THE GRASS IS ALWAYS GREENER…

So last night I was taking a stroll down memory lane trying to remember the names of people I used to know when I was a kid.

I looked up some cousins I can’t forgive or at least, I cannot forgive them right now; maybe I will later. How much later I do not know.

I looked up some old old friends back when I was a young 17 year old naive kid and I recognized this couple through their daughter’s facebook page site. They looked the same, only older and one of their kids was getting married and he didn’t look like an Armenian guy but that’s cool. Love is love as they say.

The couple I will always remember fell in love hard together. They married and stayed that way and are still married to this day. I like that very much because I liked them as a couple. They were in love, they were young and they embraced everyone around them in their love for each other. I’ll tell you this; the wife I have known since I was a small kid. She lived in my hood and went to my church and she and her best friend (another beautiful girl) would sit around and dream about boys and what their lives would be once they grew up.

I don’t envy them but I’m thinking how depressed I am looking at all their pictures because my life is NOT what I want it to be. So I pout and then I go there…the place I hate to be most in life – The “WOE IS ME” Place in my soul – the selfish zone where only I can pout, stomp around and act like an infant. I can cry there, be a jerk, kick the table, kick the make-believe dog and tell the world – the entire world to go to hell.

Until, of course, Myqui hears me mumbling and then gets up and yells at me. What is she yelling at? ME – These were her exact words…”People look at your facebook page and think “heyyy Bonju’s doing great! She has a house, a car, a partner, two dogs, she’s loved. She has money and jobs, Hell! She even has her own business! I bet those people are wishing they were you!”

REALLY? HOW REALLY STUPID ARE PEOPLE – I’m thinking to myself and then I…get it.

I really get it.

She’s right after all because she’s Myqui the Mighty and she understands me and won’t put up with my ‘WOE IS ME” Act. She’s had it and she has told me and I have to listen because it’s better than freaking out nights wondering what else is in store for me in the world at large the very next day.

So I listen.

So I learn.

And I understand

The grass is always greener on the other side but do I really know what is happening on that other side? No. No I don’t. It could be worst then what is happening on my side or better but most times I don’t know and won’t know cause people today don’t tell you the bad stuff.

My late father got sick late in life and in his 80s he was confined to a wheelchair because of his stoke and his bad back made it difficult for him to walk and when people met him they would always ask, “Hi Ken! How are you?” and instead of just telling them a white lie like “I’m great or I’m dealing with it,  How are you?” my dad would actually give that person a long laundry list of what was ailing him and he kept doing it until the people he met stopped asking. Then he had no one to bitch to so he called me up and I used to hang up because I didn’t want to hear it either.

The grass is NOT always greener on the other side and today most of the grass is brown and discolored bbecause people have more to do than just tend to their landscape – like looking for work, staying home and cooking instead of going out like they used to.

So that couple I was talking about before; they threw a wedding for their kid who married and they all looked happy but I have no idea how much it cost them if anything at all. I don’t know them anymore but they brought back a lot of memories for me – all good and happy ones where I didn’t have pressures and life was fun and hanging out was great and I was smoking, playing my tunes and drinking beer with the best of them. My cousin Haig was alive and we were always hanging together checking out the Armo scene and going to all the cool middle eastern joints to listen and dance to great music.

I miss my cousin no matter what his stupid brother Ray may say to the opposite. The stuff I wrote to them about was such a long time ago and I have forgotten but they haven’t forgotten. Unfortunately my cousin Haig was a bit of savant and make copies and framed the letter I wrote telling him that his brother’s wife married two men; one for sex (her husband Ray) and the other (Haig) for the money AND it was true then…and it’s true now.  Not only did he show his brother and his wife but he also showed his sister-in-law’s crazy assed Armenian born mother who I have always disliked and who now, hates me to her core. It’s nice to know she thinks about me sometimes…lol but if never see this woman again in my life or my next life; I will be eternally grateful. I might be inclined to punch her in the head otherwise.

So when Haig passed I had been speaking to him by phone and deduced that he was sick from Diabetes (his feet were bad) and that is what he passed from or complications there of. The problem is no one told me and six months later I read about it on line when I went looking for his telephone number as I had tried to call and the response was that the number was no longer active. Imagine my shock – well – I cried for many days after that until I realized his spirit was in the house with us. After that it was cool and he comes by on holidays and sometimes just to hang with my folks on off days that I’m home.

I think of him sometimes whenever I hear a middle eastern tune and it makes me smile and I wipe a tear from my eyes remembering those good old times when we were all a family; before the war of words, the indignant denial of ruffled feathers and the truth that I always endeavor to seek out overcomes my opposition.  No one wants to hear, read about or understand the truth because the truth is always bad. No one wants to think of themselves as being bad so when you tell the truth – people get mad.

I alienated the cousins on my father’s side too but that’s okay b/c I don’t like that family too much. Too much incest and pedophilia and sp0usal rape went on in those generations. I don’t want to know them anymore but again, my cousin Lee died too young and again, no one told me and I had to read it on the internet; this time it was 2 years later. That killed me and I wrote a song called LIVING LIGHT in her memory.

I didn’t write a song for Haig but everyday I sign my last name with his first – So that is how I honor my cousin who was like the brother I never had. A brother I could count on not to physically hurt or rape me or not protect me. Haig was an honorable man with a big heart and a RAINMAN approach to life.

I listened to my friend who told me that he single brother who is a bit slow (all his life but he was a great date when I was in my 20s) was struggling with a part time job and living in his parents old house and needed his siblings to help him pay the heavy burden of high property taxes in Queens. Arthur where ever you are – I just want you to know – you were the best date friend I ever had – I will always love you, man, and I will always remember the times we shared together.

Our parents give us  life and then they leave us here to make an imprint on the world. Through my friends I can see myself in this world. I may be struggling but life on my side is pretty damn good.

Have a great night people.

————————————– Bonju

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