Pothead Poltergeists

All right then, we have a new plan here. It’s pretty simple. Too simple actually, but what else do you say for a time like this. There just isn’t a good way to do it. But I feel good right now considering waking up from the strangest dream of my life just a few days ago, and already life is falling back into what it used to be.

It’s actually pretty amazing what humans can deal with, pick up the pieces and keep going if they really have the courage to.

Anyway, here is the plan:

Billie Joe says, “I lost my wallet on the street. You picked it up and gave it back to me, and then you realize I’m in ‘that band’ and that sort of thing. I take you out to lunch, etc. What do you think?”

“I think that should work. They won’t know any better. There’s nothing to suspect.”

So we went with that story. It all blew family away maybe. I think I might have acted a little too relaxed. You remember what happened when I really first saw Billie. I fell over. But it was the best acting I could do. Same goes for Billie’s part. There’s a reason we don’t do that sort of stuff. I would get into the gritty details and the make up of that whole conversation, but right now, after all this, I don’t think it really matters. There is nothing else you need to know, and nothing I could say that you don’t know already. Because now you know me.

“So now what’s going to happen?”

“Well, for now I’ll go home. I have to.”

“I know, you aught to miss your family. I’ll miss you though. I don’t have anyone who knows me this well.” I stare at my feet as I realize I am going to have to say good bye to my rock god for awhile.

You know what; it’s not that my friends don’t know who I am. They know exactly who I am, at least each one knows their own version of me, but they know. They know because who I am is not the me of the wild fantasies inside my head when I’m day dreaming about blood, sex and booze. Who I am is what I actually say, and what I do. Remember that.

Billie and I will stay in contact. He have. We always have really though – through music. Music saved my life I think. I’m glad I got to give something back to the guys who did that for me.

I have felt so miserable in the past that I have wanted nothing more than the ability to jump out a window and just end it there. I knew so well all the options I could look for; all the people that could give me help.

Some people don’t know there is help out there, but I believe now there are some who did know before they let themselves go. They just didn’t want it. It is so much easier to let it all just go; to just feel nothing and be done with it. It’s understandable, it makes sense, it makes perfect sense, it’s wrong. Doesn’t matter what religion or state you are; there is nothing more wrong.

Music heals. Songs can heal panic attacks and mental breakdowns. Show you that you are not alone. That life has the meaning that you give it, that it was significant to the world if not to the boy in math class with the baseball hat or the girl in history with the perfect nails. Those people didn’t matter to me like I matter to me. I am a person.

I matter merely because I am alive.

That is all it takes to matter to the world. Just to have been alive.

I feel love and that’s okay. I feel hurt and pain and sorrow and anger too though. And that is just as wonderful as the love and the happy moments that pop up every once in awhile. It doesn’t matter if I dress like a punk or a prep or I belong to a nudist colony, I’m still part of it.

If you’re okay now, you will be. Nothing really matters in the long run. I’m going to be okay. One day, very soon really considering, I will die anyway. For real, we all will. And most importantly, I’m not in complete control as I have been told. Life has been pretty good about taking my hand and directing me where to go.

So just listen and stay alive. That is all that anyone in this world can ask.

So sit down, shut up and think about it.

For now, I don’t know what is going to happen with my life, but as I sit there on my own porch step and watching Billie Joe drive slowly away and around the corner; out of sight, I know that we made it this far. I know that.

And very quickly I am falling back into the routine of the life I used to have. That’s what other people see anyway. I have a whole bunch of pictures up in my head now that I know I will never forget, and I’m doing my best not to let them fade. Sometimes not forgetting something is the hardest thing in the world. But you know in the back of your mind that it’s true, and you can always say that you were there.

But don’t worry about a thing. You’ve got the pictures too, remember?

Because you’re me.

THE END