My Kingdom For A Broomstick

It's mid day, mid week, mid autumn. The sun is shining, it's 80 degrees out. I'm smoking legal weed, listening to the new Goo Goo Dolls album, air-jammin' in my wheelchair. God Bless America!

Hail October

I always like to kick off the Halloween season with this poem. It is my way of wishing you a joyous, healthy, and fun-filled autumn. And if you do fall, may it be into a pile of leaves with a wet sucker.

"Hail, old October, bright and chill,

First freed man from the summer sun.

Spice high the bowl, and drink your fill,

Thank Heaven at last, the summer's done."

~Thomas Constable

The Pen Is Mightier

Today's Google doodle is particularly interesting to me because many people feel my writing is a waste of good ink. Be that as it may, September 29th is the birthday of László József Bíró, the inventor of the ballpoint pen. When he presented the pen at the Budapest International Fair in 1931, it caused an immediate uproar on both sides of the Atlantic.

The fountain pen industry was not amused. Previously the province of bankers and well-heeled businessmen, Bíró made permanent writing accessible to the masses.

I always used a pen, even for math. The teachers hated it, but I loved the feel of it on paper, the consistent dark color (or red, or green), and I considered the "un-erase-ability" to be a challenge, not a hindrance.

Although the date of his death is recorded as October 24, 1985, the cause remains a mystery. Immediately following an investigation into Bíró being found dead on a park bench in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the files were sealed. It was rumored, but never confirmed, at the time, that Bíró's brain was pierced, through the ear, with a #2 pencil.

One Explanation

Somewhere, sometime, somehow, a stern father sent a naughty boy to his room to play with his toys. The naughty, petulant boy vented his rage upon the toys, which meant nothing to him. He twisted and tortured them, punished and played with them. Toyed with them. When he was done with one of them, he carelessly tossed it away. His father made sure there was a continuous flow of new toys to entertain him.

Suicide Note

I hate my cat
I hate my wife
I hate my children
I hate my life
I hate my grandkids
I hate my friends
I hate the world till the world ends
I hate my job
I hate my boss
I hate the fact I'd be no loss
I hate God
I hate the Devil
I hate that neither are on the level
I hate my body
I hate my mind
I hate my soul
I hate mankind
I hate the pain night and day
I hate my legs that won't obey
I hate spring
I hate fall
I hate myself most of all
I hate this whole pile of shit
I hate I had to step in it
I hate the bullet that ends it fast
I hate that love cannot last

The Story of the Crocheted Cap

I had just undergone a brutal emergency spinal cord surgery...

Some months earlier I had begun to experience an unaccustomed tiredness in my legs, and falling without warning like my strings had been cut.

A battery of tests revealed an abnormality in my lower spinal cord. It was determined that immediate surgery was called for.

After months of agonizing rehabilitation, my condition continued to deteriorate. Walking was becoming increasingly painful, standing was intolerable. My legs felt like they were made of lead. I was having difficulty urinating, and other related problems down below.

My neurologist subsequently diagnosed me with a condition called Transverse Myelitis, a rare and debilitating disease. He recommended a course of intravenous steroid treatments. I hated them. They made me feel like crap, food tasted like iodine, and I had an allergic skin reaction. Big bumps like pimples erupted all over my scalp and forehead.

Only these weren't pimples. They were hard and painful, but they would not pop. Yet, I kept trying to squeeze them because they hurt so much. There was a cluster of these bumps in one area on my forehead that I could not leave alone. All I accomplished was making them bleed. Then I kept picking at the scabs. Once they "healed," I was left with a nickle sized patch of scar tissue slightly to the right of center.

This became my worry spot. Whenever under physical or mental stress, which was pretty much all the time, I rubbed the spot with my middle finger, being sure to scrape the nail against the scar tissue. I would do this until one arm got tired, then I would switch to the other hand, back and forth all day long, and eventually in my sleep.

My wife pleaded with me to stop, even suggesting I wear mittens at night.

The patch of scar tissue went from nickle sized to quarter sized to the size of a half dollar. And not only was it getting wider in diameter, but a circular bony ridge was forming around it from the constant swirling motion.

My wife had been crocheting hats and donating them to local hospitals and cancer treatment centers since my first go around with testicular cancer some years back. When the patch started really becoming noticeable, I took to wearing the caps. My wife made a number of soft, seasonal hats for me out of beautiful yarns.

In 2012 I was diagnosed with cancer for the second time in the form of lymphoma.

People may think I wear the hats out of vanity, like I'm ashamed of losing my hair. Of course, that's ridiculous because I was bald before any of this happened, and I was certainly not vain about it. But I let them think that.

Being in a wheelchair is bad enough. When I talk to people I want them looking me in the eye, not staring at my forehead, and being drawn by what I say, not repulsed by how I look.

That's why I wear a hat, and feel exposed without one.

Dear CIA, NSA, FBI, FSB, SVR, MSS, and PLA, Et Al:

To the Security Services of the United States, Russia, China, and whomever else it may concern:

I have published Volume 1 of a two volume set (Volume 2 is due out in spring of 2017) of my blog posts in which you have shown such an interest. Now you can have a hard copy of all the stories that tripped the red flags on your search bots. Volume 1 is sure to make an excellent gift for the Drumpfs, Clintons, Putins, and whatever old fossil China is propping up on your holiday shopping list.

Copies of Man of Words Volume 1 by Stephen J. Dunn can be purchased on Amazon.com and Amazon Europe, just go to Books and enter the book title and author's full name. Autographed copies can be purchased by special arrangement with the author at holidayman58@yahoo.com.

https://www.amazon.com/MAN-WORDS-Stephen-J-Dunn/dp/1535562536/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1473709974&sr=8-3&keywords=man+of+words+dunn