This post will not be easy to read, but know that it was much more difficult for me to write.
It was July 1977, when my hell on earth began. I don't remember the exact day. Even if I did, it wouldn't matter. The typical day for me, back then, was waking up to have toast or pop tarts, watch The Gong Show, later, then go outside and begin doing what most kids did, in those days: Actually playing outside. Though I didn't have toys (my toys were records and a coloring book), I still played outside like every other kid. But, this day was different and it was the speck which became a bigger snowball, yeat after year, especially when I finally realized what my orientation was. It made coming to terms with my own truth more difficult than I can ever put to words, here or elsewhere. If you wonder why some kids do drugs and are looking for possible reasons other than peer pressure, here is one possibility:
On that day, in 1977, a group of 4 boys, 2 at a time, walked up to me, grabbed me by my arms, then picked me up by my legs, and put me on the ground, on my back. One had a red Polaroid camera with the strap around his wrist, and they were all laughing in a way I was not familiar with. I originally thought it was going to be a situation where I got the hell beat out of me with a few rubber pieces of Hot Wheels track, so I initially tried to laugh along with them. But, I had no idea how wrong I would become. Besides, I didn't see any of them holding pieces of track.
What was being said, I can't remember. All I can remember is the faint sound of my voice begging them to let me up and to let me go. What I got, instead, was 4 boys who continued the strange laughter while placing a foot on me, 3 of them taking a piss all over me, and the one holding that red Polaroid began taking photos of this incident.
For all I know, the whole thing may not have lasted longer than 2 or 3 minutes. But when you're a kid who is suddenly scared to death of being alive, those 2 or 3 minutes are your whole life flashing before your eyes and you never forget how the heat from the sun began to quickly dry the piss on your arms, part of your neck and face, and begins to cool on your clothing, compared to original body temperature.
You never forget that when those boys walked away, you were still screaming but all your neighbors were either at work or away from home, which is how these boys got away with what they did.
You never forget that by the time you stopped screaming, and a shred of fear began to let up, that first Polaroid photo you pulled off your shirt had tried to begin sticking to your shirt from the heat of the sun and from the chemicals within the photo as it developed and dried.
You never forget that the first thing you thought, after getting up, was to get rid of those photos in a way that only a 9 year old kid understands, but in a place where that kid is positive that no one would ever find them.
You never forget vomitting, right after running into the woods, because the smell of piss from 3 boys is beginning to heat up and, no matter how hard you run to the woods to bury those photos, you can't get rid of the smell.
You never forget how bad the new combination of vomit and piss smells, and you vomit again while poking holes through the photos with a tree limbs that keep breaking, and you have to keep getting new ones because you'll be god damned if your face stays in those photos.
You never forget picking up a rock to dig a hole because you're shaking so hard that you can't dig good enough with your hands (I am now shaking, and making lots of typos, having to backspace like crazy).
You never forget how hard you worked to slam other rocks on top of the newly dug photo grave, in the hopes that the rocks you picked, with moss all over them, will camouflage well enough with other limbs you sat around them, will look as if they had always been there.
You never forget taking your shirt off and wringing piss (and vomit) out of it, but you don't have a strong enough stomach to put it back on, as you thought would happen when you first had the idea to take it off and wring it out.
You never forget running down to the lake and taking the shirt in with you, just to get the piss and vomit out of it.
You never forget how you knew you would have to explain to your mother why you jumped in the lake with all your clothes on, in the first place.
You never forget that no matter how ridiculous your explanation is, your fear of being violated by those 4 boys again is worse than anything your mother could possibly do to you, and that includes her AND your father taking a belt to you (yes, it happened, both of them).
You never forget how you began to shake, every single time you thought about that incident, and do your best to forget it. But, no matter how hard you try, you can't forget it completely.
You never forget the faces of these boys doing what they did, the trails of piss hitting you, the splatter as it hit your clothes, the sick laughter, and photos landing on your clothing as you lay there, unable to get up, because 4 shoes with a foot in each have got you pinned to the ground and you're stuck there, helpless. No one can hear you, no one can get those boys off of you, and you wish you were dead.
This is the day I can't seem to shake, above all others in my life. Even with the passing of Jack, this is still more difficult and I will never understand why, except for the seemingly thin explanation (at least to me) that all possible innocence was lost, on that day, and I never truly recovered from it. If you were never violated or abused, you will never understand....I don't care how many stories like this you hear, or how harshly it may affect you. And by the way, this was not the only time I was violated. But, it WAS the only time that 4 were involved. After that, further violations almost seemed easy, though never acceptable.
And for the record: I have only seen one red Polaroid camera, as an adult. It stopped my normal day, dead. I shook as I walked, and eventually ran away. It erased enough progress of therapy that I ended up back on medication, after being off of it for more than 3 years. I was sick for days, afterwards. I hoped I would never see another one, and luckily have not. Don't expect that I will ever look for an image of one, on a search engine. It's not going to happen.
OK: I have now laid this filthy chapter of my life out for the world to see, and I am done with it. For now, I don't feel better. At this exact moment, I have a familiar feeling of being sick to my stomach that is almost haunting. But, I am now 43 years old and would fight to the death over the possibility of ever being violated again by anyone, anywhere, at anytime.
Carve this much in stone: If I ever see a child being violated, that will be the day I go to prison for murder and will only plead guilty of trying to save a child from a future of misplaced guilt, questions, blame, self-degradation and simply going out of his or her mind from the pain of not being able to fully put it behind him or her. As for adult child molesters, I would gladly kill them for a living. To me, child molesters are the lowest form of 'human' on earth who deserve nothing more or less than immediate death.
All parents: Listen to me, and do everything possible to become fully wise to the possibility that, no matter how hard you may try, the reality of your child being abused by another child is much more of a reality than you comprehend. Watch your children. Watch them closely. Observe the behavior, and call 'bullshit' on whatever it is they are hiding. Take it from someone who has been there, it could make all the difference in their world, for their sanity, and for some, their will to live to see the future.
Peace and love to all, from Paul.
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