Two letters

Hey Johnny,

Just wanted to see how you're doing. I'm doing well, maybe not by most standards though. I recently parted ways with a steady companion of 15 years, alcohol. Not an easy thing. My bank account is negative, lawyers and collection agencies are after me for unpaid debts. I live in an apartment with almost no furniture. The rent is due next week. I don't have it. I don't have a girlfriend, and haven't been on a date since last year, I've been dealing with some health issues, I'm on dangerous ground in my career. My greatest dream was to meet "her", and have a beautiful family. I'm getting closer to 40, and the window of opportunity is quickly closing on that, and that scares me, and makes me sad.

But, despite all of it, I am doing incredibly well. At my age, people expect me to be at a different place in life, but their expecations, and focus are on the outward appearance of things. It all starts with the spirit. I chose to follow my own path, and I have not held my life to the same timeline as others. In everything I have done until now, in all the living I have done to this point, my goal was nothing more than to lay a foundation upon which the greatest achievements will rise later.

It's all in the spirit. I knew, when I set out on the path I had decided to walk, that no one around me would understand it. They would not comprehend it. I knew there would be laughter and ridicule. I knew there would be contempt and hate. I knew I would be considered a fool. I knew I would have to endure that these many years. To be a pariah, to be hated. No one to talk to, because there would be no one able to understand. I would be walking alone. I anticipated all of it. I was still a teenager then. I set out into that "wilderness" those many years ago, willing to face it, knowing I would either pass the test or die trying. My vision was that in my mid thirties, I would finally find the end of that path, and my real life would begin.

Now is the time. I have walked "through the valley of the shadow of death" I am almost 40 years old, and only now do I consider myself a man. I did it. I passed all of the tests. I did not lose myself, not even close. I have passed through the fire, and all that is good in me has been tempered by the heat. My spirit is strong, unshakeable. Now I can really begin my life. I am flying.

I am not in a position financially, or materially, that many in this society would consider impressive for a man of my age, but they don't know what I know. They are only able to see a very small part of a great work. Most likely they will never be able to see it, never be able to understand it .I can't bee too concerned with the judgments of these men.

You, being a sappy, overly emotional, melodramatic guy like myself, will understand all of this I'm sure. ha ha. Just kidding. Don't judge yourself by the same, faulty standards used by small men, of which there are many in this society. You just have to give them a smile, knowing that they can't help it, that they are just in a different stage of their spiritual development.

I suddenly got the urge to write you tonight. I'm not sure why. This letter is not what I expected. I began to write, and the words and thoughts just came, as if the letter wrote itself. I can only think that your present position in life could be considered very similar to my own in many respects. I see it all as a time of rebirth.

I hope you are doing well. Choose to fly my friend,

Evan 

Evan,
I've actually been trying to write this for about five months, ever since the anniversary of your passing. I don't know why it's so hard anymore to write about you. After you died, I probably wrote about you at least twenty times. But it's been different the last couple of years. Probably because I am different as well. I've had to find a way to move forward, and that's not always easy. It's not easy when you have a friend, a brother, that left a shadow as big as yours. That touched so many lives, and left so many memories.
How am I doing? It's hard to say. Like you, I am my own worst critic. Regardless of what I may do that seems positive, it's hard to let myself feel like it's enough. Compared to where I was when I came to Dallas, I am in a much better place, but it never seems to be enough. I still have a lot of debt, still trying to build my private business as a trainer, and still painfully single. Like you, I hoped that was a void that would have been filled a long time ago, but I am actually starting to understand better now why it hasn't happened. It's like you said in your letter, I have "walked through the valley" and only now do I consider myself a man. Of course, I'm almost 50 now, not 40. I don't know that I didn't lose part of myself, because only now do I realize who I am as a man.
I am still a "sappy, overly emotional" guy, but a lot less melodramatic than the old days lol. But I realize also that I am passionate, hard headed, loyal, and a big nerd at heart. Things I really didn't understand about myself. I realize that I survived a background that many people wouldn't. And I realize that I at least should respect myself for that much. And if Dallas has taught me anything, it's that I am a survivor. Depression is still a factor in my life, but I am fighting everyday.
I think I also realized just how much anger I have carried. Not just in my life in general, but at you. I was angry at how you beat yourself up, how you felt sorry for your self, and how you underestimated yourself. But mostly, I was angry at you leaving so soon. Really fucking angry. And envious.
Envious at the stories so many other people had to tell about you. About training with you, being roommates with you, seeing the world with you. I have been envious because I really don't have a lot of those stories. It almost makes no sense how close we became with so little time really spent doing stuff together. I guess we can just chalk it up to being two kindred spirits. I never knew the specifics of your story, because I didn't need to. Just from the most basic details you gave me, I could piece it together. Because survivors always know other survivors. Come to find out our upbringing was nearly identical in many ways. But we both kind of knew that already, didn't we? Because survivors always know.
In a funny way, I think you'd be happy for me not being able to write so much about you anymore. Because you know how much I needed to move forward. I hate when people say "get over" something, because that's just dumb. You can't get over someone's death. Especially your big brother's. A death is not like losing a job, or getting divorced. Believe me, because I've done both. You don't just "get over it". You have to integrate it into your life. Learn to live with it. But, life does get better.
I got that last part from a comic book. Like I said, nerd.
But I have done my best to move forward, and I think that's what you'd have wanted.

Of course, that doesn't mean I don't still talk about you. Or brag, as some people might say. I'm sure some people are pretty sick of  hearing me talk about you lol, but I don't care. I'm proud to say you were my friend and my brother. I'm proud that the kid that stuck up for me when someone was trying to kick my ass because UFC champion. I'm proud that he became a man that people admired. And I am proud that he became a person that would be missed by so many.
What's next for me? It's hard to say. I think I am a pretty good trainer, but I don't know if that's what I want to do with the rest of my life. I have started taking acting lessons. I am also desperately trying to learn to play guitar, but that "worst critic" in me makes it hard sometimes. I am also starting to write more, finally. Because some people seem to think that being a survivor gives me a lot to say. I guess we will see.
Like I said, I've been trying to write this for a while. As usual, it took your words to actually inspire me to finally get to it. But I am glad to finally get these things out. I am so grateful for you. I guess some of my anger is in never getting to tell you that. You probably toughened me up as a kid. Made me believe in having goals. And made me believe in working my ass off for them. Grateful you were my friend, and my brother. And hoping that I do you proud.
Love you brother.

Still flying,

Johnny

China Springs

I filled my car with gas before heading south down I-35 to Waco. It was a route I knew well, one that I had worn many times when going to Waco to visit my grandmother and some other relatives that I had only found a few years before, thanks to the miracle of social media. But this trip, this route, would be slightly different. The exit I would take would come a few miles before my usual one, the one that takes me to Granny's assisted living apartment building. For this trip I would exit a bit early, and head west down an assortment of roads to China Springs, Texas. One of those tiny little places in Texas that always seems to be named for a place in has nothing in common with.

My destination took me more than ten miles away from the interstate, down winding back roads with houses and horse properties throughout. An intersection would bring about the usual small town convenience store, gas station, what have you, and then on to another empty stretch with more properties spread around.
Siri gave me instructions to make one final left turn, and my destination would be on my left. I can't describe the nerves that went through me as I got closer and closer. Closer to what though? I had no idea what answers I was really going to find here. I knew I would get something, but would it be what I was really looking for?
After seeing the home I was searching for, I made a U-turn at the top of the street and came back around to the house. It was a small horse property like so many I had passed on the way here. The kind you could only afford if you had made a decent living, and then were smart enough to hold onto it. Having horses isn't a cheap hobby. There was a small riding area adjacent to the front yard, not large, but enough to take a couple of horses around at a time. The front yard was well kept, with grass that was torn between winter brown, and holding-onto-the-hope of Spring green. I parked in front of a mailbox that did me no favors by not having the home owner's name on it. I hoped to at least see some clue if this was the house I was looking for that may save me from having to actually have to go up to the front door and risk someone seeing me. And worse, asking who the hell I was. If the mailbox had been kind enough to have something written on it, at least I could have braced myself further, or knew to just pack it in and leave because this was not the house I had hoped to find.

The driveway connected to a small sidewalk that was horizontal to the house. Off to one side was a small work shed with a Chevy pickup parked beside it, and between the shed was a carport with two more cars underneath. It gave the impression of a quiet family home that probably didn't get a lot of visitors. Certainly not like the one they were about to receive.
As I got closer to the front door, I could feel my heart rate quicken even more. There was a USMC themed sign near the door that had the family name on it, and I found myself hoping it said anything but "Fitzhugh". After coming all this way, I wouldn't mind if whatever disappointment came from this, happened simply because of human error and meant me being given a wrong address.

I've never met my father before. Before it gets confusing, I separate the man I call my dad, Jack(who is in reality my stepdad), and the actual sperm donor, whom I am referring to here as my father. That man's name is John Fitzhugh, and it's his door I am about to knock upon on this mild December day. John was my mom's second marriage. Her first produced three kids, my brothers Will and Chuck, and my late sister, Christine. My mom wasn't really good at relationships, and her second marriage was falling apart even faster than the first. Her and John had been together less than two years when she left Waco for Amarillo, and filed for divorce after. John wasn't even in the country at the time she made this decision, as he was on a tour of duty in Vietnam. My mom had told her in laws that her father was ill in Amarillo, and that she had to get there immediately to be by his side. Which, coincidentally, was the exact same story she had told her first set of in laws when she wanted to leave Ohio, and her first husband. Honesty was never mother's strong point.

It's actually rare to hear me refer to my mother as anything other than her first name, Dorothy. That's because our relationship became so fractured over the years, that I didn't really feel like she was a mother to me at all. And it was her lack of honesty, combined with some championship caliber bitterness and petty behavior, that kept me from knowing about my father for most of my life. She was so determined to will him out of my life, that she even denied he was my father until the day she died. Despite her entire family, my brothers, and even Jack telling me the contrary.

As I approached the front door, I gripped the letter I had written ahead of time and brought down with me. Due to previous experience, I had a pretty good idea John was married again, and an even better idea that his current wife and family probably had no inkling that he had children. It was a secret that ended his previous marriage(or so I am told), which was his third. I had no interest in creating that kind of upheaval for him now, so I had come up with an alibi for my appearance at his doorstep, and a reason to give the letter to whomever opened the door. I would tell them I was a member of his family in Waco that he had no contact with(true), and that the letter was to let him know they would like to mend fences with him(also true). The only issue with that story is that no one on the paternal side of my family knew I was even planning this trip, so as not to cause any undue harm if this didn't go as I hoped.

Standing on the doormat was one of those surreal experiences in life. You've dreamt of this moment in thousands of different ways, but part of you never really thought you'd end up here. That this moment was actually happening. You keep waiting for some cruel thing to happen and ruin it all. But as I took a deep breath and rang the doorbell, I reminded myself of everything I needed to say, and that even if I couldn't say it in person, the letter would do the rest. I just had to give it to him.

Once I rang the bell, I could see a figure approaching from the other side of the glass. When he opened the door, all of the pictures I had seen of him seemed to flood my memory at once. John had never seemed like a real person to me. After hearing his name whispered around me since I was a kid, and only seeing photos of him, a part of you starts to question if he is even real. But now all of the statements of "you look just like your dad" rang in my ears, as I finally stood face to face with him, wondering if he'd even know who I was.
I immediately took stock of the man in front of me. We were the same height with the same thin frame. Mine had been expanded a bit by 30 plus years of weightlifting, but the basics were the same. His hair was more red than brown like mine, with streaks of white in it. It reminded me of the comic book character Jason Blood, minus Etrigan the demon(or so I hoped) . He had the same bow-legged gait, with a slight paunch to his belly, light colored eyes, and hands that seemed familiar with hard work. It was pretty easy to see why everyone immediately compared me to him when I first met his estranged family in Waco years before.

It took less than a second for it to hit him. His greeting went from "Can I help you" to "Oh hey, how are you?" almost instantly. The look of shock stayed there the whole time though. He asked what I was doing there, and I quickly explained the purpose of my trip. Simply put, it was time we finally met. I didn't want money, or need anything from him. What I hoped was that there was some possibility of having a relationship of some kind. But barring that, it was still time to at least meet face to face. He responded several times with "I don't know what to say", which I followed up by telling him that he didn't have to say anything. I handed him the letter with one request, contact me at some point. Even if it's just to say you can't, or simply aren't capable of any type of relationship. I didn't put a timeline on it because I understood that it may take a while for him to decide. I only asked that he respond at some point and not just leave me hanging. I handed him the letter, let him know my phone number was at the bottom, and shook his hand. In less than five minutes, I had dealt with the biggest ghost from my past and was back on the road home. Just like that.

The reasons why my mom worked so hard to keep John out of my life are like a Jerry Springer episode come to life: Guy returns from Vietnam to seek out his ex to figure out custody and visitation. Guy meets new girl. Guy takes new girl home with him, and eventually marries her. New girl happens to be younger sister of ex-wife, who is slightly pissed. Guy and new girl have baby, who is now half-sibling/half-cousin to the guy's son. Ex tells both to go to hell, and that Guy will never see said son ever again.
And my mother stood by the promise, at least where John was concerned. When he and my aunt divorced, she moved back to Amarillo. My mother forgave her, but then swore her and their entire family to secrecy, and forbade anyone from ever telling me that John was my father. As far as the world was concerned, and especially me, Jack was my biological father now. A secret she was so intent on keeping, she even had my original birth certificate changed when she had Jack adopt me. And even after finding John once before and speaking with him on the phone, she still insisted he wasn't my father. Even Jack telling me the whole story himself couldn't get her to budge. It became a hallmark of our relationship, and just one of the reasons I wasn't speaking to her at the time she passed.

As of this moment, I haven't heard anything from John. I'm not sure if I will, or even how much I need to hear from him. In my letter, I said that there are parts of me that I will never know for sure, until I know him. And that's true. But I got a lot answered just from that short few minutes in his yard. Questions about who I am as a man, the journey I have been on my entire life, and what part my parents, biological or not, played in that journey. And to be honest, it's probably going to take months for me to completely process what this moment meant. So I can imagine how long it may take him. But I realized that the important thing is who I want to be from this moment forward. And if I get the chance to be a dad, I want to make sure my son or daughter never has the questions that I have had to live with. I may never get the father I hoped for, but if I can be that man to someone else, that will mean just as much.