The Players

Jeremy: I met Jeremy at Wilson Park in Florence after my return to Muscle Shoals from Birmingham (the first time I lived here back in the 80′s.). Jeremy is perhaps the single most important guy in my life. I have spoke about him often in my podcasts. He is the source of much worry. More like the little brother I never had. Someone I wanted to see succeed where I had failed. But like an evil trick of life, I’d have to watch helplessly as his life would spiral out of control. Like my brother, a victim of the drug culture that would envelope so many young men and women in our time. The parallels to my brother are striking and yet different.

Steve M: (former Best Friend) Steve and I would meet one another after I moved back from Birmingham in the 1980′s. I met Steve at Wilson Park in Florence and we had sex. Steve was a good guy and over time we would become friends. The sex would end. Somehow it didn’t seem awkward that we’d begun our friendship with sex. Somehow we managed to achieve a good friendship. We’d later acknowledge ourselves as Best friends. Steve would be a person I could turn to. Steve was there to help me make it through the death of my mom and of my dad. I was certain that Steve would be there till the end. While our friendship was that of best friend’s it sort of felt like a marriage. And while there were no vows exchanged I’d felt I could depend on Steve for anything. Sometime after moving to Birmingham Steve would disappear from my life. At a time when I needed him most dealing with Jeremy’s descent, he was not there. Perhaps I’d over burdened him. Till this day I really do not understand what happened. Steve and I are featured together in two podcasts recorded after I moved into the town house. Those podcasts can be found in the archive.

Betty and Harold: My Mom and Dad (Now deceased) The best parents a man could ever have. I wouldn’t trade them or my life experiences with my parents with anyone. I wish I could go back. I wish I’d told my Mom and Dad (more often) how much I loved them. My mother wanted to live. She held on a long time before her body would betray her; ravaged by cancer. Life isn’t fair. It cheats us of time. Never realizing until it is to late; never being able to do anything about it. I know she worried about me. This I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life. I wish I could have been the perfect son. If anyone deserves an afterlife it is my mother. I suspect she’d just like to be reunited with her family again someday. She lived for her family. She was a good mother. My mom and dad didn’t have a perfect marriage. But they grew closer in their later years; like a rediscovery of their early life together. The first time they held each others hands. A love rekindled. My dad most certainly tried my mother’s patience in the days of my youth. Me, my brother and my two sisters didn’t make it any easier for them. I cannot imagine raising four kids. But somehow they did it. I can’t hold them to blame for our imperfections. And if they did hold some measure of blame for the way I turned out? It would be better than being indifferent to the suffering of a man’s heart. I would be called, tenderhearted. My mom would say that I wore my feelings on my shoulders. To face the truth of the inevitability of death is difficult. But it was made real by my parents deaths. I hope at the moment of my own death that somehow I be reunited with my family. That somehow I would be transported back to those happy and sad times of the early years of life. Maybe this time I could make it right. You can find pictures of my mom and dad in my page entitled, Childhood’s End.

You can experience a fraction of my early home life through the magic of home movies in my Photo and Video page.

Ronny: (My older brother by three years) My brother hardly worked a day in his life. He was a popular guy in High school and an athlete. He played little league baseball in his early school years and was a member of the Muscle Shoals High School football team up until he quit school. My brother got involved with a group of guys who turned him onto drugs. At 18 he would leave home and move with his so-called friend, Steve B to Chicago. My brother’s departure would hurt my mom deeply. I would be ambivalent because my bother had made my life a living hell while living at home. In the beginning I was glad he’d gone. We would later learn my brother had become a heavy drug user while in Chicago and had sold his body for drugs. At some point my brother would return to Muscle Shoals., be admitted to a hospital and eventually sent to a retreat where he’d be diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. I only remember my brother (seriously) dating one girl in High school. He would end up marrying against my mother’s wishes. Her name is Elise and she and my brother would have two girls. There names will not be mentioned here. There will be no one to carry on the family name. It ends here. My brother and his wife’s marriage would survive the turmoil of my brother’s problems. They would hold true to the marriage vows, “for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do you part.” To this day I receive frequent telephone calls from my brother. I rarely hear anything from my youngest sister, Kathy. My oldest sister Lisa is enduring such hardship with her health issues and the problems with her ex-husband. I understand why I don’t often hear from her.

Lisa: (My oldest sister, who some mistake for my twin) Lisa divorced her husband, David Y., because he cheated on her. Lisa has been suffering from debilitating rheumatoid arthritis. I suspect this is the reason for David’s cheating. Lisa’s hands are crooked and she suffers persistent pain from her condition. Despite this, she is still able to be a mother to her and David’s two children.

Kathy: Kathy was the baby. We would not let my mom and dad whip her if she did anything wrong. Kathy never knew solitude. There was always one of us there to care for her. Kathy was a tomboy during her school years. She hated wearing dresses. She only wanted to wear jeans. I’d never really questioned my youngest sisters sexuality. I was more concerned with my own feelings. But at one point I’d be faced with the possibility that I was not the only child of my parent’s who felt an attraction to the same sex. Kathy had several girl friends while in school. One in particularly, Selina was very close to my sister. There came a time when Selina and Kathy would break off their friendship and another of my sister’s friends would confide in me that Selina had accused my sister of being a lesbian. Till this day I wonder if there may have been something to this allegation. And if that may have been the reason for her troubled relationships with men. Kathy is now married to her second husband, Steve B.. They have no children. Steve is a right-wing religious nut., anti-Obama, anti-gay. During the last presidential campaign Steve took to forwarding me anti-Obama emails. To show him my discontent at receiving this trash I wrote a nasty reply and forwarded it to everyone on the list of recipients. Steve was not happy with this and called my voice mail to leave a threatening message. I offered up this voice mail on a prior podcast. You should be able to find it be searching my show notes. We have since tried to put all this behind us and continue to communicate.

Timothy: A former boyfriend. I talk about Timothy in one of my older podcasts. I met Timothy before moving back home from Birmingham in the 80′s to Muscle Shoals (after Ron and I broke up). Timothy was 18 years old when I met him. This was one of the strangest involvements of all the relationships I tried to establish. Timothy is now deceased.

Rick: A boyfriend of two years. Rick’s tough love would ironically teach me how to become independent and to eventually leave him. He was both physically and verbally abusive to me. But despite everything, I hold no ill will toward him. More thanks for his help in making me become a man and leave the boy in me behind. Soon after our breakup Rick would learn he’d been infected with HIV. I’d be tested at his request and would test negative. I think Rick was surprised by this result. I know that I was relieved. Had the result been different I’d likely have returned to Rick. Destiny or fate? Rick is now deceased.

Ron: Ron truly loved me. We were together for four years. I’d discover with the passing of time how much I’d miss him. And what a terrible mistake I’d made by cheating on him. This would mark a turning point in my life. It would be a long time before I’d ever know love again. I’ve talked about Ron in many of my podcasts.

Jessie: I talk about Jessie in one of my earlier podcasts entitled, “The story of Jessie”. Here is a picture I took of Jessie. I like this pic of him best. Jessie was a BAD boy. A thief and an alcoholic. But he has a lovely face and a hot body. To lethal a combination for many a gay man to resist. He is also VERY masculine.

Jessie