Author: Benjamin C. Roy Cory Garrett Rev History Rev .00 - 03/05/2008 Rev .01 - 03/08/2022
Lessons learned living beneath tyrants…
When I was a child I used to pray.
Every night before I went to sleep I asked God to show me the world that would become.
To show me the world in which the women I loved lived through tomorrow.
The world in which absent father figures stayed absent.
The world in which Indians rode horses across unending plains.
The world where the wild things still are.
I was young and stories of wrath and Leviticus had yet to scare me as much as the stories I saw in 5 o’clock shadows or the eyes of my best friend KC every morning when she stepped out of her step-father’s car. My god was not forgiving, but he was just. Where covenants were made, they were not forgotten, and thus I made mine.
Barukh ata Adonai, Eloheinu melekh ha-olam pokeiach ivrim…
But I knew even then that promises are never given freely, they are always traded. Thus I made two concessions for the sight I sought:
The first was for my life. I dedicate it always to the service of those I love. I will put their happiness before my own and never balk at a direct request for help from someone I care about.
The second was for my silence. Granted sight to see what would be, I will say nothing but that which never could. I will share my glimpses into the future with no one and use these glimpses only in pursuit of my first promise.
I had learned my codependency by the age of six–I sanctified it–and I would spend the rest of my life learning that seeing the headlights does nothing to push you off of the road before the truck gets there.