“Evie , you have to fight for everything in this life.” He said as he lean on the hood of his car. As always his mouth was full of dip and that smell mixed with the oil caked on his skin. “Fight?” He nodded his head and spit out the tobacco. “Fight and fight smart.” At the rip old age of 6, I had no idea what he was really talking about but I learned. I pushed and I fought until I had no fight left in me. As an adult I asked him , why he didn’t warn me the cost. As he smiled with hazed eyes and drunken smile he relied. “You have to fight and when you need rest find a vice.” I looked at him , really looked , the broken man on that chair out of his mind with the vices that now consumed his life. The man who seemed to have an halo around his head when I was a child, was now a fallen one.

I let go of that mentality after that day. I still progressed but much slower and only into things I wanted. I thought the fight was finally over ….

——- 10 years later ________

“Evie, fight for me , or at least for our marriage!” He said as I walked out the door tugging a suitcase. “I don’t fight Teddy”. He grabbed my hands and stopped me on the front step. “Just a minute” “what is it ?” He replied and exhaled , “you can’t be a lover and not a fighter.” Remember kenu reeves , he said it on that talk show. You have to be willing to fight for what you love or you have nothing at all”