'If I Can Free Those Birds' ...

Gloria Faye Brown Bates ... 2019


IF I CAN FREE THOSE BIRDS ... (written, owned by Gloria Faye Brown Bates ... photos, also)




No one chooses when grief surfaces. All can go well and all of a sudden ... it happens. NO one can understand until they lose someone closest to their hearts ... NO ONE.




Sometimes people will wonder why in the world after all this time grief has such power. I can say until you lose your own child, your own loved ones ... they won't ever understand.




What people can't understand ... the ones who haven't lost anyone dear ... is that like when my son died ... he is still alive in my mind. I see, hear him walk, talk, laugh, be silly ... I see his tears, happiness ... through all my memories ... he is alive in my memories. I am not seeing him ... DEAD ... in my memories. If I dwell on that ... oh my God. I can't do that ... it has an effect on my chest discomfort I've been experiencing for a week now.




What I am trying to say is ... if Tommy M Sidden Tommy walked into this room at this very moment ... it would be ... like yesterday. It would be like he's been on a trip and just got home. I haven't forgotten a thing about my child. We could ... take up where we left off in our life.




This is how I describe my grief ... I don't know about yours or anyone else's. I am trying to understand myself about the whys? of grief ... when it happens, what triggers it so I can avoid whatever it is. The pain is too much ... oh my God ... I will live the rest of my life without my son. He should have outlived ME, his mother.




You see only my words here ... you don't see my thoughts of ... I have things put up meant to leave to my son that only he would have treasured. You don't see all the things a mother shares with her child in my Heart now ... whereas you as a parent are actually living these very things out with your child.




You can't understand until ... it's all cut off abruptly ... your ... child dies. Your child isn't here anymore. So much unfinished living ... all your plans, dreams in that child, all your love ... it's all cut off the moment you are told he/she has died. So many thoughts, feelings I won't ever get to share with my son ... gone. No one even realizes that grief is more ... than the word ... 'grief'. No one knows it goes so much deeper into a person's heart ... where there aren't words to describe it.




I've never read anything to say the things I've just said. I've had to face all these things. I've lived the panicky sensations in my heart ... like during these holidays I'm going through such. I don't choose to be sad ... all the while I'm trying to ease the panic inside ... that feels like birds trapped in a cage desperately trying to escape. If ... when ... 'I can free those birds' ... I can be alright again.




Until then ... I will stay to myself and I'll write the pain, panicky feelings away. I won't talk about them to any one person. That's not ME ... I write ... I don't talk about it. I don't add my burdens to other people's lives ... I don't add sadness to others' lives. I do my best to always be smiling ... just like going to the doctor ... say, "I'm just fine!" I am guilty of doing just that :)




I have promised all through time to write ... describe grief as I personally know, experience it to all who have followed ME for years since Tommy died (my only child, my son).




I have done well coping with it through time ... but NO one has seen ME cry, go to pieces ... go through the agony, anguish ... I chose to grieve in private ... I lived in my own personal Hell.




Many people have the luxury of family to grieve with ... people who loved the same person you did. They cry together, help the other through the most awful pain in this world. Many have someone to counsel them through their grief.




I didn't have any family left to cry with ... everyone began dying before my son died. Many died under circumstances that I won't write about anymore ... hurts just too bad. So many, many questions that won't ever be answered. Today ... I don't want to know the answers ... I don't think I could bear it.




I don't grieve for only one person ... so many of my family members ... they all died too close together ... on both sides of my family. My grief hasn't ever had a chance to just rest. Combined with my only child's death ... a part of ME, my Heart ...




Grieving ... what no one knows is that when I am grieving for my son ... I'm grieving for my mother ... even my father whom I loved, hated ... my brothers, every family member whom I loved with my very Heart. No one was perfect .. but, they were my family, the only family I ever had, knew. They are where I came from ... I'm the most imperfect person in this world. Humor here ... I'm lucky I'm not just a blooming idiot. Maybe I am and I just not know it. So be it :)




I also, grieve for the loss of ever knowing my 2 grandchildren since Tommy died. No one can know that pain either until they FEEL it. They were all left in this whole world of MY son. I won't discuss this or answer comments on it. I know you respect me on this just as I respect you. <3




I never had anyone to go to grieve with even when my family members were living. I suffer in silence until I'm alright again. With my son's death, family members ... it has taken all these past 9 years to get through it. I made it. Real Life ... if you live Real Life ... you are going to die. If you have loved ones who live, they will die one day, also.




Hopefully ... as a parent you won't outlive your children. It's really bad to begin to grow older ... no one being there for you that's your own flesh, blood to protect, love you as one's child/children do.




So, you ask ... why didn't I share my grief with my husband ... with Skip Bates Skip? Because it's rare I discuss painful things with Skip ... he becomes concerned ... it's hard for him to focus on other things when he knows I'm not doing well. Skip has been very sick through time ... I kept my pain to myself and just kept taking care of him. I was so afraid of losing him too. Skip and I are so close that we hurt when the other hurts. He and our Pups3 are all I have left in my world ... they are my world.




I have to pretend to be okay. That's alright ... I've played that game all my life ... a little humor here again and it's true ... when I go to the doctor when sick and he asks me how I'm feeling ... I answer quickly, "I am fine, thank you!" You won't hear ME complain. Even going through my health crises with cancer, medical ... no one ever heard me complain. Why?




I don't wallow in my pain ... I fight it. I fight to get out of it, away from it. The worse part about grief ... you can't get out of it ... you can't get away from it. It's the heaviest thing I've ever carried in my life ... yet ... no one can see when I struggle.




Rather than to make others feel bad for ME ... I stay to myself until I'm ready to be out and about again. Sometimes ... people don't understand ... the ones who know ME best ... understand. They have to ... in person, I can't talk about it, I won't try.




The positive here is ... I never stay down on the ground very long when Life knocks me down. As I'm falling I am already dusting my pants off for the getting right back up. That's my fighting spirit I inherited from my Grandma Alma.




Note from this Author:




My Grandma Alma was paralyzed for over 20 years ... she was very fragile, weak ... yet ... she was the strongest woman I ever knew. She had one Helluva fighting spirit. She lived in Hell with George, her husband. He was the only grandfather I ever knew ... the kindest man I ever knew until Skip. George was blind. I was thrown into Hell to live with them. Gloria Faye Brown Bates Tommy M Sidden Skip Bates Dukester Kissy Camie Precious Camo

Why? Maybe ... Because ... I Wonder?

Why?  Maybe ...  Because ... I Wonder
 

Written, owned by Gloria Faye Brown Bates
(photo owned by Gloria Faye Brown Bates)



Why? does someone have to die
My answer is maybe ... to let others take their space to live?
Until ... they too, die ... isn't that the way of Life?

Why? does one's heart hurt when a loved one dies?
Maybe ... because pure love never dies meaning ...
One's heart will hurt always, forever

Why? can't all the tests in the world ... show grief, heartache?
Maybe ... because Love is invisible, powerful only seen in one's actions
When one is gone ... Love lives on though no one's there

Actions are only through signs from the other side
No one can prove they are from a loved one
But, maybe ... we know ... we KNOW

Today I remember my son, Tommy ... he lived once upon a time
He left unexpectedly leaving a void place in my very Heart
I put a key on my pain ... I wonder 'why?'

Ever so often ... my pain slips out unexpectedly
When I think it's well-guarded to not hurt anymore
I wonder ... why?

Maybe ... because I will love my son forever ... always
Whether he's here or ... there
As long as I love ... I will feel pain

I wonder why Love hurts?
I wonder if I quit loving would the pain go away?
Maybe ... but, my Love is always, forever in my Heart

I don't have to wonder if on the day I die
Will I think of my loved ones, my son who have died
I know I will ... I would like to think I would reach out to them

With open arms ... go toward the light as I am
A sunshine girl ... smile because pain isn't anymore
I won't have to guard my Heart ... I'll just ... be

I won't be here ... I'll be there
I wonder when we see reflections in the glass
If that's how the other side is?

Maybe at special times we can see them for a moment
Maybe ... they see us at all times
My attention always goes toward reflections ...

I'm always looking, searching for what I don't know
Why?  I feel if I look long enough I might see to the other side
Maybe ... I might see my son smiling back at ME

I used to wonder if I could walk, placing my hands out
Into the thin air ... maybe find an opening of some kind
Slip inside ... see what's on the other side

I wonder why? such thoughts came into my mind?
Why?  I sense Life, Death is so close to each other
That we can almost ... almost reach out to pull someone back

I wonder 'why?'
I wonder why I have thoughts ... why my mind weaves many colors
through words into my very fabric of Life?

I'll always write ... like a scientist maybe one day I will discover
The answers to my 'whys?' Until then ...
I will keep writing ... wondering 'why?'

Grief Doesn't Show Up on Tests at Hospital

11-18-2019  Gloria Faye Brown Bates

I tried ... to see ... the pain from grief after my tests results showed my Heart doing as it should.

I try to write, describe it as I promised I would when I began to write after my son, Tommy's death.

Hospital tests don't show the pain in a mother's heart ... why she can't breathe ... why she can't make the panicky feelings go away.

I have been coping so, so well for a long time. This pain, pure grief slipped up on ME ... did I somehow leave the key to my Heart unlocked? How did this happen? Why?

Why? I am learning as I live after my child's death that my grief is simply pure love for the child I had once.

I am learning no matter how long time separates me from the day he died ... I have coped in a good, positive way ... I think I won't hurt so deeply anymore ... this is a pain with a mind of its own.

This pain strikes out of the blue. Who knows what triggers it when one can't see why. We all have deep memories in our subconscious ... we always remember even if not conscious of it.

I have faced this pain head-on in the past ... not this time ... I don't have time to sit back in the darkness of my mind when ... I already know what hurts ME. I have my own little world who loves, depends on ME to be alright. Skip and our Pups3.

Now that I know from the doctor, tests ... my heart is doing as it should (from double bypass surgery ... 2 complete blockages ... widowmaker ... April 26, 2019) ... what is left to make my heart hurt badly, making it difficult to breathe.

It is ... grief ... pure heartache ... pure love for my son. That love for him can't ever go away hence ... grief won't ever go away.

Yes, time does help ... one can get themselves into a state of mind to cope with the worst pain I have personally ever known. I can do that. I just don't know the secret to ...

How? Why? that pain can slip out quietly through the lock I have put on my Heart hurting ME so deeply ... I have to once again stop all I am doing physically to cope. This time for almost a week ... being physically sick to my Heart.

I have a suspicion even I ... who tries to study all that affects my life, emotions ... won't ever know the answer to one day ... tell you ... my readers ... so you can know. So if you are ever grieving ... it could help you. For now ... I keep my promise to you to describe.

Thankfully ... the sunshine is out today ... my son, Tommy's birthday ... November 20th.

It makes me smile even with tears in my eyes ... making me know everything IS going to be alright again. I really am going to be alright.

The pain in my Heart is for my son ... grief ... yearning, wishing he wasn't gone so much with my Heart that I feel physical pain.

Never feel sorry for ME ... I have lived through many things realizing to live ... I have to make myself keep getting up, keep making my feet go forward one step at a time all the while dusting my pants off.

I do this smiling through the pain ... I do this thinking of my Grandma Alma ... her legacy to ME is the incredible fighting spirit I have inside my body, heart. She lived paralyzed for over 20 years ... to be so weak ... she WAS the strongest woman I ever knew.

Thank you, Grandma Alma ... your fighting spirit is what keeps me here today.

Happy Birthday, Tommy M Sidden. Physically you aren't here ...you are here in my Heart ... I know by feeling so much love ... it hurts.

Everything IS going to be alright ... like Humpty-Dumpty ... I have been playing 'pick up the pieces again' ... soon they will all be back in place.

Note by this Author:

Photos, true story owned, written by Gloria Faye Brown Bates.

I study myself, each emotion, thought I have when writing. I try to learn constantly ... the 'whys?' ... of Life.

Maybe you can see, learn something you see that I don't. It would be Special if any words I wrote touched your life in a good way. 💖💖💖

Skip Bates Gloria Bates Colors Dukester Kissy Camie Precious Camo Tommy M Sidden

Grief ... 9 Years Later

Grief ... 9 Years Later

 My son, Tommy ... and his son

Tears of grief overwhelmed my very Heart so, much I couldn't breathe very well. Causing such discomfort to take me to the hospital ER last night.

All kinds of tests show my Heart to be just fine ... the tests didn't show the pure pain I feel inside. The doctor said I had a new heart when I had my surgery in April this year. At least we know I'm just fine physically.

The pain, discomfort in my chest can't be seen on an EKG nor an x-ray ... can't show up in the tests done. My pain is invisible ... no one, not even I can see it ... I am the only one who feels it.

The feeling of wanting to just fall down ... cry ... overwhelms me. It won't, can't change a thing. My son can't come back. No matter what ... this is the impossible in Life ... one can't bring a loved one back from the other side.

This IS the one mountain I can't move in my life ... this is the mountain I will go up, go down, go up, down for the rest of my life. No matter what I do ... it will always be there.

I don't dare let myself begin to cry ... I might never stop crying again. I just feel it all in the center of my chest ... heartache, discomfort that doesn't show up on tests at all. It's only known to ME ... I am the only person who knows where it's at.

No ... no ... a mother never gets over the loss of her child. She fools herself into believing for a time she has found peace of mind ... she satisfies everyone around her that all is just fine. She even feels fine for a time. It's a game of pretending all is well ... one has to play the game for everyone's sake. We don't make others sad because we are.

This is one of those very real games we have to play in life ... it's called surviving the loss of a child. If we don't play it ... if I don't play it being a grieving mother ... I won't survive, I won't live to be old one day. I have someone who needs ME ... my whole world, Skip and the Pups3. I have to be here for them.

Grief is one of the heaviest loads any one person can carry in life. No one can see how heavy it is ... you might not tell how heavy it is as you watch another person carry it. All you see is the physical person standing, walking ... the burden they carry on their shoulders isn't one seen at all.

The only thing Skip said he saw ... could tell I'm going through this time of hurting ... are my eyes. He recognized the pain in my eyes. I wasn't aware of that.

People who have lost someone smile as they go through life never showing, talking their pain. Oh yes, they are carrying that load well ... they have learned to cope.

No one ever sees how it really is ... unless someone sits, whines and cries all the time feeling sorry for themselves. Some people crave the attention ... want to be showered with sympathy, and words of 'poor, poor you'. Don't no one dare ever do that to ME. I don't need, nor want that kind of attention.

I try never-ever to show my pain especially like at this moment. I have to stay to myself so, I can get better inside. I avoid people ... I avoid talking ... I just want to be very quiet until all is okay again. I never-ever feel sorry for myself ... I don't waste time in a negative way. I keep putting that mental foot forward ... one step at a time.

It's not an easy walk back to the smoother path I'm trying to get back on. I DO get back on ... I have to ... I don't want to live in the darkness again. I am a sunshine person ... I'm so fortunate to find the sunshine again in my life ... I didn't know that I ever would.

Grief ..... pure, pure grief. Pain ... from loving completely someone with one's heart ... only to lose that person unexpectedly. I think the closest person one can lose is being a mother who loses a child ...the one whose body actually brought that child into the world.

I am that person ... tomorrow is that child's birthday. Tomorrow ... November 20th ... is Tommy's birthday. Tommy's birth was a very difficult one ... so much so ... I wasn't ever tempted to have another child. No one could have paid ME to go through such a nightmare again. I treasured my one child, my only child.

Grief ... pure, pure grief ...

It's invisible yet ... it's the most powerful emotion one can have. One can't take a break from it ... one can't run from it ... it's so much bigger than I. It's inside ME ... no matter where I go it will go with me the same as my bones, blood, heart, lungs do ... I can't make it get out of my body. I AM going to live with it whether I want to or not ... I have no choice ... I have to, I will. I want to live until I am old. I want to grow older gracefully.

I want for Skip and me to know how it feels again to not want just the necessities of life to make it ... I would like us to live without the worry of paying bills and not having anything left. I know realistically ... we aren't the only ones who struggle in today's time. Whatever ... we will make all be alright, we don't give up.

Grief ... pure, pure grief is pure, pure love from one's very heart. Such special love for someone who means the world to you. I see now since Tommy has died that ... as long as I love my son with my Heart ... I am going to grieve. That's okay ... I can, will get myself back together again ... for now it is taking a little time.

That's okay ... it isn't the first time I've had to be 'Humpty-Dumpty' ... put my pieces back together again. One more thing ... it's okay to be sad ... grieve in a good way ... good meaning you know you are going in the direction of being alright again. You have to ... you truly have to.

I always try to go toward the sunshine ... happy colors of Life. For now ... the days without sunshine ... rainy days ... affect me helping to make me sad. Just for now ... I'm going to be quiet, still ... and become stronger again. For now ... I am hoping my heartache will go away soon ... along with it the feeling of wanting to cry. I can be alright once that happens. It's all there in the center of my chest ... a big lump of pain ... like someone has placed a baseball there.

Skip wondered what the lump of pain is ... when he asked me ... my answer came out naturally so, I know it's true ... I answered, "it's heartache". It's pure heartache.

Note by this Author:

I always promised to write, describe grief as I lived it ... try to tell you what it's like. I write about pain, grief ... real life as I live it. I write what I think. I never argue anything with anyone ... I write for others to read, go on with their life ... come back again if interested in anything I have to say. I'm surprised at the ones who have followed me on my blogs all through time ... I'm most honored. You all have stayed with Me as I lived the loss of my son. I treasure you.

Written, owned by Gloria Faye Brown Bates Gloria Bates Colors Skip Bates Tommy M Sidden Dukester Kissy Camie Precious Camo Photos are owned by Me, also.

What's On My Mind?

Gloria Faye Brown Bates ... taken 2019 Fall

What's on my mind this morning? Facebook ... these are my thoughts this morning.

This weekend has been one of doing something we don't normally do ... well, maybe sometimes at Christmas. We have watched Christmas movies one after the other on Lifetime TV.

Watching the beautiful stories ... feeling emotions with each character was good for us. We were feeling for others even if fictional ... rooted for the underdog ... glad the 'bad' guys got what they deserved ... and the couple (guy and girl) ... yes, the couples we thought were ... meant for the other ... got together.

I avoid these kinds of movies because ... I don't like to feel the tears in my eyes ... emotion in my Heart. I've always been like this ... I can't help it. Even if it's a story I feel the ... pain. If I can get through the sad parts of a movie ... I love the good feelings of 'they lived happily ever after ... The End'.

I felt pure satisfaction each time the greedy, nasty characters 'got their payback'. I believe in ... payback ... when Karma deals it out. If I have a hand in someone's payback who hurt anyone I love or Me ... I have a hand and it knows how to close a door. Not to hurt others but, to let them know how something feels ... no more, no less than what they dealt out.

If I sound mean, I'm not at all ... I believe in 'an eye for an eye'. I really believe if someone does something bad ... shoot someone ... cut someone ... beat someone ... rob someone ... their punishment should be immediately if there isn't any doubt they did the deed. Do it publicly where all their peers can see what happens when they do bad ... here, I am thinking of all the defiant faces on the news each morning after a night of shooting up people, places, murdering others. No remorse ... no feelings ... of ... oh my God, I just took a life if not lives ... of real people.

Let everyone see their asses shot ... let everyone see 'their asses' beaten ... shame them. Some people would die ... because they had no regard for the life of others, people or animals. Life has no value to them ... what good is someone like that in this world? Think about it.

I know this can shock people coming from ME. I'm one of the most kindest, caring people in this world. I love with my very Heart. I also, can hate ... feel the pain of others treated wrongly from that same Heart. I can want to hurt ... to protect. Why do you think fathers hurt, take someone out if they rape their little daughters? Think about it. Pure love, caring ... good can turn ugly if someone crosses the line. They deserve all they get for ... punishment ... yes, even death.

I watch every morning the horrible crimes inflicted upon others on the news. I don't even see, hear of a fraction of them in all the world ... I do know they happen everywhere. How well I knew when traveling constantly ... every news channel reported it. I don't hear everywhere now ... but, I do pay attention to the world news.

I am left wondering 'what next?' What next to do to really stop such violence, crime on ... to others? Really? What? What is going to work ... now? Prison doesn't work ... house arrest doesn't work ... jail time doesn't work ... a lot of these crimes are committed so others can survive ... so they can make money from selling others' valuables, get money from their bank accounts. They survive on the lives of others ... or deaths. They sell others ... human trafficking ... to buy jewelry, live a rich life never hearing the cries of pure suffering.

People are 'removed' from life when they stand in the way of others who want something that person prevents them from having as long as they are alive. You know the saying ... 'not over my dead body'. Well, yes ... if the body is dead ... someone has taken you out of the equation. They can walk in ... take whatever it was they felt was worth taking your life for. I've known people who have died for one dollar in their pocket.

Wow ... there are things such as people shooting others to gain points, status with their peers. Drive-by shootings finally reached the East coast some years ago. I clearly remember Skip and I talking in the late 90's when we drove a tractor-trailer to the West coast ... where drive-bys happened frequently. We said 'one day ... it's just a matter of time drive-by shootings will be on the East coast ... sure enough, it's here.

Every horrific crime has been committed ... every scam imaginable has happened now ... what else is left to the imagination? What other punishments are left to stop it drastically or ... once and for all?

Should we put the murderers, robbers in clear boxes in a public square ... each day heap all kinds of degrading punishments on them so everyone can watch? Then ... when they have 'reaped what they sowed' ... let them go ... or not go at all ... depending? Slaughter them in public ... one limb at a time letting their friends see, hear their screams, cries? Think about how your loved one suffered when that person killed, beat, robbed them. No one heard their cries as their life's blood ran out from their bodies onto the ground. No one excepting the bastard who took their life.

Wouldn't you get satisfaction watching someone's ass get beaten where everyone could see ... after beating your child, wife, or mother? Wouldn't it be like ointment on a wound ... healing to see them ... hear them as they received 'an eye for an eye' ... no more ... no less?

These are some of my thoughts this morning ... and for Facebook's 'what's on your mind'? Does this mean my thoughts are set in concrete ...that I'm close-minded in the way I think ... believe? NO ... tomorrow ... I may look at things in a whole different way. I may have ... changed my mind. My thoughts are in the moment ... NOW.

Today though ... this is ... what's on my mind. I won't argue, debate this with anyone. I write ... letting my imagination have the freedom to think, see in my mind whatever it wants to. This is where my stories come from. This is a story.

This is ME, my thoughts today ... maybe not the same thoughts tomorrow ... but ... still ME. If you have followed me through the years ... you know this about ME. If not ... now ... you can see you never know any more than I do ... what I will write, think ... next. :) <3 :)

Note by this Author:

I write the colors of my life, thoughts as I feel them. Today ... my thoughts have bordered on the darker colors of life ... colors no one likes unless ... you are a murderer, shooter, robber or do really bad things to destroy people, animals.

You are the ones I take pleasure in seeing suffer like your victims ... just as the pleasure you feel while torturing, harming innocent people, animals. I have the perfect character I write about sometimes ... Victoria Fairchild. I wish there were many characters like her ... Victoria Fairchild ... in this world, living quietly ... meting out justice.

Who am I to say such? Just ... ME. Who am I? Just someone who writes stories ... fiction and non-fiction. I can write the stories any way I want to. My characters can ... will do anything I write them to do. Sometimes ... they take over my fingers typing out their own stories. :) :) <3 I love to sit back at those times and let my fingers talk. It has been a long time.

Thoughts, ideas, photos/written here are owned by ... Gloria Faye Brown Bates. Skip Bates Tommy M Sidden Gloria Faye Brown Bates Precious Camo Dukester Kissy Camie

Blue Ball Lightning

Gloria Faye Brown Bates ... photo taken 2018 winter

I sat on the old vinyl, red couch in my Grandma Alma's living room. I was under the quilt that somehow magically appeared to 'save' me.

I watched ... I knew it was coming ... coming to sit, stare at me as if it were deciding to get ME ... hurt me. I didn't want to ... I kept peeping out through the crack I left in the quilt.

I jumped when lightning struck close by ... somehow as young as I was ... I knew ... it was time! Sure enough ... as I sat on the old, red couch facing my evil aunt's bedroom ... it rolled out through the door toward me.

It sat there ... I felt its attention on me ... I felt ice-cold ... fear paralyzing my little body, my voice. I couldn't cry for help. It watched me ... as I peeped at it through the quilt.

My eyes quickly darted to my Grandma Alma, George sitting in the next room ... Grandma Alma sat in her old, upholstered slightly pink chair ... it rocked. George always sat beside her in his cane-bottomed chair. George was blind but, his cane-bottomed chairs were in demand. He was good.

I couldn't call them to help me! My eyes went right back to the huge ball that rolled out of my teenage aunt's bedroom ... it was blue ... it looked dangerous. It was a blue ball of lightning just a little bigger than a basketball. It teased me ... rolling slowly toward me. Fear unlike no other filled my mind ... I couldn't scream.

Then ... it lost interest in me ... dissipated into thin air. It always happened to me when thunderstorms came up while living at my Grandma Alma's house ... the portal to Hell ... where we lived in the flames of Hell ... where Hell-raising was always going on.

Again ... as a little, innocent girl I just knew everyone lived the same way. Can you imagine my amazement as I became older through time how surprised I was to find out ... no, they didn't.

All my life ... I've never known anyone else to see blue lightning balls roll through the house during a thunderstorm ... yet, it was a common occurrence in ... HELL. Any, everything was possible there.

Once I saw it over the Hardee's in Louisburg, NC when Tommy was little. We were in a TG&Y store across from it at that time ... that ball was bigger than 2-3 basketballs ... very red right over the fast food restaurant. That was the first, only red ball of lightning I ever saw. Then, when living in Mebane, NC as a child ... I saw more blue lightning.

As an adult ... where ... I saw the blue lightning stood out to me. I researched it online ... I read it was associated with 'evil'. Each place except Hardee's (I had no way of knowing who was in there) ... there was 2 very evil women who were young women then ... lived in each dwelling I lived in.

They affected my life in a very bad, awful ... evil way as a child and when I laid dying with cancer. They did the unthinkable. That's food for another story I'll write one day. One was my aunt, one was my step-mother.

This is what came to mind this morning as my mind wandered the memory halls of my mind.

I would be very interested if you ever experienced seeing blue ball lightning I saw often as a little girl, or even the red ball lightning I saw only once in my lifetime. It's an interesting phenomenon ... that is what shaped my fear of storms as a child.

To me ... a little girl wide-eyed with fear, wonder ... that blue ball of lightning appeared to be alive ... as if it watched me ... as if it were deciding to get me ... eat me. When it would move slowly toward me ... the fear mounted until I was faint ... then, it would stop, sit 'forever' ... disappear.

Note by this Author:

True story, photo written, owned by Gloria Faye Brown Bates Faye Brown Bates. Skip Bates Tommy M Sidden Dukester Kissy Camie Precious Camo

No one would believe the things the 2 evil women did to me because of hatred, jealousy ... one jealous that I was pretty, seemed to have 'everything' in my young life as a young woman ... one full of jealousy, anger that I was my beautiful mother's child ... and her husband happened to be my father. It couldn't be denied .. I favored him ... a lot.

When both saw the opportunity to strike ... strike they did. Strange enough .. the stepmother died with cancer just after her evil deed (it didn't take long once she learned why she couldn't eat) ... I survived to learn how evil, how much she hated me from a child up. She did the most awful, awful thing to hurt ME, succeeded. Strangely ... I still had compassion for her ... I still felt love, pain for a woman who hated my very existence.

One last little memory here ... I won't ever forget going to my father's mother's funeral ... I made myself get up from bed ... tried to act strong ... drove to Mebane, NC by myself. I was trying to survive cancer ... my body ravaged by the disease ... oh God, I looked so bad ... no hair ... probably the wig was on lopsided ... I can't remember ... I loved my Grandmother Lola ... that love made me get up from bed to go. I had lost such weight ... I can't even remember what I wore. I probably deserved to be made fun of. Skip was on the road trying to work ... I didn't let him know what I was going to do. He was hurt when he learned what happened.

I was made fun of by my sisters and their families ... I'll never forget their laughter at me while they sat ... ran in and out to smoke their cigarettes. They made sure to look at me ... my eyes as they laughed, saying mean things. I was dying ... did no one care? Doesn't matter ... I still feel love for them today. They are just that kind of people.

I won't ever forget looking at one of my sister's daughter-in-law ... knowing she was a stripper in some club ... as she made fun of me. I never knew any of them ... even my sisters very well. I can't even imagine making fun of either of them or their family members. I only loved them.

Life goes on ... it only served to make me fight harder to win my battle with cancer ... non-Hodgkins lymphoma. I fought that battle a little over 3 years. Then it was only to go into another battle ... Skip was diagnosed with colon cancer ... surgery removed 27 1/2 inches of his colon. The fight was on for him, for me to get very strong.

Don't ever feel sorry for ME as you read my stories ... these are events that shaped me, put steel in my backbone in order to survive all my Life Battles. If one thing never happened ... it would have made me ... less strong. So, you see ... it has taken all to bring me this far today.

I am a survivor ... I am like a big, redwood tree ... I've survived many, many storms of Life ... I am still standing ... I'm still smiling ... I still have a big Heart ... I still love. I never grew bitter, angry or mean. My body is riddled with visible scars, invisible scars of many battles of Life. Each scar represents strength ... Life, the will to live ... and my Grandma Alma's fighting spirit that lives in me today.

Good things can ... come from Hell ... I'm here, a for-real good person even if I can cuss good if, when the occasion should arise.