Tonight I'm posting the follow-up to the blog I posted last night. last night's blog was labeled as the most important blog I've ever posted, but the truth is that tonight I'm posting something even more important to myself and to my readership as a whole.
Tonight I'm going to tell you about a friend of mine. The individual I will be writing about was friends with me for a relatively long period of time. The friend I will be writing about was a devoted, loyal friend who cared a lot about his family and his friends. The friend I will be writing about tonight has everything to do with the blog I posted last night, and he was not left unscarred by the acts of an abusive father.
I knew Tom* from the time that he was one and a half, and I was two and a half. Tom was probably my best friend from the time I was old enough to recognize friends until I graduated from High School.
I am typing about Tom because the second time that I awoke to strobing lights and crying from downstairs, I descended the steps to find Tom, his older sister, his younger brother, and his mom in the living room.
It would be years before I would find out what happened that night. All I knew was that Tom was upset, that his mom was upset, and that his life would never be the same after that night.
Tom's dad came from a well-to-do New England family. They weren't what you'd call rich, but they weren't poor, either. Tom's mom was also from an old New England family, so she had learned from her earliest years that you keep your problems to yourself, and t hat talking about them will only spread the misery. Years later I would figure out that her presence in our living room spelled out a tragedy of epic proportions.
Tom's father moved to another state after that night, and Tom's mother began to support three children with literally no help from that night on. Tom started taking work from the age of eight or ten--well before the age that he could legally work--because he felt responsible to take care of his family as "the man of the house." I didn't know what that was all about. I knew that when I went to stay over at Tom's house, my mother often had me bring food or some money, but I didn't know why. I knew that when Tom and his brother went camping with their father, I wasn't allowed to go, but I didn't know why. I knew that Tom's mother was stressed a lot of the time and that Tom acted like an adult from a very early age, but I didn't know why. I only knew that my friend had a harder life than I did, and that he was still the best friend I had ever had at that point.
Tom's little brother was a discipline problem until he hit his teen years. Tom's older sister was rebellious and unpredictable. She was defensive and suspicious, far beyond what one might expect from the average teenager. Tom was like a little adult, very serious, very responsible, and very concerned about his mom. Years later would find out why. Years later I would discover that he blamed himself for everything that happened on that fateful night, and spent the rest of his childhood trying to make up for it.
Most of you have probably surmised by now that something terrible happened on that second night of sirens and terrified weeping. Most of you have probably even surmised that the night I'm talking about was not the first or the last night of terror and pain that Tom and his family had to suffer through. This was not the last night that my family reached out and opened our home to those in need. This was, however, the first time that the pain hit so very close to me. My best friend, my closest companion from the time that I was able to speak, was irreparably scarred by the events of that night and the events that led up to the destruction of everything he'd come to know as family.
Tom's dad was a very big man. Tom's mother was not. Tom's dad was around 6'4" or 6'5", and somewhere near 300 lbs. He was built like a pro wrestler, and was as gentle and caring as the same. Tom's older sister took after her mother. At something near 5 feet tall, and under 100 lbs, little Casey was a waifish little thing by any measure.
Everything came to ahead on that Sunday night, when the five year old Tom asked his mother why every time she sent to church, Daddy went into Casey's room and Casey would spend the rest of the night crying.
Tom had no idea what was going on, and Tom would blame himself for the rest of his life for what happened that night. He had no idea that his father was brutally raping his sister when his mother was leaving the house. He had no idea about the pain that this poor little girl was enduring on a weekly basis, if not more often. He had no idea that his father would blame that little girl for his own actions. He had no idea that every Christmas and birthday from then on, his father would buy extravagant gifts for the boys while completely ignoring his own daughter.
No, all that Tom knew was that he asked his mother a simple question, and that his mother started crying, and then his father went away and his life was never again the same. Years later his mother would remarry. She would marry a loving and kind man of means who would take the burdensome yoke of provision off of Tom's mother and off of Tom. Tom would go off to college and spiral into a chaotic pit of drug and alcohol abuse. To this day I can't tell you if he ever emerged from that pit.
When I was seventeen and Tom was sixteen, Tom's dad hung himself. Tom's grandfather found his dad hanging after several days of unanswered phone calls. I was still too young to have figured out all that happened, but I knew enough to be glad that Tom's father was out of his life. Tom never knew what happened on that night when he was five. He looked up to his dad and spent as much time as possible with him. I think that's why Tom always viewed women as inferior and as sex objects. Even as a teenage boy, I knew that there was something really, really wrong about the way Tom treated and talked about the opposite sex. He was probably only following the example he'd been shown from his earliest days. I can only pray that this example wasn't followed to the last detail.
I haven't talked to Tom in almost ten years, and just writing about him is almost bringing me to tears.
Tom wasn't the last friend I'd encounter in such harsh circumstances. I was planning to end this series tonight, but I think I'll save the saga of Rico for tomorrow night. Rico was my very good friend during high school, and his story might possibly even surpass Tom's in the realm of pure horror and tragedy.
My point is not to shock you, and I assure you that these stories are 100% true and not embellished in the least.
My point is to ask you to open your eyes. Right now, as you are reading this, most of you know a Tom. If you don't know a Tom then you know a Casey, or Tom's mother, or a Jessica, or someone else in dire need of your love, your protection, and your resources.
Tonight I ask you--I beg of you--to please open your eyes and your hearts. Don't let the Tom's and the Casey's of this world suffer alone. Don't let your hearts be so calloused that you close your eyes and close your ears in the fear that your peaceful and serene life might be disrupted.
I'm not going to share another verse with you tonight. I think that the verse I shared last night is just as relevant to this blog as it was to the last. I only ask that you please do me a favor if you believe that this is important. I don't care about blog views or comments or any of that crap, but if you think that others need to see what is all around us, please do me a favor and direct others here and to the blog that I referenced last night. I don't think that I've ever written about anything so important in my life, and I'd like as many people to see this as possible.
Thank you for your time, and God bless.
~The Yankee
*Names have been changed throughout the blog for the sake of those who wish to remain anonymous.
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