THE BULL IN THE GARDEN - J. MILLER FICTION - PART 2

In Part 1 I was contemplating "Domestic Violence". I provided what to me were a few examples, and introduced a fictional, John Miller story, that may or may not be based on a true story.

There's a lot of domestic style violence or abuse that goes on. It's something generally considered a personalissue. Words, phrases, verbatim directed towards another with the intend to degrade, lower self-esteem, attack character or personal integrity, are all just as painful as a fist in one's face. Some events such as these become public, and result in legal intervention... much goes unnoticed, except by those involved. Case in point, John Miller - The Bull in the Garden".

He comes to me wincing from pain on his left side... feels like broken ribs, but probably just bruised. He's got a cut on his head, bleeding but scabbed over. So I ask him, "John, what happened?"

"It was tax-time"... two days before the federal tax deadline. The Bull had waited until the last minute to do his taxes. He'd been pretty much unemployed that whole previous year, being a carpenter, few people were looking for his skills. He'd had a few jobs, so had to file."

"He decided to do it online. I think the one the IRS provides for free."

"What you need to understand is dial-up internet is what we have, and a server distributes the connection, something called ICS (Internet Connection Sharing). Dial-up is slow enough, but when three computers share the same connection, it's frustrating. What has to happen is the other two computers need to be idle if someone is working on something like taxes."

"Exactly what I was doing in my room - I wasn't using the internet, i was watching a movie on my computer. From Bulls direction I heard cussing and complaints. Eventually I paused the movie and went over to talk to him."

"His response - 'are you *ucking with the internet? I keep getting disconnected, lose stuff'... he was angry, frustrated. I assured him i wasn't on the internet, I was watching a movie, it was the dial-up, not me". He wasn't buying it. I went back to my room to resume watching the movie."

"Didn't last long... Bulls irritation was growing by the minute... I paused the movie and again went out to see if I could help."

"Another thing you would need to know. Bull has a short fuse. He grew up with a father that would slam him against the wall, punch and hit him. Overall bull is a great guy... but he's got this 'dark-side' one has to be wary of. For me, that night, after 4 beers, not wary enough"

"Bull launched himself at me... tackled me, and being almost twice my weight, had me pinned to the floor, his knee across my throat, the other knee over my ribcage. I wedged my right arm under the knee across my throat, as he spewed and threatened, and held his fist in a way to hold back, but consider a punch... his mind was reliving his past... he was his father."

"Long story short, the Farmer's wife pulled him off of me, but then I was so frustrated I grabbed my throat and mimed my being choked, which freaked out the Farmer's wife, and prompted a new scuffle between bull and I. The Farmer's wife called her brother, who said to call 911, which is what she did. In the meantime Bull has dragged me down the stairs trying to toss me out. As I wiry guy no way could he get me out that door - short of injuring me to the point that resistance is futile. I think I kicked him in the groin, which is what he remembers."

The police arrived, I was in my room. I got the knock on the door and had to talk to the police chief. And another officer. Somehow, the call was that I was trying to strangle myself... so I was asked if I am suicidal? I laugh, but quickly explain, No, I was pissed and I pretended to strangle myself out of frustration. It was a mime. The Farmer's wife and the Bull are downstairs. Or Bull is sequestered outside - don't know as I was upstairs. Six cops altogether, 3 cruisers. Bull tells the story I attacked him. I tell how Bull attacked me. The Farmer's wife recalls I tried to strangle myself. The chief ultimately tells me no one's charged with anything, but that it is routine to take someone away from the scene to lock-down for the night in domestic calls such as this... and since I'd had four beers, that would be me... BUT! Under the circumstances, given the story that unfolded"... if you promise to go into your room, shut the door and stay there I make clear to the other two you are not to be bothered the rest of the night."

"Ah... thank-you chief... and off I was to my room. To contemplate".

End of Story

John Miller's story is fiction, of course... as is much in a person's everyday life. By that I mean many of us create our own reality - a fact of life! Some may have a tough time with that truth... and all I can say is, no matter how much we want it otherwise, Reality is Subjective. Given that truth, there are still tremendous influences put on individuals... by parents, laws, rules, etc.

In contemplating the story John was fortunate the chief was considerate. Technically, in a domestic situation, someone is taken away. To those on the outside of the domestic situation, ie, law enforcement, they get the facts from witnesses, evidence. John has a cut on his head, redness to his throat... Bull is happy and shooting the shit with the cops outside, from the way his story goes.

In John's case, rarely does he scuffle with Bull... they argue sometimes, and have stand-offs, the , macho version of "king rooster', but they often work together. Besides, John has his own problems that occupy his time.

The story as it was told to the police highlights how the story can be so different, especially based on the individual backgrounds. Bull with his abusive father and intense military background. The Farmer's wife, as a child watching her father beat up her mother, and shoot not only her pet dog, but the puppies it's given birth to - which was why her father shot the dogs - they couldn't feed their own family of 5.

The point I want to make is how difficult it can be to interpret domestic abuse and violence. How do substances play into the situations. How do past experiences? What lesson is there in interpreting other cases... witness testimony is proven to be unreliable. And John's story describes why that can be. In a situation truly serious, it would have been to John's benefit to go to lock-down. The problem with that if there are charges... which then involves court, so it's no wonder 911 isn't called more often.

John and Bull are like grown-up brothers, as he describes it. As John puts it, "I never had the kind of brother where we had scuffles like that. Aside from the pain, they connected as he feels they were both frustrated to the point the scuffle was a positive event." As long as it's a rare occurrence I tend to agree.

THE BULL IN THE GARDEN - J. MILLER FICTION - PART 1

I had been thinking about violence, domestic violence, and a correlation between it and stressful financial times. But unlike my experiences with those who use cannabis, or the general population and college communities in general, domestic abuse, which sometimes leads to victim death, i can't recall much memorable experience. There's plenty though - it's simply I mentally block such memories if I can.

There was my friend Deb from 15 years ago... got her nose almost torn off when her boyfriend smashed it. She was a co-worker at the time and we became friends. He, her "boyfriend", did disappear after that - locked up for a time and then onto greener pastures , where no doubt he would repeat his aggressive behavior.

Their was Maria, a girl-friend I knew back in the 70's... her mother seemed similar to mine; at around 2AM one morning while in bed with Maria her phone rang... which was in the other room. Maria had to answer it at that hour, could be an emergency... myself in bed, from across the hall I could hear Maria talking to her mother. I could hear her mother's voice as she (correctly) claimed Maria had a man in her bed, but she then screamed at Maria what a whore she was, etc...

There were the HS dances, that despite my geeky nature, I attended occasionally, usually with friends, but sometimes alone... how often they ended in some male or males confronting me, and threatening me. I have looked at a knife more than once. Alcohol was always involved.

There was the night I was at a good college friend's house for a party... the end of my first year at college... my friend and I had spent hours and days and weeks studying over the phone (in the 1970's) for homework and tests in our physics class...  he also was a co-worker at the dept. store I worked at. We had a party at his house one Friday night. All the hot ladies from work were there, and in spite of my fear of dancing... since no woman ever accepted a invitation for a dance at one of those past mentioned dances, I was delighted that at this party, I danced up a storm. Life was good. Until, my friends brother, took a dislike to me, and while we passed in the hallway he suddenly started beating the crap out of me; until others, including my friend pulled him off of me.

Score one for a major turning point in my life... a downturn.

Those are snippets of my past... all leading to a discussion about Domestic Violence", and it's many forms.

I'm not a fighter... though if I had to I am a wiry guy, and I'm sure I could defend myself. The fact is, I don't wish to hurt anyone... I would prefer talk, use patience until things cool. If it came down to imminent death, I wouldn't hesitate to use deadly force in return. The question is, how does one know when that moment is at hand?

Enter John Miller and an experience he'd like to share.

It's a cliff hanger, as the story is pretty involved, intense...

It was the deadline for this past federal taxes... the farmer's wife, divorced, was due home after a week in Florida. John had gotten home from work and the Bull was fretting the farmer's wife's return... his girlfriend, sure, but he depended on her as since the housing bubble burst, he's been out of work. Plenty of work where he lived. But that put him in a girlfriend/laborer role. Meanwhile, John got home and talked to the Bull awhile, trying to lend a ear, and it turned out the Bull HAD NOT filed his tax return yet. And the next day was the deadline. He was bullish, to say the least!!!

The Bull could use a computer, but wasn't comfortable with them. He was a carpenter. So John not only built a computer for him to use, since we can hardly get by without one these days, but he provided whatever help he could for Bull. What he couldn't provide was a broadband connection, and the process of downloading the necessary tax forms from the IRS, via dial-up internet, filling them out, was torture. The internet connection kept freezing... and the cursing began.

Next time... Bull snaps... BobKat gets a inside view of how domestic violence can yield so many different "facts..."

BLOGGER BASH - Are We Authors or Simply, Babbling Typists???

I won't mention the mainstream news channel I found this topic... but it's not one I haven't heard before, which is, that bloggers aren't authors, journalists, or artistic. The article I read today said we're "typists".

TYPISTS???

Whew... yeah, I'm sitting here with nothing better to do than type words in the cloud, and expect that there's any intelligent mind behind them. Call me sensitive, as a matter of fact I am, sensitive. Reminds me that day in my early 20's when I happily announced to my parents, "I'm a writer". Their response? They laughed, my mother cried, and they pointed out - "you're not a writer".

Thanks, for that Reality Check!

A little history on how I got to be the blogger I am today.

Not only did I seriously take up creative writing in the mid 70's, but have always been an avid reader, researcher, and for years was in the thick of the society of my peers. That's called experience. In the early 90's I got into computers, and by the mid-90's put together my own website using HTML, not a web designer program. The site was quite popular. I had it going approx. 3 years when i had to abandon it since I was moving and couldn't take it with me. There are ways, but they eluded me at the time.

For a few years after that I was too busy with other responsibilities to pursue another website, though I wanted to. Instead, I focused more on computers, technology, more reading, and a concentration on the web, brandy new to the human race, and set to change who we are forever.

In late 2004 I got involved in a missing person case, Brianna Maitland from VT. I became close with the family and the case. The family had a forum and I wrote often on the forum. I wrote a "pinned topic" - the family posted, detailing the events prior to and after Brianna's disappearance. This in addition to working closely with family and friends assisting in searches and interviewing friends of Brianna's.

I have assisted in other cases, and if too far away, gotten involved writing for those forums also.

Around 2007, Brianna's case went "cold", and the family took down the forum, as forums are very difficult to maintain. Their's was plagued by hackers, and malicious intrusions, among numerous technical issues.

In 2009, doing a routine Google search about Brianna, wondering if there was anything new, I stumbled upon Slam Dunk's Blog, and his already extensive postings on Brianna's case. His link is available here: http://theslamdunktrove.blogspot.com/

I offered my assistance, described my experience, and found myself writing some 13-14 new posts on her case myself, or in conjunction with Slam Dunks.

Beginning last October, I began my own blog... and though it's sometimes a bit "rough around the edges", I find hope and satisfaction in writing on my blog and pursuing those issues that mean a lot to me. I leave the "missing person's" blogging to Slam Dunk, as he has expertise in that area. I have other interests I like to pursue also... but to suggest I'm simply a TYPIST? What's next... Blogging as a "controlled substance"? State laws banning bloggers? Permits to blog? Psychological evaluations of bloggers? Questions on job applications: "Have you ever been a blogger?"

What's to a blog - just words randomly written to a cloud?

Hardly.

"Dugout Dick", Died recently at age 94, Idaho's last of the River-Canyon Loners

I'm beginning a series on what it's like to be alone, which to some earns you a title as a "loner". As destiny would have it, I went to check my Yahoo personal's account, and found this article. It touched me deeply, as I am both, a loner and a guy that wants friends and lovers. At the moment I am pretty much a loner again. I may die that way, have no idea. Before I tell you more about me, the goal of my blog, after all, let's take a moment and give Dugout Dick a few moments of our time. See, he represents many things to many people... to some he's a non-conformist, and exactly the kind of person a capitalistic society doesn't need. To others he represents what's possible in America... freedom to live one's life as they chose, as long as they don't harm others.

A part of me as I suggested makes me wish I wasn't so entangled in my own web, that I could actually live out my next 30 - 50 years like Dugout Dick. Another part of me wants to build off of what I became in the mid to late 70's, then lost...

There are a lot of dynamics in life, no-matter where one lives. We're not truly "FREE" in America, no, we're not, but, we have options here that many in the world don't have. Education is a key to finding and using those options. But education in and of itself is not the key... one doesn't have to have a college degree to survive, to be happy. Rather, it's the heart and desire to learn, to learn to survive, and to survive in a way that satisfies one's soul that's important. And teaching that, especially in HS where the status quo and state regulations dictate learning, it's pretty difficult to develop one's own life. Was Dugout Dick really a loner? Or did he find true happiness?

Link to picture and story here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/04/23/1164899/death-of-caveman-ends-an-era-in.html