame it, and put it on your wall; it’s your little victory, isn’t it? Bravo for you.

Why am I putting this letter here? Maybe because I want to be center stage. I don’t know. I think the reason why though, is that I have a feeling that I’m not the only person in the world to feel betrayed. Maybe out there, there’s a soul who’ll read this, and it’s just what they need, to walk away from a bad situation. Maybe. Maybe somewhere, a million miles away, a speck of good can come out of my hell – and yours.

Maybe I just don’t have anywhere else to put it. F**king pathetic.

It always gets down to taking responsibility for your actions. As far as my own personal responsibility goes: maybe I shouldn’t have ever written that letter. Anger can be so destructive. So I f**ked up letting it out. Maybe instead, I should have written a nice little polite, politically correct “heads up” letter to all the people I mentioned in that letter, expressing some general feelings that have been “bugging” me - some ongoing “issues”, and asked if they’d be willing to talk about the whole situation. That would have been the mature thing to do. But that’s all we ever do. Talk talk talk talk talk. f**king empty shallow meaningless futile words accentuated with all the right facial expressions, all the right hand gestures. And when all is said and done, it all goes right back to what it was.

I get so tired of the “nice” face that people put on. The f**king Facebook face. The face that posts links to books about forgiveness and then blocks the person with whom forgiveness needs to happen. What the f**k is that? I’m just taking a wack at it but if I had to put a name on that, I’d call it hypocrisy. If you do talk, you talk about stuff all polite and proper and politically correct and it ends up amounting to nothing more than another ass kissing session. You agree to the unanimous conclusion that the shit has been aired, talked about and mutually resolved; you say your pleasant goodbyes, and walk away from the problem only to find that the pile of shit is there, still there. Nothing has changed, nothing has been resolved, it’s all right there exactly as it was. Life goes on, the bomb goes off again and all f**king hellfire breaks loose. Again. And everyone is just so astounded at how shocking and horrible and nuts it all is. How could it happen again?

I don’t know. Maybe I’m just stupid. Maybe I think about stuff too much. Maybe I should just let it go and get on with my life, avoiding anyone or anything that might bring me nearer to that pile of shit. That’s what everyone else seems to be doing. Maybe I should just take my cue from them and go on my merry little way with a big smile plastered on my face.

F**k me. I’m just crying because I thought I could be a superhero for a moment. I thought I could do good and have it make a difference. I’m just another arrogant, self-righteous prick. I just wanted to be special.

It must be about something else. Maybe I’ll look at things in a different way and see if I can find the clue that I’m missing. The tiny piece of the puzzle that makes shit “make sense”.

“Soft skin, red lips, so kissable - Hard to resist, so touchable,” sings Katy Perry about a girl who dares to plant a kiss on a hot chick (in the song - I KISSED A GIRL). The song has a catchy tune and a rebellious theme. A good rock song usually has a rebellious element in play. The song was widely rated as the number one song of 2008, but it barely made my top 100 greatest rock songs list. In fact, I rated it number 100 (in last place).

I own a small ipod which holds 100 songs. After 100 songs play, my play list starts over again so after I hear Katy Perry sing lyrics like “I kissed a girl and I liked it, the taste of her cherry chapstick,” I soon listen to - LIVIN’ ON A PRAYER by Bon Jovi, which I think is the greatest rock anthem of the 1980s. The song is about a struggling young couple (Tommy & Gina) trying to keep their love alive against the tough odds of a rough economy. Tommy isn’t making any money (”He’s down on his luck…it’s tough, so tough”) and Gina has to support both of them with her crummy, low paying waitress job (”Gina works the diner all day - Working for her man, she brings home her pay for love.”)  I like the song’s gritty optimism and never give up attitude. Even though Tommy and Gina have nothing but their love and a prayer, they have faith that they will make it somehow (”We’re halfway there, livin’ on a prayer. Take my hand and we’ll make it I swear.”)

Of course it’s a lot easier for couples to work out their problems in a fictional song or a fantasy movie than in real life. We know economic problems is the number one cause of all divorces. I guess the super rich conservatives hogging most of America’s money don’t really care that much about family values after all. I can’t resist pointing out Ronald Reagan lowered the income tax rate of the richest people in the United States to 28 percent during the 1980s (when Livin’ On a Prayer first topped the charts) and the quality of life for the middle class continued to be lowered as well. During the 1950s, when the quality of life for the middle class was very high, the federal income tax rate for people earning over $400,00.00 per year was 91 percent.

LIVIN’ ON A PRAYER has a great ending - “We’ve got to hold on ready or not - You live for the fight when it’s all that you’ve got.”

What are your favorite songs?

You can’t fit more than one of their dead bodies in the trunk of the car without using a chainsaw!

 

Why is it that you women are so complex? I mean if you ask a man what is wrong, you better have time to hear exactly what IS wrong. Men don’t beat around the bush. They say what they mean.

 

The statement, “Oh, we’re having chicken for dinner!?” does NOT mean that I hate chicken, rice, carrots or your mother who gave you the recipe.

IT MEANS THAT WE ARE HAVING FUCKING CHICKEN FOR DINNER!!

 

Girlie, don’t come to the Rude Dude in the morning and say that the television kept you awake last night while I was watching the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and expect me to drop to my knees and beg for your forgiveness. I’m going to ask WHY you didn’t tell me that last night, while it was so loud that you thought Leatherface was in the living room with me and secretly you fantasized about him chopping me to bits and devouring my coccyx so that you would have had a shot at getting some shut eye then. Now you want to make a big deal about it after it’s too late for me to turn it down. I would have turned it down TWELVE HOURS AGO if Doc Brown could throw my ass in his time hopping DeLorean, but he can’t and I can’t do a motherfucking thing about last Saturday night today either, can I.

 

Hell, I don’t remember what time I got up on any given day last week, so don’t expect me to take responsibility for anything I said or did then or before then either. Don’t go bringing up shit from a month ago to pin on me because I couldn’t swear on a stack of Bibles to tell the truth about something that I quite frankly couldn’t remember if you threatened my life about it.

 

Screw that shit about you want me to sympathize with the pain of listening to a movie so loud it could stop a charging Rhino at twenty paces. You didn’t say something so I thought I could get away with it. I saw White Men Can’t Jump and when Rosie Perez gave Woody the scolding about “Having Dry Mouthed ness” I would have emptied a fire hydrant down her throat. You don’t have cottonmouth now, do you?

 

Don’t think for a nanosecond that I’m going to even act like those subtle hints you’re throwing about new curtains or knick knacks are about to send my ass packing off to the Linens and Shit Superstore to hammer the credit card into a new dimension. Come right out and ask it!

 

“Honey, can we go get some stuff at that place you hate more than having bamboo shoots thrust under your nails?” will go a lot further than, “Boy Oh Boy, We need to spruce this house up a bit. What do you think?” If I took the time to think about it AND decided that it needed fixing, I’d have already been working on it with a sledgehammer and freaking hand axe to give it that manly, pounded the living piss out of it, rustic look that is so popular in the Wild West.

 

Oh yeah, we get into a pile of shit for weeks every time we do something wrong. I am in the Dog house for a month and a half about wiping my dick off on your pillow case because you either can’t or won’t let the MEMORY of the spoogie stains fade away long after the Clorox Industrial Strength Stain remover has taken it and the print right off the fabric.

 

When the shoe is on the other foot it becomes a different story. I come home to you hanging pictures on the wall by bashing sixteen penny nails into a plaster wall that was built in the fifties with my three hundred dollar torque wrench and I’m supposed to shrug it off because it’s only a wrench anyway. I suggest, merely in passing, that the next time you want to pound nails into the plaster and make the ceiling collapse under the weight of those “cute” hanging trees you put up, you use my loaded handgun for a hammer instead of a wrench and suddenly I’M the bad guy.

 

You know, sometimes I sleep on the couch just because I want to feel like I made the decision myself instead of having my pillow thrown at me like a sidewinder missile and my nuts slammed in the bedroom door.

 

Hell, with the tarp from the carport to cuddle up with, this is almost like being in the wilderness since the thermostat is now set on stun and I don’t dare stick an appendage in the room to touch it for fear of having to get it stitched back on.

 

I have done very little study but it seems to me that Marriage is the NUMBER ONE cause of Divorce in the world.

 

 

 

Older Men - Pros

 

If the older man had lead a life that has gained him experience and wisdom, he can relax and still keep the fires burning.

 

He knows what sexy is even when it’s not within the commercial guidelines.

 

If He is wise enough, he knows what battles to pick, and how to do things for a woman that will make her appreciate him, even if it is a small gesture. He does this not just because of her needs, but because of his needs. He knows if he messes up, his previous good nature may save him from full onslaught of his misdoings.

 

He is intelligent enough to know that what he has isn’t as important in materials, as in his relationship. He enjoys pleasuring his woman. He knows how to keep his woman interested not only in him, but in their relationship.

 

He may be more established, and be able to allow his woman things that is needed and sometimes remembers things she wants, because he understands that is needed too.

 

An older man most likely will not need to have continuous noise or talking and understands that being together means just being in the same room to be close.

 

Older Men - Cons

 

Some older men do not gain enough experience or wisdom to understand how to keep a woman - younger or older.

 

He may want to rain his kingdom, but loose the rains through direct orders, or petty guidelines that only provokes a fight, or a power struggle.

 

Not changing or understanding the change that is necessary means that he may be too settled in, and won’t want to do what he could to help keep the relationship

 

He may not understand the underlying importance of helping his mate feel important to him as a woman, and again fail his part in the relationship.

 

He may not understand the importance of giving to a woman sexually, and at times over do or misunderstand because he has not taking the time to find out how to.

 

Younger Men – Pros

 

If the younger man enjoys women, he will be well liked and often have the most success.

Not just sexually, but in friendship.

 

Although younger men may or may not be less wrinkled, or they may have more muscles, their energy to life is refreshing. Even if a woman is much older, she can enjoy and allow the fever for life and relish it. Especially after being with a man who does not relish much.

 

Creation of a relationship with a woman will be important to him. It is not always sexual, but his energy to sustain that will be plenty.

 

A younger man will often want to please a woman and find it erotic for himself to do so for a woman. Women like this, and it does not have to be a lot of drama to accomplish this. Woman also like cunninlingus, some older men do not do this.

 

Younger men like to explore, while older men may have a tendency to follow “old directions” even if the highway has changed some.

 

Younger Men – Cons

 

Younger men seemed to have less patience in things, and may not understand how to retain his emotions, or how to express them properly when something devastating happens.

 

Younger men may not want to stay in and just enjoy the evening as it is, but rather feel the need to always moving or doing and not understand the quiet closeness.

 

It may be harder for the younger man to feel comfortable with your older friends, however; for some they may feel more comfortable.

 

Younger men tend to be in need for the next adventure, while some may not be adventuring enough and feel lost.

 

Men: In conclusion, all men are stubborn and will not stop and ask for directions.

 

I want to see YOUR input on Cons and Pros of Younger and Older Men

The spirit of the snake oil salesman from yesteryear’s wagon trains is ghosting around wreaking havoc is cities, in suburbs, in the country, and very possibly in your home.  The ghoul is convincing seemingly reasonable people that the big “D” is gosh-darn sure to be the answer to all their problems. 

Can’t sleep?  Must be the spouse’s fault.  Can’t perform?  Must be the spouse’s fault.  Job sucks?  Must be the spouse’s fault.  Had an unplanned baby?  Must be the spouse’s fault.  The fastest cure this side of the Mason Dixon?  D-i-v-o-r-c-e right here in River City ladies and gents! 

They say a sucker is born every minute.  If the sneaky snake oil salesman ghost is knocking at your door promising a quick fix to your problems by dumping your spouse, consider yourself warned by me: divorce is emotionally, financially, and spiritually devastating.  Commit yourself to couples counseling first, because divorce (even an amicable one) will forever change you and leaves scars on everyone in the family: both spouses, children, parents, grandparents, siblings, and on and on.

Older men want to be with younger women for three key reasons:

 

1) Physical Attraction

2) Ego

3) Baggage

 

First off, “Physical Attraction”….this is a given. Younger women are more attractive, physically fit, all in all just plain hot. Think of it this way, if you could afford a Mercedes, why buy a model that is five years old and not the new model?

 

Secondly, it’s no surprise to anyone that men carry the trait of “EGO”. The mid-life man may feel insecure, they need to know they still have that vitality, that swagger and nailing a 22 year-old girlfriend is like having the nicer car, the tricked out soundsystem, the LCD flat screen, and yes, the biggest dick. An arms race is what it is. Men have spent their twenties and thirties constantly upgrading their “toys”, getting that promotion, finding a bigger pad each time you move, and  buying the latest gadgets. Having a younger girlfriend is the queen in the chessboard of toys.

 

Lastly, the word all men hate, “BAGGAGE”. Yes, we all have it but we hate it as well. Older women come with baggage. They come with a complicated history, and that my friend is a book most men don’t want to read.

 

To sum it all up, if I was to choose the main the reason; it would be the ego factor. When it’s all said and done the young girlfriend is the mans trophy; it’s the royal flush, the MVP, the jackpot. It’s like what I said before, it’s an arms race out there for us men and we just want to be the first one to make it to the finish line.