To The Commenter Below

For a while I've tried to make it a point to answer every comment made on any piece of writing I've submitted here or elsewhere. I've had my say and you've been good enough to let me know how you feel and it's only right that I leave nothing unanswered if I can help it. Not too long ago an anonymous (semi-anonymous) comment was left under my story entitled ....then. It's still there if anyone wants to read it. And I just want to say right away that if anyone at all for any reason is offended by it, let me know right away and I'll take it down. I mean that seriously, not a joke or sarcasm, just let me know, leave a comment below this post, anything unambiguous and I'll remove it. This goes for any writer on the site or follower or anyone. The purpose of the piece was not to offend anyone and if you were offended by any one aspect I'm very, very sorry; you don't have to tell me your reason, just let me know if it's caused you anything resembling harm and I'll remove it immediately. You don't have to read any further if you don't want to but I wish you would. As I'll explain in a minute, any harm that was caused was completely accidental.

The story was written in two pieces, the first when I was in high school when everything was fresh in my memory and I went around feeling persecuted and more than a little superior. I was at war with everyone for reasons beyond their control. I disliked wealth, I disliked anyone as pretentious as me and I drew lines where there needn't have been any. Maybe some people helped me draw them but I blame no one but myself for my anger and bloated sense of self-importance; it'd be ridiculous to think anyone could have made me act that way. So when I began writing it, it was just an extension of the self-important cloud I walked around in. I felt like lashing out and this was my way of doing it. Then when I saw what it had turned into, the first half of the story, I put it away and didn't touch it for nearly three years. Then, in a time of emotional turmoil I pulled it out again because once again I was angry and alone and afraid and felt like lashing out. It was either go back and finish the story or cut off all my hair. I think the commenter would have preferred the latter of the two but anyone who has to spend time with me should be glad I finished the story. They can choose not to read it but they would have had to look at my giant mohawked head for the months it took for my hair to grow out again. I can assure you this was the less painful way. Not because I don't think that someone could read it and think I was taking potshots at them, but because it's fiction, by this point, all of it and you can choose to not read it and I beg you not to take it seriously as it's not meant to be. The idea that I remember anything clearly enough to pass off as something that happened in high school is fantasy. I couldn't if I wanted to and I don't want to. The people in this story are not anyone I know; they're fictional constructs that my angry, confused and shallow brain created. It's arrogant, it's angry, it's hateful, it's pretentious and overall it's dreadful, and I know it's all fake. Anyone who thinks they recognize themselves in this story didn't do anything that happens here. It's nonsense, a farce; just look at the ending. It's all fiction. I'd never dream of calling it anything else. I didn't hold grudges in between starting and finishing the story; by the time I finished it these were no longer people I knew, they were overblown caricatures all from my fevered ego, but all the same if I've offended you, please, please, please just tell me.

One word below and I'll remove it because I intended this as something for the ten people who come here regularly to laugh at or sympathize with or critique or talk about. It's not meant as a condemnation of any one person or group, nor is meant to retroactively win arguments I had with the world while I was in high school. That would be counter-productive. The story is a purgation of violent feelings inside me brought out by a bad time in my life that passed in a shorter time than it takes to read this nonsense. We all have them and this was how I responded. I then let it sit for almost another year before cleaning it up, taking out the grammatical mistakes and putting it online to get it off my harddrive and out for people to read and judge so that it wasn't sitting around reminding me of its constant presence. I didn't hide it but all the same I didn't expect any but maybe the seven followers on the sidebar to read it. As I'm sure you know, blogs don't exactly come with world-wide readership. But I'm not married to the piece. It means so little because it's simply a work of delirious pretend. The things I am proud of are the thousands of references to works of fiction, films, obscure historical events & figures, paintings and pieces of music, but I'm not so proud that I can't see how insignificant this is. After all the moral of the story is not to be small-minded but the story itself is also small-minded in that it presents a right and a wrong viewpoint and places cartoonish personas on one side and slightly more developed characters on another. Frankly the people I depict as heroic are too short-sighted and cynical to be so entirely, anyway. And furthermore even if you, commenter, are someone who thinks that the story is one long slight (presumably you know exactly who I am based on the temporary name you chose) I don't want at all to chastise you for things I think you may have done. If you hadn't done something that my brain turned huge in imagining, I wouldn't be me, would I? We're all shaped by our experiences and my grossly overreacting and invention in response to your behavior made me in part who I am. I know you might not but I rather like who I am and I owe it to anyone and everyone who's ever made me angry, even if you've done nothing wrong. There are hundreds of people I've been angry with for no reason at all and everyone in this story is one of them and I don't suggest that you're monstrous or evil or cartoonish. You are not in this story, there's only me in this story. I'm only railing against myself and I owe you a great deal of thanks for continuing to be yourself so that I could evolve and get over myself and be able to purge all of my vicious and nasty feelings out in one long rambling story that makes sense to maybe three people. If many of my close friends don't understand half of what goes in there, what chance did I think someone who I never really connected with (for lack of trying on my part, admittedly) would get them. I'm not trying to sound condescending but this story is the contents of my brain fired against a wall and no one should feel offended or hurt because I needed to pull the trigger. Not that I consider your pain or offense minor or insignificant because they're not.

By this point I'm sure you've thought that I've simply rambled off incoherently again and for that I apologize. I was never very good at making a concise point. But I'll reiterate, don't lose an ounce of sleep over my silly story on some little-read blog. I write about antique sex movies and Filipino women-in-prison films for fun, I have no moral high ground and I don't pretend I'm a better person than anyone else. I'd happily discuss it with anyone (that's why I put it up after all) but if you don't find yourself willing to talk or simply have no desire to, you just need to put the word "Stop" in the comment section on a borrowed screen-name that you can then delete. I won't pursue matters further, I won't try and figure out who wrote it, I'll respect your wishes and remove it. I'm not so proud that my story is worth more than someone else's piece of mind. If you meant your comment as simply a slight and have no intention of coming back or posting again, I can understand that, as well as you most definitely saw the piece as a slight, for which I apologize as it's not. And please understand that I'm being as sincere as I know how to be, and though your memory of me might not allow for that to mean much, I'm trying so hard to be sympathetic and put myself in your shoes, I just ask you to try and do the same for me. I'm not writing to hurt people. I'm not who I was in high school and if you don't want it up it will go down.