Short Non-Fiction By Dru Dixon
Blind, deaf, drunk, drugged, phuked..
Born broken, born an obstacle for my parents to overcome, and an emblem of their strength in God as they dealt with my shit, I never realized the dereliction of profundity their espousals solicited. Said differently, my parents loved to brag in church about how great they were in spite of a disabled child.
Job is a biblical story of all the tests God can give a man and still be loved. Mike Tyson said, “The more one is favored by God, the more he’s favored by the devil.” My story is laughably the one of the anti-hero who embodies all the above and none at all.
It’s that of the typical boring disabled kid, one who rode a short bus to school, thrown in a dumpster, and overcompensated with dull try-hard jokes that no one laughed at. Kissed two girls before graduating high school, literal chick repellant.
Desperate for love, I knew if I worked hard enough and was smart enough, I’d find it. National honor society, 4.0 GPA, captain of the track team. I was skinny with abs, which is the equivalent of a big girl with big boobs. Not remarkable at all.
Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, all throughout this time, one thing was clear. My family and I would go to church. People falling on the ground, slain in the spirit around me, my parents would bring me forward for healing as if I was worthy of it. If he didn’t do it the first time, why would he on the 1000th?
Enter college… No 3-day-a-week church. No people to judge me. Shot-gunned beers, bongs made from milk jugs, and the Grateful Dead defined me. For every beer in my closet pyramid, there was a notch on the bedpost. There was no party where I couldn’t be the total antithesis of my raising. Coke, smack, rolls, whatever.
I wasn’t loved by my parents and certainly not God.
I was meant to die.
I didn’t.
Dru Dixon is an inquisitive, chronic overthinker who loves to write.
