Letter 13

Today Was A Good Day

By James Scott
(Note by Mom: This was written prior to James' incarceration)

Today was a good day. I no longer have bad days, as the last one ended with a bullet passing through my brain. Now, I experience two types of days; good and great. My definition of a good day is when nothing happens to test me and my sober date doesn’t change. The definition of a great day is when everything in the world rubs me wrong and my sober date doesn’t change. Another way of saying the same is that I have good days and learning days.

Due to my checkered past, I’m not wired right. I don’t care about that, but I do believe I’ve stayed unchanged personally for far too long. It is only by way of prolonged, strenuous effort that I can make any real difference at all.

Here goes…

I am finding myself again, after going through what amounts to be a life spent moving in the wrong direction. To pity me would be insulting, but I get ahead of myself. My “thinker” doesn’t work the way I’d like it to most of the time.

Picking out an individual event in my past is often difficult, always time consuming, and perhaps even painful to know. Suffice it to say, life has had my complete, unflagging attention at times. As distasteful as life is, it is always preferable to the alternative. This may be the theme of my tale of maniacal woe which is flowing onto the paper at this moment.

Keeping it real entails not misinforming people about any part of my experience. I don’t have a flawless resume`, having been able to get a government check all of my “adult” life, and also having been either incarcerated or institutionalized for some of it. I put quotation marks around the word adult because, due to the experiences I’ve been through, I don’t feel I have ever matured at a rate that would be equivalent to my age. I ask myself if I am handicapped. I cannot tell, or sense, that I am handicapped. At least not in the ways that I feel are important. I believe feelings are important. There was a time not long ago when all I felt, thought, and mostly what I said didn’t mean a thing to anyone. This most often led to events that left me unsatisfied.

Born on the day before Halloween, 1965, you would expect me to have at least some tangible accomplishments. Not! The greatest thing I have accomplished, in my own warped estimation, is pure survival. Often, it was survival at an animal level. Many and drastic are the changes I’ve put myself through. Not a day goes by that I don’t have at least one thought in mind about the vast, empty gulf of perception between myself and everyone else. This includes even the family members closest to me. …..I seem to have lost whatever point I was trying to make. Oh well, it was probably fantasy.

Like others who have their varied reasons to create, destroy, or otherwise use their time, I have my reasons as well. The overriding desire to move forward, while being close to the chief reason I am writing this, is in reality only a small factor. The main reason I am writing this is two-fold: First, I am putting pen to paper because if I didn’t do this there would be no change in anything except my sober date. Secondly, I need to write because my aim is to have these words serve as a kind of warning to others. This brings me to what I know to be the most important information I can convey: There is a way out for me and it is to trust in Jesus.

Most of the time, I am rendered senseless by what I see people do. For instance, what pastimes or hobbies others choose during their idle time. I know the danger of holding another to my own standards and therefore I reveal only what I must when I must to get what I want or need. To say this in another way, I only open up when I believe it is necessary. I am still not saying what I mean. I believe the greatest gift I have is an open mind. Conversely, the greatest hazard is a closed mind. Not sure if this covers what I mean either but it is close enough.

As I touched on before, I am a spiritual person. I know it took His direct, personal intervention for me to be here now. This is uncharted territory for me to walk into so blindly, but as I am fond of saying, “if nothing changes, my sober-date will.” I would be inexcusably remiss if I didn’t mention I know God/Jesus is not only a growing part of my life (and the only reason I’m sucking sober breath) but also He is faithful even when I am not. This is what has brought me to this point and is also what I most want to say. I read many books and one particular passage comes strongly to my mind: I asked God for all things, that I might enjoy life…God gave me life, that I might enjoy all things. ‘Nuff said.

Wow! That was…real different. I know I am not qualified to make this sort of pronouncement, but that has never been a deterrent before so why should it now? Sorry if this is a little off beat for you. My head only works with me on an accidental basis. Hopefully, it will keep working for me as there is much more to this picture.

Filling in the gaps is always difficult for me. If I am fortunate enough to be able to recall the past truthfully, I’ve got the task of putting it down in a way that everyone can understand. 

To talk about a different part of who I am, I feel that will power and dedication are not the issues. I was once told that I can walk away from something as easily as anyone else. The issue for me is to know when to walk away. Something like the Law of Diminishing Returns is at work, or so I am told. It occurs to me that most people dig their graves with their tongues. Or, put another way, people don’t engage their brain while operating their mouth. This is a pretty universal shortcoming and I am no exception to the rule.

I grow weary of this…the thrill is gone.