I am so tired with my dad’s constant carping about life and the struggles it is throwing at us. I know we are going through a hard time but my dad just does not seem to understand that he makes it harder for us to think and act through his constant grousing. Times such as these require peace more than anything else. Peace is what can bring in the solutions to the seemingly daunting problems. “Seemingly” because most of them are just the illusions of my dad’s mind. If those problems transpire then we might face some major troubles. But there’s an ‘if’. However, I believe that one must not waste time over things that have either happened in the past or may happen in the future. It is the present that matters most. Because it is in the present that we are alive.

My father refuses to accept that philosophy that whatever we think manifests in our lives. If our thoughts are primarily negative, what happens in our life will also consist of primarily negative events. He thinks these are just words except that he is observing the same manifest over and over because of his negative thinking. My dad is not a villain in my life but he surely is becoming a burden by creating such a massive negative spiral around us. No amount of positive thinking seems to appease him.

The result of his behavior is that both, my brother and I, are moving into a shell. A protective shell that we don’t want to come out of as we don’t want to face his continuous negativity. In fact, we do not feel like talking to him or even being in the same room as him. The problem is becoming colossal as the two of us don’t even feel like working or doing anything constructive and sometimes anything at all when he is around. His negativity begins early morning from the first words he speaks as he gets up and lasts to the last words he speaks before sleeping. As per him, he is unable to sleep at night as he has these thoughts troubling him when he is lying down to sleep as well. Which means he is immersed in the negativity 24x7.

I have shown him videos which show the power of positivity. Have read out and made him read several articles that harp on the power of positivity. Have tried to make him meditate in the morning which he is unable to because his thoughts won’t leave him or he won’t leave them. Nothing positive manifests. And it doesn’t because he won’t let. He believes that money is the solution to all problems we are facing. I believe peace will manifest all solutions if it’s let to. Therein lays our tussle with each other. Everyday.

I'm lost when it comes to abortion; my religious views and my baser human opinion clash. As a Catholic, I would never consider abortion, and I DO believe that everything happens for a reason. Fate is God's development, and it ties into every choice that's ever made. Life challenges us every day, and nature has a way of correcting itself. For instance, if a woman miscarries, that is God's, and nature's, way of saying that she wasn't ready to have that baby. Abortion, to me, is cheating God. I don't believe that this is a woman's rights subject, I believe that it is more about life and death and giving new lives a CHANCE to live.

As a conservationalist, though, I believe that there are already too many human beings for planet Earth to support. Each one of us is destructive and ultimately detrimental to every other earthly organism (that is struggling to survive because of us). We, as human beings, have a misplaced sense of importance that I wish we didn't. I have no idea why we believe that we are so above other living things. It hurts to see other species going extinct because humans are so selfish. I also believe that abortion, on the other hand, is selfish on the woman's part.

In short, I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about abortion. I know that I am only one voice and one opinion, but I know what my decision would be, and I wouldn't have a problem living with the consequences. What I couldn't live with, however, is the guilt that would most certainly consume me had I ever decided differently.

Drop of the gavel, judgement served.

With closed eyes, facts observed.

A coward, he was, by word of mouth.

Never was a timely drouth.

Simple man of simple sin.

Of kind that most let sleep within.

Took his own, the life bestowed.

How this makes a man a coward?

I do not know.

Innuendo, nay much more,

Is all you leave upon my door...

Kisses soft, like valentines,

not on my lips, but in my mind,

Behind the heart a secret rests

Left untold, left unblessed.

Tender touch could never heal

This scarred betrayal that I feel.

Jaded tears rip jaded heart,

Desperate aches in desperate dark...

Devotion close, yet so alone,

Virtue stands, ideals are gone.

In the place where spirits cry,

mine has staggered there to die..

And bowed it's head and slowly wept...

Completely stunned by secret kept.

     Your hands were shaking.  Your voice trembled.  I saw the fear in your face.  I watched from behind, unable to offer aid.  I wanted to reach out.  I wanted to speak up.  I wanted to jump to my feet and pull you out of that room.

     They treated you like a criminal, but I couldn't say a word.  How could I?  Who would trust the word of a child?  I could have cried.  I could have climbed a mountain and screamed to the world that you were innocent.  What would it have done?  These people were determined.  They needed a name to put in the papers.  They needed a body to put behind bars.  I'm sorry, daddy.  I wasn't brave.  You were the unlucky soul, and I was the coward who could not stand against fate.

He was too smart  

to fight their wars,

to put himself in danger for others,

to get himself hurt, 

or to do things that scared him. 

He was too smart to need strength in hard times because he was too smart to allow such times to happen.

He was too smart to be the one to step up because he was smart enough to hide himself from pain. 

He was too smart, he told himself, to have courage,

or spirit,

or daring,

or bravery,

or life. 

Not him. 

He'd be safe.

He was too smart for them.    

If you break through the chains binding you to your past...

Are you brave for walking forward renewed?

Or a coward for leaving everything you were behind?

What does it mean to be an ‘adult’?

To walk past that line of adolescence

And metamorphosize into an insect of this buzzing community

Of course you have to change

Even a little, for better or worse

But is it cowardice to forget the kid that got you there to begin with?

Is it easier to scoff at their mistakes

Their gentle naivete

To put them in a corner with imaginary friends and misconceptions

And swear to never turn around

But does that take strength?

Or are you just playing along to the masquerade?

Is it harder to get people to see the ‘new you’

Or for you to still be stitched to that sobbing welp?

…

So…

If you do break those chains in their entirety…

Did you regret it?

Can't you see that it's okay to be afraid?

Out there, in the real world, we've got everything to fear.

Wherever you are, fear finds you.

Anytime you take a breath, it may be your last.

Rather than dwelling on that, though, it is best to make each breath count.

Don't take even a single moment for granted, but be afraid when you feel that it is necessary.

I am not afraid of being a coward.

Clear away the misconceptions of those who pretend to be fearless.

Everyone is afraid of something, but one is only a coward if he lets that fear stop him from doing what he came to achieve.

Shrinking back

Into the shadows

Safe

Away from danger

But not allowed to live

For how is one able to be happy

When their fear of death

Is greater than the joy of life?

The bakers

The shopkeepers

And me

I'm important but no one knows it

They get on with their lives

Not knowing that without me they wouldn't exist

All of it

Because of me

I'm the lonely gate keeper

Who just sits and observes a lonely world