An Attempt To Maybe Start To Try To Talk About Goal #1

“I have a residence that I love in New York City.”

So that’s number one on my goal list. (The goals are in no particular order.)

Yesterday I went down the spiritual rabbit hole about consciousness and faith and finance and such. I promised you that today I’d tell you what the hell all that has to do with goal #1 on my list (or any of them for that matter).

I’ve been thinking about spirituality and finance for many years now. I’ve even come to believe that I have garnered some profound understanding about how it all works which seems odd given the current state of my finances. I do believe that Consciousness has everything to do with abundance, with living an abundant life, with seeing ones goals come into manifestation.

Of my list of ten goals that I want to start with— actually, to remind us of what they are, I’ll list them again:

1.I have a residence that I love in NYC.

2.I weight 260 lbs and have 15% body fat.

3.I lift or do CrossFit six days per week.

4.I write for four hours every day.

5.I have written 25 movies, 10 TV shows, 25 plays, 5 novels, 5 non-fiction books, a book of poetry and a short story anthology.

6.I am married to the man of my dreams.

Wait, hold up. I’m revising that one. I’ve said this many times before but Ellis (aka Santino) reminded me of it this week: I am the man of my dreams. My new revised version of number 6 is

6. I am the man of my dreams and I’m married to the right and perfect husband for me.

7.We have three sons.

8.I make $110K or more every month.

9.I live off 10% of my income and direct the rest to do good on the planet.

10.I head a very successful non-profit that helps Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. We teach Pure Peer Support techniques, host weekend retreats, sponsor creativity workshops, and offer paid internships in the entertainment industry to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans helping them to find work that fulfills them and sustains them financially. It has  big, beautiful workspaces and headquarters in New York City and LA.

Numbers 5, 8, 9, and 10 are directly connected to finance. In fact, if I managed to get out of God’s way and let number 8 happen, I actually think the other 9 would fall into place. Perhaps that’s not quite true with number 5 and in fact, if I got out of God’s way and let number 5 come into fruition, I’d probably (and I’m risking sounding arrogant here) have number 8 pretty goddamn easily.

I’ve spent most of this year in Alabama begin of service to my family. I don’t regret that. I doubt I ever will. If I hadn’t left New York and come down to help with Dad, we would not have been able to die in his own home. Mother’s a little confused about that. She says that she would have paid to have round-the-clock help but I know from experience (with Eric) how expensive that can get. Maybe that could have happened but she’d be flat broke. And I could also see what my parent’s idea of what was acceptable with regard to how they were living was, shall we say, slipping. I won’t go into all that. I’m already leaning toward the blue side of things today and I don’t want to go diving to any great depths. Short story, I am happy that I chose to come here this year and help my family. Being able to help my dad, especially given the contentious history of our relationship makes me feel good about the man I am— my dad even told me “you’re a good man” toward the end. I knew that. But to hear him say it was wonderful as well.

The other side of being down here is that it has kept me away from people doing things in the entertainment business. Being in LA or New York, you just “come across” people doing what I do and you end up making connections and becoming involved. The same was true of my time in Salt Lake (as far as being “removed” from the bulk of what’s “going on”) but I had gone there based on a promise from Adam that it would pay off for me in my career too. He broke that promise. He walked away with a smirk and literally, in the end, said, “Yeah, I’m not going to do that.” I honestly, sincerely wish him well. If I thought I was looking at his karma, I’d put a pistol in my mouth. I hope he doesn’t. In fact, I hope he can square his life away and make the amends he needs to make with as little pain to him as possible. Why is that? Because I am in love Adam Nelson and did from the instant I laid eyes on him (probably long before) and I will love him as long as my soul lives. I just live in a different relationship to him now which includes my not having to see him ever again (I hope).

A funny thing happened this week. Adam Jung (my commie anarchist street rebel fucking awesome friend who drives me crazy and whom I love dearly) sent me a postcard from Mexico. His handwriting (and signature especially) look identical to Adam Nelson’s. Before I knew it I had sent Adam Nelson a text saying “please don’t send me any more postcards” and I spent the next few minutes in an anxiety spiral imagining the wonderful time Adam and his husbands (he’s in a polyamorous relationship now) must have had in Mexico. My mom was in the car with me and she could see I was having a majorly hard time dealing with it. The divorce and all the painful chaos that lead up to it would have been enough but the current situation as I try to figure out how to get back on track with the knowledge that…

This was supposed to be the time. This was supposed to be the payoff. This was supposed to be when I got to do what Adam said my efforts would allow me to do. This was to be my seeing my investment pay me back so I could live and follow my dream. This was when I was supposed to be okay because I had given him ten thousand dollars to bail out his rental property that he now shares in ownership (“yours, mine and ours” were his words) with his new husbands [one who is a muscled-up stand-in for Adam’s father and the other, in Adam’s own words, is someone who “I would care if he (meaning the other guy, John) disappeared.”]  and I had encouraged Adam to quit the job he hated and find something he loved and paid to fly us everywhere we flew for eight years (my parents often helped with that one) and bought everything that was to be bought for our household and put him back together over and over when he fell apart during med school and held his had when he sweated it out through things he’d done that stood to end his med school career and held him when his patients died and provided him transportation when he didn’t have it and drove back and forth delivering him to school and the gym and put up with his secret fucking around and drug stealing and stayed after he pushed, choked, and punched me and stayed after he told me what a psycho piece of shit I was (he had a point with the psycho part) and helped him get sober again after each disastrous relapse and washed his clothes and cooked his food and rubbed his feet and catered to his whims and put up with his bad behavior and made him laugh when he was despondent— this was supposed to be my time! This was supposed to be when it all paid off! This was when he said (as part of each pleading apology and begging me not to leave) it would all pay off and I would be okay!

Oh my God I wish I had that eight years back— look at me! I’m sixteen years older!

“Don’t let Adam hurt me anymore?” Abso-fucking-lutely! Sign me the-fuck up! I’m all for it! I’m ready to move on. I’m ready to have what I hoped and dreamed for in its authentic version. And I’m also willing not keep secrets about what it was really like for me. If that’s what you need from me for you to feel like I’m doing this right, you can take your poor excuse for friendship and shove it straight up your ass. I’m through Honey! I’m through being a coconspirator for bad behavior by letting the assholes get away with it. (Actually, that’s not entirely true because I could actually end Adam’s career with just a little bit of effort but I have decided in my infinitely mercy not to do that.)  I wonder how many other men and women are in the Medical First Wives’ and Husbands’ Club. Other sweet, awesome people like myself who suffered through med school only to have the have the MD dance off into financial and professional success while we were left with nothing. I wonder what would happen if we banded together. I wonder what we could pull off. Isn’t there a movie called First Wives Club? Maybe I should watch it. Maybe I could get some ideas.

By “killing off” Adam, you see. I am killing off that part of me that is like him— the part of me that is willing to lie, cheat, and steal to get what I want. I want him dead. And in this case, I am absolutely positively going to get what I want. I’m going to get what Adam promised me and oh so much more and I am going to do it without lying, cheating and stealing. Because the Adam part of me is standing at the gallows, Baby. I’m also going to get what I want without ever having to prostitute myself in any way ever again, to include even letting the nasty old queens grope my ass of say lecherous shit to me. I get to see my goals come to fruition without having to compromise my values and morals one fucking bit. The foundation for my empire will be built on a solid foundation of concrete made from the powdered bones of the Adams of my past and my own blood, sweat and tears. And my brothers and sisters who were similarly abused will always be able to take comfort in the fact that no matter who tells you just to keep your mouth shut and forget the past and think only of the future and let bygones be bygones and give Charlie Fucking Manson the Keys to the Kingdom— fuck them, you’re story turns out happy in the end! You should know that you were not the villain in this story and if the motherfucker who beats you is still lying there asleep beside you, well, there’s a frying pan in the kitchen. You know what to do with it. No. Don’t do that. Because then it’ll just cause you more aggravation for you. Get out and get up. No matter how long it takes. Tell you truth, Honey. Bear your testimony. The days of the disenfranchised being forced back into our closets of secrecy are over.

Smirk at me will you? I’ll wash that fucking smirk off your face with my own blood that you drew. You fucked with the wrong queer Marine.

You see, even if you’re not a place where you can realize that you didn’t/don’t deserve to be abused, this isn’t about us really. We, as victims of abuse have a responsibility to speak up so that it makes a world a safer place— a world where it is less likely that people like Adam get away with what they do. Think of the children in your life. Do you want them to have to endure what you have in the way of abuse? Then create a world where abusers are less likely to perpetuate their evil plans for fear that one day their victims will speak up. Adam banked on my just shutting up and going away. He banked on my low self-esteem insuring that no one ever knowing what he did. But he miscalculated, because even during all those relapses and thefts and cheating and lies, I was still trudging forward as best I could and I was building a resilience that has made me stronger that I ever was. And I will never, ever sit down and shut up again. I will speak up for myself and other victims of this kind of abuse. And if any of you object to my use of the word “victim” and prefer that I replace it will “survivor” or some other term, you can suck my ass, do you hear me? Because we are victims. We are also survivors, of course we are, but we are also victims of crime. Someone who has lived through abuse will hopefully go on to be a survivor but she or he is also a victim of abuse. That is part of our story. You can’t clean that up for your own emotional convenience. Fuck you.

Dear God, for every good thing I have ever prayed for for myself, I pray for for Adam Nelson MD (and all who have sexually, physically, spiritually, or psychologically abused me) May they may have these great blessings a thousandfold. If only one of us can have them, please Dear God, give it to him.

So you want to move back to New York City?

I do.

Have you thought about how that might happen?

Some. But at this point I really don’t have much more than stubborn determination and a faith in a God that I don’t understand.

That’s alright. You really don’t need anything more than that.

Really?

Really. But you are going to have to get more clear about what that looks like. And you’re going to have to let go of this Adam shit.

Look, I told you all—

Hang on, hang on! Look nobody’s trying to shut you up or deprive you of your story or any of that shit. I’m on your side here. What’s all that about anyway?

What’s all what about?

The stuff with Adam and feeling like you’re supposed to—

Oh. Right. Well, I guess it’s just because— well, no one, maybe some people— I mean I have had some people tell me something like “It’s not going to benefit you to destroy Adam” or some shit like that. But I’m not destroying Adam by admitting what he did to me in the blog. Fuck, if anything that might be the only thing that in the end saves his stinking, stupid life because somebody might start to watch his crazy ass a little closer and start knitting a net for when he falls. One thing for sure, I won’t ever try again. I reached out to people who were supposed to love him over and over during our marriage and I always got the same “You’re on your own kid,” every time. That’s his family’s M.O. (I’m not talking about Jen) I mean shit, Adam could’ve snorted Comet at on the Thanksgiving table and I swear to God I think everyone would have just sat around and pretended that it wasn’t happening. That’s one approach.

What the fuck are you talking about?

I don’t know

Right. So let’s get back to creating you a fucking place to live in New York so you can get busy with the rest of your life.

Okay, fine.

First, you have to forgive Adam

What the fuck?! I thought you said we were done talking about all that shit!

Lack of forgiveness stands in the way of our blessings. I don’t know why it works that way but it does. It’s like the pipeline designed to carry what all we do want and need is clogged by hate, resentment, self-pity and lack of forgiveness.

How did “self-pity” slip into that mix?

You’re going to tell me you’re not feeling sorry for yourself at all?

I don’t th— okay, touché, you’re right, carry on.

So you have to move out of resentment and self-pity. Around Adam, around money and Adam, around money without Adam, and all the rest of it. You’ve been gifted with an inventory process yes?

(lowers head) I have.

Why you looking down?

I haven’t really made use of any of that lately?

You’re still gathering with other sober drunks, yeah?

(silence)

Jesus, Jeff!

I know.

Apparently you don’t. How does every disastrous relapse story begin?

With “I stopped going to meetings” or “I cut way back on meetings.”

Exactly. You want some twisted motherfucker writing a blog about how you lied, cheated, stole, beat—

Okay, okay, I get it.

When you gonna fix that?

Hang on.

Where you going?

I’ll be right back.

(several minutes pass)

What the fuck took you so long, where did you go?

I went to find out where and when a—

Well, that shouldn’t haven’t taken that long. What else did you do?

Will you fucking just lay off me buddy! I’m doing my fucking best.

(silence)

I mean I’m doing my best, okay? I’m doing my best. I’m fucking hurting here and I’m doing my best and shit yeah, some little cheap-ass-excuse for pain relief in the midst of all this—

Oh so that’s where you went. I thought you already took care of that earlier.

Fuck you.

Dude, I’m—

Fuck you.

(several minutes pass)

Where did you go that time?

Mom came in with Barbecue and the mail.

Why do you look so stunned?

There was a package from Lynne McNair.

What kind of package?

Pictures.

Pictures of what?

Of us. Of our friends. Chad, Stacey, Smooch, The Fish, Tommy, one or two of my mom. Lynne and me.

Why do you look— why is that—?

I don’t know. I was so young. It was only 1997. I actually thought I’d let my life pass me by. And there were— (laughs) there were these pictures of me on the beach, posing. I think I thought I was— I don’t know, I mean I couldn’t— Mom’s in the living room. She’s lonely. She’ll interject some comment every one in a while— like about the weather just now. She’s lonely. She’s just— lonely. She doesn’t realize when I’m writing it takes me out of what I’m working on. It’s her house. I actually have to hide and close the door to work uninterrupted. It’s just so sad around here. And I feel like if I go back to New York, I’ll be abandoning her.

What about the pictures? What else?

I don’t know. I— this is embarrassing— I looked good. I was a sort of— I thought my body looked bad— I mean on some level I had to think it was okay if I was doing those silly poses with that crown on (laughs) but— I didn’t know I looked as healthy and fit as I did. I really hate that I took— that I internalized all that rejection. I just wish I’d known that’s all. And before you say it, I know what you’re thinking.

I wasn’t thinking anything.

No? I thought you were about to tell me to use that now. To realize that maybe I’m better off, not only physically, but in other ways too. I dunno. Let’s talk about New York. It gives me hope. It helps me not to feel depressed.

See y’all tomorrow.