Who Do You Think You Are?

DEAR SEAN:

Shut up. You have no idea what you’re talking about. …Just who the hell do you think you are?

DEAR READER:

Who do I think I am?

My life begins at age 11. That’s when my father took his own life.

He killed himself probably because he was going to prison. The night before Daddy died, he was arrested for attempted murder, assault and battery, and threatening his family with a firearm.

He spent the night in county lockup. And I knew, as an 11-year-old boy, that he was freaking out. One of his worst fears was incarceration.

The last image of my father is imprinted on my brain. I am a little boy. Officers are reading Daddy his Miranda rights. My baby sister is screaming. My mother is battered and bloody. There are deputies in riot gear who entered our house with short-barrel shotguns.

And I’m saying goodbye to my father. Forever.

The next morning, his brother posts his bail. It's crazy expensive. He drops my father off at his house, then goes to work. When my aunt gets home, her car comes charging into the garage, and she hits a body.

There’s a shotgun in the decedent’s hands. The body’s big toe is stuck in the trigger guard. It’s Daddy.

Nobody is ever the same.

Everyone is in shellshock. All the adults are worried about me because I’m not crying. They expect me to be a wreck, but I’m not. I’m just stunned. I can’t cry.

Oddly enough, I am relieved that he is dead. I am actually glad he’s gone. My father was so difficult to live with. He could fly off the handle at any moment. You never knew if you were getting Good Daddy or Abusive Daddy.

So now that he’s gone, I have this strong sense—a STRONG feeling—that my life is just now beginning. And I’m actually a little optimistic.

But over time, I start to fully grieve. By my teenage years, I’ve learned to hate him. Although, I don’t hate him the way you would hate, say, Adolf Hitler. I begin to dislike him the same way you’d dislike a godawful actor such as, for example, Adam Sandler.

I don’t want to THINK about Daddy anymore. The residual brain-gunk he left behind is driving me insane. I wish I could purge him from my memory. But my brain is my constant tormenter.

Doctors tell me I have PTSD because, since age 11, I have night terrors every night. Every single night. Bad dreams. Doctors tell me that staying hydrated will help the dreams go away. But no amount of hydration works. I get so accustomed to the dreams that it becomes more concerning for me NOT to have a night terror.

I drop out of school in seventh grade. Kids treat me like I have plague. Teachers do the same. We are the hillbillies whose flawed patriarch made the front page. I do not return to school. I skip high school.

I play a lot of music during this educationless period of childhood. I have an old piano. Sometimes I play it for eight hours per day. I have my grandfather’s fiddle. A mandolin. I have a guitar my uncle gave me. I have an an accordion which repels the opposite sex.

I also have a bunch of books. I read three or four books a week sometimes. Anything to stave off thoughts of my own crappy life. Anything to forget.

I get married at 20. I get my remedial high-school diploma. I enroll in college.

To earn a living, I’m playing music at a church part time. I am fired because the bulk of my living comes from playing music in local bar bands.

I work construction in the daytime to supplement my income. But I get fired a lot there, too, because there is always someone who will work cheaper than you.

Somehow, I start writing a local newspaper column. It’s mostly humor. To my supreme amazement, locals are actually reading it. I get to write about anything I want.

This is cool.

Then I start writing books. Then, some readers want to hear me speak. So I giving random talks to groups. Nursing homes. Rotary clubs. I am also talking to a lot of schoolkids, telling them they aren’t defined by who they THINK they are. They are defined by who God thinks they are.

I don’t want to be a speaker at first, but I start to love it. Soon, I am making keynote speeches at fancy events for corporations who sell things like air-conditioner filters. My audience appears to like me, and they constantly showing their genuine approval by looking at their watches.

My schtick is comedy. I am referred to as a musical-comedian. I start performing my one-man show in theaters. I get to travel all around the U.S. making people laugh.

And I can’t remember ever being so happy. But not because I’m performing—which I dearly love. But because after the shows, I go into the lobby and give hugs. And the atmosphere is electric for me. There is nothing like a mass hugging.

A lot of people bring their kids to shows, kids who have been through trauma. And sometimes we hug and they cry. And so do I. Because I know how alone they feel. I know how shunned they feel. I know.

And we all just hold each other in the lobby, getting snot all over each other’s shoulders. And it’s the most wonderful feeling on the planet. And I get to tell them that God is real. And the good news is you don’t have to do anything to find God. All you have to do is retell the story of your own life, and you’ll see Him.

And anyway, that’s “who the hell” I think I am.