B71) The Russian Speed skater at the Olympics 1976

The first Olympic Games I remember watching with any real interest was the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal Canada. Dorothy Hamel was one of the stars from that Olympics. I had a wicked crush on her. Nadia Comaneci shocked the world with her amazing performances as a gymnast in the 1976 Olympic games. She was the first female gymnast to be awarded a perfect score of 10 in an Olympic gymnastic event. 

I was sixteen and recently became a new driver. A big deal for a sixteen year old. We lived on Morgan Lane in Hoffman Estates, IL. We had been there for two years at that point. It was a house. A big four bedroom ranch style house. Big back yard. It looked like middle town America. We actually had a house. A home. It's the first time I remember us ever owning a house. It was a taste of normalcy. A horrific tease.

The new house was brought to us partially by our new step dad. It began to feel like we might just end up with a greatly overdue dose of normalcy and stability. Freshman year I got almost straight A's. One lonely B on my report card.  Normalcy was all I needed in order for my academic endeavours to blossom.

I began to relax my posture.  Living in this new house began to feel good. I begin to believe. I thought we were on a good path. I was wrong. The taste of normalcy was nothing more than a tease. It had no permanence. The Permanency and normalcy was an illusion and temporary. What hurt the worst was getting fooled again. Motherfuckers. They fooled me again. At sixteen I thought I was beyond being fooled again. I was wrong.

The only permanence we were ever going to have was a lack of it. We permanently lacked permanence.

The Olympics were much easier to watch back in 1976. It was a simpler time. I've grown to understand how people from other generations can say when looking back "it was a simpler time"  The seventies were a much simpler time in comparison to the last decade.

When watching the Olympics back in 1976 there were not as many commercials. There was an abundance of information about the event or events being covered for the moment. Excellent interviews with current or former athletes. 

It's difficult to watch the Olympics now. Every minute seems to be canned with commercials. Obnoxious and disgusting commercials. The best option you have in watching the Olympics today is recording it and fast forwarding through the vile adult diaper commercials, the annoying erection commercials, insurance commercials, food commercials, food never consumed by world class athlete commercials. Nauseating commercials of one type or another.

The commercialization of the Olympics is a tragedy of Olympic proportion. No one cares. This is the new normal. The over commercialization of event possible is the goal of big business. Big business owns the world and they run in a way that fattens their coffers a little more every day. I can't stand the commercials.

Now I have a craving for McDonald's :-(

What I remember most about the 1976 Olympic games is this. I watched a speed skating race. Those athletes are amazing. The size of the quads on those skaters seems super human. Not normally an event I would watch but there I was. I was sitting in the family room with some of my sisters. I think my mom and step dad were in the room. All our eyes were transfixed onto the TV. It was kind of a family time. The speed skating race was won by a Russian gentleman. As usual they interviewed the Gold medal winner.
He was a Gold medal winner in the Olympics. It's a big deal. A very big deal. One of the biggest honors an athlete can obtain. It's the Gold medals of gold medal. In America a Gold medal translates into $$$$ Time to capitalize on all that training. All the hours of training. I’m not sure how it works for Russians.

The commentator ask the Russian gold medal winner what's next. What are the plans for your future. What were his hopes for the future.

His answer rocked my insignificant little world.

As it turned out the Gold medal winner had a full time job in Russia (or where ever his home town was). He was a fireman. His full time job was helping save the lives of his fellow citizens. He rescued people for his full time job. After a day of saving lives and making his community a better place to be he went to the ice skating rink and trained on his speed skating. He hope was to one day win a Gold medal for his family, his friends, his community. His Country.

They took the time to interview the Gold medal winner. He took the time to thank some people, his coaches, his teammates, his family, his friends. He won it for them.

The gold medal winner went on to say:

"I would surely give my gold medal up if only we could have peace in the world. Peace between American and Russia or rather The Soviet Union back then"

While holding the greatest prize any athlete can earn and possess his thoughts turn to peace across the world.

"I would surely give my gold medal up if only we could have peace in the world"

His words. His statement. His intention, all were awe inspiring.

As I tried to process the Russian's words they came up conflicting what I thought I knew about the russians. I was taught they were the enemy......In my mind I went through a long series of school textbooks, classroom discussions, news reports on TV and in the newspapers. I remembered movies, lots and lots of movies potraying russians as the enemy. They were even in the cartoons....all of this helped me to the conclusion the Russians were the bad people. America was the good..

These notions were programmed into me.

Someone has been lying to me. Someone has been lying to us. The skaters words changed me. Forever.

Who am I now?

"I would surely give my gold medal up if only we could have peace in the world"

The gold medal winner Those words changed me forever. Astonishment was exploding inside my mind. In my mind I watched a long series of lies and propaganda begin to fade away.

How can this be? I read in so many textbooks that the Russians were the enemy. I was taught in school they were bad. Evil. I watched movie after movie about the Russians being the enemy. I was taught they were bad and we were good. I was taught they wanted to hurt us, to hurt America. We needed a strong army to defend against them.

Now I watch this Russian fireman that won a gold medal and he offered to give it up in exchange for peace in the world. I don't ever recall hearing any American gold medal winners offering to give up their medals for world peace. This russian gentelman is not a bad guy. Why did the American government spend so much moneny in an effort to make me think the russians were the eneemy

Why did big business interests in American want me to hate russians? Why are the textbooks wrong? I have been lied to. We have been lied to. Americans have been lied to. The textbooks are wrong. The government is wrong. The news is wrong.
The seeds of contempt were planted in the fertile soil of my mind that day. They took root immediately. I'm changed. This changed me. Hearing that Russian gentleman speak those honest and heart felt words changed me.

 
At sixteen I thought, if you can't trust the government, if you can't trust the schools and textbooks, and if you can't trust the news/media, who can you trust?

I needed to hear that Russian gentleman speak. Maybe it was the beginning for me. The beginning of being woken up. Life is not what you think it is.

The Russians are not the enemy.

Who is?

Why does there always need to be an enemy?

What would are world be like if there was no enemy? Imagine what all that money, manpower and brainpower in action but not for war. Imagine all that working on peace and the betterment of humanity. This truly would be a garden of Eden. All we need to do is lose this need for the enemy.

But they keep lying to us.

 

B70) Time

It's been three years, three months and one week since the accident.

B69) В Россию с любовью

Я был поражен тем, у меня так много хитов от людей в России. Я так любопытно, что это обращение?


Я собираюсь посетить Россию в один прекрасный день

B67) Hearts and MInds

"When you got em by the balls their hearts and minds will follow"

 

B64) I shutter to think....

 

What if I won my appeal. What if won at trial. What if I exposed the lies told against me by the detective? What if I proved what happened that day at the airport. What if my conviction had never existed or been vacated. What if I won a record setting law suit against the state and all parties involved in my wrongful prosecution and imprisonment.

Money. Lots and lots of money if only the truth would have come out.

So much good came from prison ------------------------------------- for me. I shudder to think about life had I not spent six years in prison. What if my spiritual ephapiny never happened.

I shudder to think...

B63) Some of my appeal facts

He lied. At my trial the detective who arrested me lied on the witness stand. It's called perjury punishable with up to five years in prison. The detective who arrested me at Sky Harbor International airport Perjured himself in order to secure a conviction against me. Even though I was the defendant in the case I was stunned at what the detective testified to.

There were two detectives at the airport. Only one showed up for the trail. Why is this? Why didn't my lawyer put both on the witness stand?

He lied because of me? This goes to show you how low his moral threshold was. Break the law to enforce the law. It's hypocrisy.

Please keep in mind I was guilty. I had weed in my luggage. But there are rules. Laws. If the cops don't uphold the laws, what good are they?

When I heard the lies It was obvious they were trying to hide something. When the prosecutor does not want the truth or facts muddying up his , her or their case, then you know somethings wrong.

The courts exist for facts. They are seeking the truth.

The end does not justify the means

I was arrested at Sky Harbor International Airport. I believe it was early afternoon. Could have been late morning. I checked my luggage at the ticket counter up front. With my boarding pass in hand I headed to the gate. It was a convenient coincidence to find my boarding gate next to one of the airport bars.

I need a drink. I was so nervous. Still after all these years I was nervous. On the outside I was calm and happy. All was right with me and the world. On the inside, my guts were in knots. My heart was racing like the engine at the Indy 500. Living in this duality comes at a price. You don’t realize the price until you are standing there with the bill in your hand. ---

It’s too late.

You own it.

I grabbed a vodka rocks and headed to the giant window in front of the plane I would soon board. I stood there watching and looking attentively for my suitcases as the baggage handlers loaded suitcase after suitcase. Bingo. There they are. Whew. One of the luggage guys loads my marijuana filled suitcases into the cargo hold.

Whew. Wow. Okay. Good. Good. Good.

That’s over. That’s the rough part. They would have busted me by now if they were going to bust me at all. I can relax. Such a relief. I do relax. I can let my guard down now, at least for the flight. I will begin to feel the panic again as soon as the wheels touch the ground at chicago’s O'Hara international airport.

Sometimes its better to be lucky instead of being good.

As I sat there at the bar I felt like I dodged a bullet. I get it. I know it. I do realize it. My name is Chip Knight and I just dodged another bullet. This is what I thought as I sat there. I could relax for a few hours. Then someone tapped me on the shoulder. I was sitting at the bar relaxing and enjoying how fucking smart I am. I want to make a declaration.

“My name is chip knight and I’m a genius with more guts than brains. I can do anything”

I turned around in my bar stool to see who was tapping on my shoulder while in my euphoria.

It was a cop.

Yes.

I am not kidding.

All I could see was the badge. All I could feel was the beginning of the depth of my stupidity. I could see it and I could feel it. It had no end. There was no bottom. I was in free fall into the depths of Hell. With the ground rushing up at me I froze in time, right there. With that hellish feeling. I had to look away. All I could see coming was a ghastly and wretched sight.

Instantly I have a new declaration:

My name is chip knight, I am the stupidest man on the planet.

It’s horrifying how fast things can change.

I was arrested and put in handcuffs. The police officers took my boarding ticket with attached luggage reciepts. The cops inlisted the help of a baggage handler to go into the plane's carho hold and retrieve my luggage.

Accourding to the cops my luggage never made it to the plane. According to the cops, I was arrested at the ticket counter.

The baggage handler is the person that can testify as to what really happened on that day. My appeal was based on finding that luggage handler. That man could free with me his testimony.

B62) Court appointed lawyers (part 1)

The detective perjured himself during my trail. I can prove this on appeal. This is the reason for the  appeal. When I prove the detective lied on the witness stand I get to walk. Not only will I be freed, I get to sue the detective, personally (his car his house his monies would be mine). My trail lawyer told me when the cop went outside the bounds of the law in his efforts to catch me he opened his self up personally for criminal and civil damages. I can sue him and the police department for their illegal actions.

Years I was investigate. Time and time again they came close. Eventually they got me, at the airport. They had an informant giving them info on my travel plans. Was the informant my wife?  As it turns out I did not know my wife as well as I thought.  The cops were waiting for me. No one else knew I was on my way to the airport. It doesn't matter at this point.  If one of us had to go away I'm glad it was me. I'm very okay with it. My wife would not have been able to overcome something like prison. Years in prison. It would have destroyed her. Prison made me stronger. It awakened the sleeping giant within me.

It did not matter that the person testifying against me in front of the grand jury was my wife's best customer.  The time for this to matter has long passed. It was not the beginning of the end for  it was the end the end. The only thing that mattered in the end was who would be with our daughter? I much preferred it being my wife.


It's all my fault. I should have quit. I knew I was a target. I was under investigation. I couldn't stop. I couldn't stop myself.  I needed my drug, my fix. The work. I was addicted to the  work. I needed to stay busy like a drug trafficker does. I needed the adrenaline rush. I needed more. more. more god dam it! I want that fucking drug coursing through my body. Through my bloodstream. Adrenaline. I need adrenalin. I love adreanline. I want more. More. More.

I want

I need 

More.

More.

More.

To be right on the edge of living and dying. To be right on the edges of freedom and incarceration.

I'm all in.

I'm playing for all the marbles.

Back to the point:
Years I was investigate. When they finally got me red handed they fucked it up. The cop had to lie about what he did at the airport when he arrested me. All that work done, hours spent, money spent, manpower. Lots and lots of effort and the only path to a conviction for the prosecutor was to have the detective perjure himself.


It's comically stupid.

After the jury found me guilty of possession of marijuana my trial lawyer turned to me and said:

"I'm sorry. The conviction will never stand on appeal. I will testify as to my mistakes when in court for your appeal. 

I should have stood up immediately and told the judge what my lawyer said. To put it on the record.

She looked exhausted . Her tired and over worked incompetence cost me a conviction. I believed her when she said she would file the Rule 32 and testify. She did file the Rule 32. She did a great job at that. She was great at filing simple motions. Things got tricky when it was time to do your job and be a lawyer defending me. 

It was the night before the trail. The public defender stopped by the jail to have a pretrial conference with her client.  We began going over the facts of the case. She was going by the "story" the cops told her. My own lawyer never prepared a defense based on the truth and facts.  It was horrific news on the eve of the trail. My lawyer had not prepared a defense based on the truth and facts.

The trail did not go well.

Fact: The typical prosecutor has half the caseload of the typical public defender. That's not fair to the public defenders and it's especially not fair for the defendants. Because of the Constancy involved with utilizing the public defenders office.

My court appointed trail lawyer filed my Rule 32 (appeal for ineffectiveness of counsel). When the day came to be in court my trail lawyer/public defender nowhere to be found. My Public Defender was not good to her word. She decided I would pay for her incompetence. Me alone. She would never be held accountable for her incompetence as my lawyer.

When the day came to be in court for my appeal, for my Rule 32, guess who was absent? My trail lawyer, the public defender. The only advice my state appointed appeal lawyer had for me:

"Be a man and do the time"

Can you imagine a criminal defense lawyer saying something like that to a client. 

"Be a man and do the time"

He did not care about the facts of my case and appeal. He did not want to be a man and do the job he was paid to do. I had a path to freedom and my state sponsored appeal lawyer says:

"Be a man and do the time"

My state appointed appeal lawyer was not the least bit interested in the merits of my case or helping me in getting my conviction over turned.

I told my state appointed appeal lawyer:

"My trail lawyer told me she would testify as to her mistakes during my trail. Where is she"?

My state appointed appeals lawyer said to me:

"Why should your trail lawyer (the public defender) tarnish her reputation for you"

I responded:

"Because she made mistakes before my trail and during my trail resulting in my conviction. Isn't that enough of a reason? It's about responsibility, Isn't it? Isn't the determining of responsibility the reason for our criminal and civil courts?  I'm being held responsible for my actions. Why shouldn't my public defender be held accountable for her actions. Why shouldn't the detective that perjured himself during my trail be held accountable for his actions?

"Why shouldn't you be held accountable for your actions as my lawyer "

I said to my state appointed appeal lawyer"

Why should my trial lawyer not be held responsible for her action. Especially when her actions and gross incompetence lead to my conviction and a ten year prison sentence? Why am I made to be held accountable but no one else but all around me it? 

My appeal lawyer continued on with more of the same. His argument was:

"Be a man and do the time"

What an asshole my appeal lawyer was. He never envisioned I would end up a computer scientist after I got out of prison. He never imagined I would become a college professor, an IT consultant with a security clearance. None of those people ever thought I would end up with a credible voice that traveled round the world and back again on a daily basis.

Why didn't my appeal lawyer "be a man and do his job"? He was paid for his services then acted like an incompetent asshole.

With respect to the individuals utilizing the public defenders. Such a high percentage of those being represented by the public defenders consist of the poor. It's the poorest that society has been deemed "not worthy or of no value". It's the poorest of the poor in our society most often going to trail with a public defender. Time after time the people needing the most help are those getting the least help.

B61) " I can do five years standing on my hands " : he said...

Maricopa County Court. 1992

I was sitting in the jury box shackled to four or five other residence of the Maricopa County Jail.  I was listening to the judge. He sentenced four or five people back to back. Along with watching the sentencing I get to watch an equal number of motions being argued. Some lawyers get all riled up for their client. They show passion. ---- Not my state appointed lawyer.  Zero passion, zero enthusiasm and even less competency.

I watched the subtle changes in the judges demeanor as a variety of different lawyers argued their cases. I was back in court on a procedural motion. Nothing of consequence from my awesome legal team on this day. Still I sat there paying attention to the judge and the lawyers. 

I watched the difference in lawyers with respect to how they dressed. I never did see a prosecutor wearing two thousand dollar suit or a five hundred dollar sport coat. The prosecutor at my trial showed up every day, all five foot six of him. He showed up with a pock marked ache scarred face, a suit from K-Mart and a bad attitude. The worst part about this guy, he hated me.

Sitting through a meriad of court dates. Stuck in the court room for hours one end and I'd watch. I became keenly aware of how the prosecutors and defense lawyers conducted themselves. I  noticed how the prosecutors and defense lawyers reacted to each other while in front of the judge as well as watching them when not in front of the judge. There's a big difference.

I noticed how the lawyers interacted with the court's administrative staff. Some lawyers seem to piss everyone off.

There was a gentelman being sentenced. The judge gave him five years. 

The veteran defendant said to the judge after hearing his sentence of five years,

“Hell judge. Just five years. I can do five years standing on my hands”

The judge responded immediately:

“Well, lets make it ten years then. This will give you time to get back on your feet”

The judge swung his gavel producing a crisp sharp smack. It was done. Take that smart ass. The convict looked as if he just taken a bullet to the heart. Everybody hearing that looked stunned in disbelief at what the judge said and did.

It was perfect.

The bailiff called the next case.

And the world kept turning...

B60) Waiting on the jury

Maricopa County Courthouse, Phoenix Arizona; 1993.

I went on trial for possession of marijuana. This was the marijuana found in my luggage at Sky Harbor airport 1992.

The chairs in the court room are very comfortable. They are unlike any chair I ever sat in. The chairs I refer to are the chairs for the lawyers. I bet the judge’s chair is the most comfortable of all. The chairs in the jury box were not bad. They were definitely a step or two down from the lawyers chairs and probably more than a few steps down from the judges chair in quality and comfort. When you get stuck in one of those for hours you begin to appreciate how comfortable they are.

My trial did not last a day. When it ended I was taken down stairs to wait while the jury was out deliberating. No more comfortable chairs. I was given a sack lunch and put in a cell with two other inmates. One of the guys was not too social. I can’t recall much about either of them. What I do remember is being asked if I wanted to get high?

What an odd question to ask someone in a jail cell. Get high in jail while the jury was out deliberating on my drug charges?

“Of course I want to get high”

If ever there was a time needing an altered state of consciousness it was this time. Right now

When the offer came I wasn’t sure what drug he had but I said yes?

What happened next was as shocking as it was disgusting. Dude went over to the toilet. Dropped his pants. Sat down. Reached into his anus and pulled out a balloon of crystal meth.

OMG

I never expected this. I don't know what I was expecting when I heard the offer to get high? Unsocial guy was quick to weigh in with his commentary on what was going on.

“You gotta be kidding me. Stuck in this fucking place with this mother fucker”

He said to himself loud enough for all to hear.

Dude sat there on the toilet preparing things. He came over with a couple of lines cut out on his legal pad. He handed me a paper straw and I snorted a line.

“Hello”

I think I’d been in the jail for six months to that point. No drugs or alcohol in my system. The speed hit me like a freight train coming down out of the high Sierras.

Doing crystal meth in Sheriff Joe Arpaio jail while waiting for the jury to come back with a verdict on my drug trial. The irony did not escape me. Sheriff Joe Arpaio has only the best crystal meth in his jail. He must be so proud!

The jury came back fast. I did not get an opportunity to eat my bag lunch. For some reason I lost my appetite. I was taken back upstairs by the guard sent to fetch me. the guard remarked about my energy and attitude, considering the circumstances.

“You seem to be in too good a mood for someone in such dire straits”

“It’s the crystal meth I did down stairs” I told her (lady guard).“It put me in a good mood”

She stopped dead in her tracks. She made me stop too.

I said “I’m just kidding” with a smile. “What do you think, guilty or innocent”?

We began moving again. The deputy said in all seriousness

“Guilty as charged”

Yes indeed. I was found guilty as charged. My sentencing would not happen for another month.

B59) Word of Honor

I was subpoenaed by the Pima County prosecutor . It was back to the Pima County Jail. At the time I was at Rincon prison in Tucson, Az. When the transport showed to pick me up I had just started reading the book, Word of Honor by Nelson DeMille. I took the book with me. I wasn't sure how far I'd get with the book. 

I’d been in prison for a couple of years. My former business associate (Larry) was finally going to trail. He was able to delay his trail for four or five years. I was in the Pima County jail when the trial began. Larry would come by every day to visit me in the jail. He never looked worse. It got to him. Four years under indictment turned Larry into a raging alcoholic. His wife left him. She was a co-conspirator that pleaded guilty and got probation on her charges.

A couple of months before the start of the trail Larry settled with the IRS. He paid hundreds of thousand of dollars to the IRS in an out of court settlement. If he won at trial his legal issues would go away forever.

The trail ended on a Friday if memory serves. When the jury went to deliberate Larry split. Bye-bye. If the jury came back guilty he would stay gone. If they came back not guilty it would not matter if he was there in the courtroom or not. Larry was indicted on half a dozen charges. All marijuana related. Because of his many priors, if Larry was found guilty on one charge it meant a twenty five year prison sentence.

The jury came back guilty on all six charges. And a life sentence to someone involved with a non-violent and victimless crime. Who does this make sense to?

Larry went to his parents house. Got a bag of cash, a bottle of vodka and one of his dad’s cars. He was fleeing the state. He was not going south. Sixty miles south is the Mexican border. Going north did not make sense.

Larry got as far as the phoenix area. He pulled off the highway bound for a convenience store and more liquor. Once in the store Larry began making a scene. He was blackout drunk. The manager of the store called 911. A police officer was dispatched to see what the problem was. When the officer approached Larry, Larry pulled out his gun and shot the officer.

The officer hit the ground. He pulled his gun and shot Larry three times. It was a nightmarish scene to be sure. After the officer shot Larry three times his gun jammed. Larry walked over to the officer laying on the ground and was getting ready to shot the officer again. This is when a bystander jumped on Larry and wrestled the gun away from him. Larry laid on the ground in the convenience store and bleed to death. 

I think the officer made a recovery from the wound. Larry shot him in the hip.

All this happened after dark on a Friday night

I get up Saturday morning for a Pima County jail breakfast. After breakfast I turn the tv on. The lead story is Larry having been killed the previous evening. I did not know. I did not want to find out by watching the local news.

I flipped out. I was taken to the psych ward of the jail. When I left the prison earlier that week I brought a book with me. I smuggled books with me everywhere I went. The jail guards took my book when I was processed into the jail. I would get the book when I left and went back to prison.

For some reason the novel I'd brought with me from prison was given to me after I was sent to the psych ward.

B58) oops

B57) The Accident Part 4

I was oblivious as to how I looked. When I got home from the hospital and had a chance to see myself in the mirror I found it disturbing. I looked like death warmed over. Green, yellow and pale are words that best describe my appearance. Worst of all the thousand yard stare was back. It’s the look of terror in my eyes. This look more commonly found in the eyes of those on the front line of the battle field during war. I remember the look and I hate seeing it again.

They put radiated dye in my bloodstream the morning of the accident. This was for the CT scanner. Normally you are in there for thirty minutes or more. They shoot the radioactive dye into me and the images can be captured in just a few minutes.

I remember being in the CT scanner. I remember talking to the nurses. Telling them about my pain and the seemingly ineffectiveness of the pain meds I have been given.

I cannot go into that scanner again without the aid of a zanax. The memory and horror are too powerful. The CT scanner is the worst but every visit to the doctor brings back more of a memory I want gone. Sitting in the waiting room, smelling the smells, seeing doctors, nurses and support staff remind me of what I am trying to forget.

"Please go away" I tell the memory.

I close my eyes. With all my might I wish the memory gone ................... to no avail.

I shake and tremble on the inside. Nobody can see it. It’s a curse. Residue from the accident.

The pain and agony was there when I woke. The pain was with me all day. The pain was with me when I went to bed and the pain woke me every night. Every single night without exception I wake up to a terror induced pain. I’m soaked. My hair, my pillow and the sheets. This is the new normal.

There’s nothing normal about the new normal.  Waking up every night soaked, consumed with terror and pursued by agony. I cannot escape it.

"Go away. god damn it"

Pain cannot be reasoned with. You cannot negotiate with terror. The words fall on deaf ears. Pain is a cruel master. Unforgiving. Unrelenting. When I close my eyes I can feel the impact. The memory of slamming into the car and being catapulted off the bike. I’m flying. God help me. I don’t want to be flying. Not like this.

I relive hitting the ground and remember sliding and tumbling down the street. I felt like a rag doll. I recall thinking during the accident, I need to stop. I need to stop tumbling and sliding but I had no control.I could not stop myself.

I remember it all. The memory feels like a fucking curse. I don't want to remember. I don't need to remember. It serves no purpose. Only torment. I wish I could have these memories taken away. Surgically. Methodically. I've spoken with others having had similar accidents. They have no memory of their accident. What a gift. I wonder, why me? Why do I get to remember? why do I have to remember?

4:00am. It's always 4:00am. This seems to be the bewitching hour for me.

I wake up. again. I’m shaking. Hyperventilating. Soaked in sweat. Completely covered in terror. I feel incapable of calming myself down. All I can do is lay there alone in the dark, remembering, trembling with a steady stream of tear falling off my cheeks.

It feels like prison all over again. No longer am I constrained by walls and shackles. Now I am a prisoner of pain. I'm being held against my will by something I cannot touch. I cannot get my arms around it. I'm a captive of pain and terror.

I don't know how to fight this?

I am blessed in having someone in the guestroom down the hall but when I wake in the middle of the night it’s such a lonely experience. I want to call out

“Help. Please. Someone. Anyone".

but I don't call out. Why interrupt their sleep because of my pain? It would be a month before I experienced my first glimpse of life without pain. There's a desperation in wanting to feel normal again. I want to go for a walk. I want to go for a run. I want to get up and leave my pain behind.

The pain rejects that notion without discussion.

Whatever life I had before the accident is gone. Ten years of work gone. Everything was taken and in its place was pain and terror. It doesn’t seem equitable.

There’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. Where ever I go the pain is sure to follow. All I could do was lay there and twist in the wind of agony and pain.

I learned things about pain that I never knew. Pain is insidious in nature. Pain does not make requests. Pain makes only demands. When those demands fail to be headed, pain punishes. sometimes more severely than others.

Pain is such a cruel master. Pain wants you to think it’s giving but it’s not. Its an illusion. Pain not giving. Pain is selfish. It’s a taker. It wont give and inch. It wont give a penny. It’s interest only in taking. Please believe me, what pain has to give, you do not want. Once you have it, it’s too late.

Pain takes and it takes and it takes. It takes a little more from you every minute of every day. When you think you have nothing left to give the pain will demand more. Even more. Even when you are running on empty the pain will take. This is the danger zone, when pain takes after you have given all you  have to give. Now you are running a  deficite. This is what pain really wants, for you to owe.

I felt relief when the pain began to subside. The first morning I woke up and realized I was not in agony,  It felt like a miracle. ---- then I moved. slightest movement sent me tumbling back into the arms of agony.

The constant agony began to ebb and flow like the tide. But the pain, unlike the ocean, would stay gone a little longer each time the tide went out. I was moving in the right direction. A little more. A little more. A little more. A little more relief each and every day from the constant agony. Even if it was only another minute added to the time I was agony free, it felt like progress. It was progress.

The pain would go but, much to my  chagrin, it left in its place trembling. I was trembling but only on the inside. One of my first thoughts about the trembling, I’d rather have the pain.

Who am I now?

B56) The Accident part 3

I woke at 4:00am. Who am I? I have no idea who I am. Complete amnesia. I don’t know who I am or where I am. I have no idea what happened to me. What I do know is pain. Agony. And not knowing who I am allows terror to show it's ugly face

The agony and terror appear to be formidable opponents.

I have been bested. It’s obvious. I feel the agony of defeat from the battle I cannot even remember.

The pain and agony made the situation so much worse. The pain is constant. Unrelenting. It just keeps coming, like an army. Like Xerxes and the Persian army hellbent on taking thermopylae. I feel like Leonidas, the king of Sparta and Xerses is the pain. Xerses demand I bow to his will (the pain).

I say "No". Xerses has a million man army. He is fighting a war of attrition. He keeps sending wave after wave of pain in the form of expendable soldiers.

I fight the good fight but the Persian army just keeps coming.

The pain broke me. They won. They have beaten me into submission and now they have taken my sanity. They have taken my ideity. I don’t know who I am anymore.

I am being tortured.

I am in agony.

The pain keeps coming...

It just keeps coming...

And coming...

(The tv was on, an old black and white WWII movie.

I put two and two together and got sixteen hundred and forty five point seven)

"I've been captured by the enemy. Now I am a POW"


“ Of what war”?

“I don’t know”

It was day four in the hospital after the accident. I'd not slept except for a few minutes here an there. I'm in the critical care unit at Rush Copley. They give excellent care but I'm not allowed to sleep. They come in every two hour (if not more often) to check on me. Sleep deprivation along with the pain and the pain meds have taken their toll and pushed me over the edge.

I didn’t recall the battle. I didn’t recall being shot down or having my ship sunk. I can’t even remember who started the war let alone who's in it. I'm a complete blank. I’m unclear as to how I became a prisoner of war. The only thing I’m certain of, I am a prisoner of war and I am being tortured. I look at my leg and wonder what they did to me or what they are doing to me.

The pain. I cannot think straight. I am struggling to hold one coherent thought in my mind at a time.

“What have they done to me”? I say.

"They are torturing me". They want information but I am a blank. I don't know. It's obvious they are torturing me because I'm not telling them what they want to know.

"I can't remember"

I cannot give my name, rank or serial number because I don’t know it. I do not know the answer to their questions.

"I don't know. I don't know". Don't they understand that.

"I don't know god damn it"! I want to scream this from the top of my lungs.

The pain is so bad. It's so bad. I need to get out of here. I need an escape plan. I feel certain my life is in jeopardy.

They are coming back soon. I know it. I begin trembling at the thought of them coming back and continuing on with more of the same.

I fear them coming back more than I fear dying.

I pulled out my IV and assorted connections. One connection I cannot break is the device attached to my leg (woundvac) . This device has a mobile cart with it. I don’t know what it is but it feels like a major source of my pain. I want to peal it off. It feels as if my bones are being crushed from the inside out.

I feel panic, pain and terror as I struggle with every breath. I fight to get the air in and fight to get the air out.

Agony in.

Agony out.

Agony in.

Agony out.

I can’t take the pain. I cannot take the pain.

I stand. The pain from standing makes me want to vomit. Walkings impossible so I hop. I came close to collapsing on the first hop. It felt like I'd been struck by lightening. My good leg almost buckled. Tears began running down my cheeks ---- another hop towards the door. One small hop at a time while I cling to the woundvac on it's rollers. Half way to the door my gown falls off. I'm naked. So. I don't care. I don't need it. I do not need clothes to escape. Clothes are non essential items.

I get to the door. still naked. Still in pain.

At the door I stop to catch my breath. I realize I have to urinate in the worst way. I see a cup sitting on the chair so I pick it up and releive myself. There I am. Naked as a Jay Bird. In one hand I have a cup of urine filled to the brim. The other hand I'm clutching the woundvac on rollers. I'm standing there on one leg staring at the cup of urine trying not to spill it.

I realize I can't move. ----------- Try it. While standing on one leg hold a cup of coffee and hop from one room to the next.

Then the nurses come in.

When I unplugged my IV and assorted connections I set off some alarms.

The first words out of my mouth:

"Who am I"?

"What have you done to me""


Their Response:

“We are nurses”

“You are Mr. Chip Knight”

“This is Rush Copley hospital”

The nurses got me back into bed and began to reattach all the connections.

“What about the war. What about the torture”? I point to the TV and the WWII movie, then to my leg.

“That’s the TV Mr. Knight. It's a movie". She walked over and turned it off.

"There is no war. You are not a prisoner of war. You were in a very bad motorcycle accident”

Nothing. I remember none of that. There was no accident…..or was there? One of the nurses hands me my cell phone. I take the phone and begin scrolling through names of contacts. I find a name that looks familiar for some reason. I call it.

Now it’s about 4:30am

My sister answered the phone. The instant I heard her voice my memory came back. Just like you would turn on a light switch. I went from not knowing to knowing.

Later on that morning I begged the doctor to let me go home. He heard about my escape attempt. Apparently they had given me such a high doses of the pain medicine it effected my memory. The doc oked my release and allowed me to be discharged. By the time I arrived home there was a nurse and a physical therapist waiting for me.

After getting upstairs (not an easy task in my condition) I took a shower with the woundvac off. My first shower in in five days. After the shower the nurse reattached the woundvac.

Not long after the nurse and physical therapist left I fell asleep. I slept for over twenty four hours only getting up to urinate in my bed pan.

Sleep...