Howdy all!
Today, I have decided to try something new. Writing has always been a love and passion of mine. When my mother passed away it was my only way to heal and to express emotions. For those that know me, you know I don't exactly wear my emotions on my sleeves. I am very internal and only open up to a select few. Introverted you could call it. So writing has always been my gateway.
For years now I have wrestled with the thought of writing professionally. Whether it be a novel or a few feature pieces here in there (I proved in High School I am a pretty damn good feature writer, 6th best in the state in 2006 to be exact...okay but enough bragging...), I haven't quite decided. All I know is I can write for hours if the mood hits me right. You may have noticed that some of my blog posts could be novels in themselves. I can't help it. I am just so damn wordy.
That's what happens when you don't talk a whole lot.
Anyway, must not digress, back to my original point of this post. Today I decided to share with you a bit of what my lonely Iowan days have consisted of the past few days. Jordan gave me this opportunity of not working and staying at home to focus on my dream (since now he gets to go to his everyday!) and see if it is something I really want to tackle.
I am, in no way at all, a professional writer by any means. My grammar is terrible and my vocabulary is not the best at times. I can struggle to be imaginative, but if the mood hits me right....
So, every few days I'll share with you segments of a short story I am doodling out in my free time between walking my lazy dog and folding laundry.
It's not great. Not by any means. I don't expect it to be. But hey, I've got to do something up here to pass the time in-between my wedding planning and Texas trips.
It's untitled, only finished works of mine ever get titles. That's with everything. Poems, blog posts, etc. You don't know it, but I don't put a header on anything until I read over it and a title pops in my head.
Sometimes they are crap...sometimes they are not. But that's OK, if I like it that's all that matters.
OKAY OKAY OKAY enough rambling. Here it is. My untitled first segment of whatever you wanna call this. BOREDOM CHRONICLES Perhaps?
Maybe.
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The name is Toben. Toben Kolar. Most people call me “Tuck” on the account that my middle name begins with a the letter U. In fact, almost everyone I know calls me Tuck, everyone except for two people. One of them is my mother.
“It is your God given birth name,” she constantly tells me, “and I refuse to acknowledge you by your initials. I am your mother for pete’s sake.” My mother has this innocent ring in her voice. In my twenty-four years of life I have never heard her utter a dirty word. Not once. We are a strictly Catholic family. All one has to do is simply walk through our front door and that fact slaps them completely in the face. Do not get me wrong, I have no reservations about my mother’s religiousness. Would it be fair of me to say that I walk the same path of faithfulness as my mother? Probably not, but I try. Most of the time though, I leave the praying and church-going to her. I attend on occasion, but I have the unlucky habit of skipping from here to there. I am not proud of it. It is what it is.
My father. Well, what can I say about him? I remember him when I was little, up until I was about six years old. And then he was gone.
Let me get one thing straight. I don’t want people to get the wrong impression and think that he went and skipped town on us, or was some kind of mad drunk who abused my mother and me. Truthfully, my father was the complete opposite. In fact, in the time we spent together, he was and still remains my hero. Up until the day he died. I don’t feel like going into the details of his death. I don’t talk about it with anyone. It has been eighteen years and my mother and I have held together just fine.
So that is all I have to say about my father.
I don’t have too many friends, maybe one or two really close ones. Scott is the opposite of me when it comes to personality. He is a womanizing party-goer. Sometimes I ever wonder if he will ever settle down or grow up. I met Scott one year during summer break of college while helping out on a farm. He was originally from somewhere in BFE Australia and jumped on the first plane he could to the States. Ever since then he has been roaming the South from small town to small town doing odd jobs until he landed up here in Cutler, Texas just two years ago. Why he chose here to stay, I will never know, but I sure do thank God everyday for sending me Scott Beckett.
It’s nice to be able to have someone who can look at you and not be constantly reminded of a tragedy.
He has an amazing love for adventure and enjoys the hell out of life. If it weren’t for Scott and his spirit, I am not sure where I would be in this world today. Who knows. But I do know one thing, whenever I see that streak of blonde, buzzed-cut hair walk up to my front door, I can be assured of anything but a quiet evening alone.
I thank him for that.
I mentioned earlier that only two people are allowed to call me by my birth name. One of them is my mother.
The other is the girl that I am madly in love with.
I have been in love with Emma May since sophomore year of college. But it is complicated. Emma can’t stand to get too close to me emotionally like that. We’re great friends, but whenever those moments arise she runs. Runs as far away as she can. I don’t blame her one bit. Most of the time I get angry at myself for feeling this way. I know I have no right. I should be punished for what I did. I forgive Emma for being so upset with me sometimes. I would be too if I were her.
I beat myself up constantly over the terrible events that changed my life six years ago. I know I will never be the same. Never whole. I know I must forgive myself, but how? How can I find any inner peace when for so long my actions have eaten away at my conscience and soul. I know it has been six years, and time has done its job in healing as much of me as it can. I admit there has been a lot of improvement, but still, if I look deep enough inside myself, or I catch that glimmer in Emma’s eyes it hits me all over again. That feeling in the gut that can make a grown man nauseous and fall to his knees.
You see, I had another friend before I met Scott. His name was Kale. Our mothers were best friends so we met when we were still in diapers and practically grew up joined at the hip. Everything we did was together. Fishing, hunting, learning about women, getting in trouble with the law at sixteen years old, etc. He was my best friend in the whole world. He was like my brother.
He was the love of Emma’s life.
And I am the reason he died.
I wasn’t always like the way I am now. Sure, a part of me was always this shy and reserved southern guy, but back then that is just who I was. Things are a lot different now. I was a lot more trusting of my actions when I was in high school, but college changed me. I no longer feel like the innocent teenager who used to ride around in the truck with Kale, a six pack in the bed, and a shotgun hanging out the window, on the hunt for anything that moved on the ground. We were bulletproof. Nothing could harm us. At least, that is what we believed. I could look in the mirror without a second hesitation. I could stare at myself for hours and and see only one guy. A different Toben. Now when I look, I see scars. Both physical and mental. I have forgiven myself for a lot of what happened. Nonetheless, there are those deep wounds that will never leave and will stick with me forever. Just like the scars I see in the mirror. For many years I used to get up in the morning and struggle with who I was. I couldn’t bear to even be around myself. Numerous people have told me that it wasn’t my fault and oh how I wish I could believe them. Part of me does believe them, but the wounded side refuses to shed that ugly image. I used to be torn between being innocent Toben who meant no harm and is as just as broken as Kale’s family. But I refused to feel that way. My mother gets to awake every morning knowing her son is safe and alive and still with her in this world. Everyday Kale’s family has to fight the emotions and remembrance that he is no longer with them. I am the living reminder of their tragedy. I finally accepted this fact. I finally came to terms with who I really am.
My name is Toben Kolar and I killed my best friend.
This fact has made all the difference in the way I live my life.
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P.S. Maybe I am just in an idiot, but this no tabbing thing that Blogger has got going on is driving me insane!
See you next segment.
- Shirley
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