In Memorium: Mark Lawrence Goodwin

  The day could not pass without reflection.

  This day will always be linked to another, which will haunt my horrors.

  In Memorium, Mark Lawrence Goodwin, Constable of Police.

 

 

 

There, but for the stroke of a pen, go I.

Mark left behind two children, Megan and Alyse, ages 2 years and 8 weeks.

Twenty five year later after that night, I would finally write of him.  I will hold copies of the book for his children, should they ever ask. 

 Thirty one years after that night, I have not forgotten him.  

The Dreamtime Stories

It has a been...a quiet time. A Dreamtime.

For the First Fans - we have lost three in sixty days.

The Big Man was the first to go. He taught me more about parenting then my own Father did.

The next was Her Mom. She needed the dependent care but in the end, She would always been the disobedient person that She was, in need of oversight at all times, and needing saving when there was no oversight. She wanted to make Her own decisions, and that is why She has gone.

The third, I did not not know well, but Her loss punctuated the generational gap.

There is a child that will be born this year, a child that will be the first (known) grandchild to me.

...and suddenly, the stories I should have written have now become the stories that will be told to a young child. The stories that they will hear of the Big Man, Large Marge and another, will no longer be coming from the lips of those people, but will be regaled by story tellers.

The aboriginal people of Australia speak of the Dreamtime, to explain the landscape of the land, and the history of their people. And I will speak of the Dreamtime in the technological era, of the people that came before the child, and of what the child meant to those people.

I wonder if my own children will tell the Dreamtime story of their Father to their children? 

Marooned Until Dates Unknown

  The Covid-19 pandemic is beginning to affect productivity.

  I sleep in shifts now, maybe four to five hours at most. I rarely maintain a uniform schedule, in part due to the elderly parent that I care for, around whom I have to work.

  The flights to Australia have been diminished to the point that should something happen to my Father, I will not be able to get to the county, let alone to him.

  I have, indeed, become "marooned" - as I have have so poignantly written about previously. I am now stranded with 354 million others in the United States of America. The advertised travel on my web site has all been pushed back until "dates unknown".

2020

  In 1999, I purchased my first computer in Australia, a Hewlett Packard Compaq computer from a big box home store. At the time, I also purchased one computer game to accompany the purchase. The game was a city building strategy game called Anno 1602. The game was a ground breaker in that the Artificial Intelligence progressed in accord with player development.

  At the time, I was divorced and not in receipt of enough income to make my daughters life more enjoyable. The girls and I played that game. Endless hours was spent with my little one sitting in my lap as her older sister cursed at the non player characters (NPC) when they destroyed something she had spent an hour creating.

  When I moved to the United States, one of the few things that was not lost at seas in transit was a box that contained this game. Last week while unpacking I found the game, still in it's original box, and did a Google search on it. In so doing, I discovered that the publishing company had a new version, titled Anno 1800. The game was available by download only, and for less money than I paid for the original game, I treated myself to my first game purchase in about eight years.

  Wow.

  The reviews justify it's nomination for Game of the Year. The graphics are immersive, the game play addictive, and last weekend, I lost both days off playing the game into the wee small hours of the morning.

  The girls are gone from my life - grown up and moved on. Late nights playing Anno on the computer are not the same without my youngest sitting in my lap pointing out the "bad guys" for her sister. Still, what I lost in the companionship with my children, is retained in the memory of the original game.

  20/20 - a year and hindsight.

The Abduction of Sarah

 

                It is twelve years today since I last saw my youngest daughter, Sarah. At the time, she was twelve years and thirteen days old. In a few weeks when Christmas arrives, I will have not seen my Daughter for more than half of her life.

                And what atrocity occurred to warrant this segregation of Daughter and Father?

                Her Mother and I divorced.

                Weeks after our divorce, her Mother remarried, and later had a child with the other man. Sarah became the “lost” child, as her Mother began to fabricate a life for her new family. Apparently, unnoticed by her Mother, Sarah slipped into a life of vice and crime, and like all divorced Fathers, I found out about it too late. Upon learning of her situation, when I telephoned Sarah’s school principal, I was informed that Sarah was “a child at risk.”

                I telephoned her Mother and suggested that Sarah reside with me, where Sarah could be monitored and have oversight while she corrected her ways and got on with her schooling. Within seven days of that conversation, her Mother absconded with our child, fled across three State lines, and took up residency in a jurisdiction where I had no reach.

                Had I done those same actions, there would be Amber alerts, wall to wall television coverage until the child was found, and then, I would have been swiftly incarcerated. But, because it was her Mother that broke the same Federal and State laws that I am bound to, there would be no repercussions, no enforcement and no consequences.

                Her Mother would rather destroy the child, than co parent with me.

                And I would have to start over, again. Except this time, I would have to restart the documentation to ensure access to our child with another country, another state, another government and another school.

                The slippage of time would rob me of her 13^th through 21^st birthdays. I would not know of her milestone events, her health, her academic awards, or her graduation. There would be no Christmas or holidays together, and my Father became collateral damage, unable to see his Grandchild. This would be in addition, to whatever lies the child was told about me.

                When the telephone went unanswered at our scheduled calling time, her mail began to be returned. Scrawled in her Mother’s handwriting on the envelopes and packages were the words “no longer at this address”.

                It would be years before I could classify her Mother’s actions as “Parental Alienation.”  I’d always treated her Mothers actions as nothing less than child abduction, albeit the discovery was after the fact.

                A parent knows within minutes, sometimes hours, when their child is abducted. An alienated parent doesn’t find out until much later.

                The parent of an abducted child has multiple law enforcement agencies chasing down leads, investigating sightings and sharing information. An alienated parent has to do their own leg work.

                The parent of an abducted child fears for their child’s life. An alienated parent fears that the child will never recover their life.

                The parent of an abducted child knows that the longer it takes, the less likelihood the child will be found.  An alienated parent usually starts at this point, as they learn of what has already occurred. They are playing from behind the moment they discover that their child has been “abducted”. For me, it was almost nine months before I uncovered that Sarah was “a child at risk”.  A perpetrator given nine months head start knows that the authorities have little chance of catching them.

                It is too late for my youngest daughter, Sarah. If She is still alive, She is now an adult who chooses to have no contact with her Father. It is reasonable to assume that Sarah was told lies by her Mother, which She accepted as truth, as I was not physically present to refute them. My only hope is to wait until my daughter questions one of those lies, and then seeks me out to verify. I pray that Sarah has better critical thinking skills that Her Mother.  Sarah’s Mother is also the daughter of an alienated Father.

                Before we were married, her Mother and I were walking along the beach together when we ran into her Father. In the weeks thereafter, Sarah’s Mother sought clarity over the horror stories that Her Mother had told, and her Father refuted them. When Sarah’s Mother independently verified her Father’s version, She learned that Her Mother had manufactured the stories about her Father, in order to cover up immoral sins. Sarah’s Mother choose not to repair the relationship with her Father, because She could not accept that her Mother’s account of her Father’s absence in her life, were all lies.

                It is twelve years today since I last saw my youngest daughter, Sarah. At the time she was twelve years and thirteen days old. You can diminish the actions of her Mother to “Parental Alienation” as much as you like, but as her Father, this is the story of the abduction of my youngest daughter, Sarah.

A Second Gut Wrenching Week

  A second gut wrenching week.

  How many boys have been potentially interfered with, when you discover that one boy has been interfered with?

  Ten? Fifty?

  Five hundred.

  Further news from my High School is that potentially 500 boys have been inappropriately dealt with. My graduating class was 104.

  It is a a sudden heartache to learn that my classmates, I was not aware, or did not see, acts being performed.

  I am searching within myself for the answer to "did I let them down?" 




 

A Gut Wrenching Week

  It has been, a gut wrenching week for me.

  First, news arrived from home of the jailing of the most influential teacher in my life.  Father Michael Endicott was jailed this week for historical offenses against children while he was teaching at Villanova College, Brisbane, during the late 1970's and the 1980's.

  The only victim to be named alleges that the priest took photographs of him after swimming training. The victim, beat me out of a place on the swimming team when we were competing against each other.

  Elsewhere, I write that the priest had brought thousands of boys from Darkness To Light, myself included. I cannot imagine the mindset for these matters.

  The second, comes from across New Zealand, where a gunman opened fire on a mosque killing 50 people. Terrorism, is not based on skin color or religion, but the acts upon which it is performed. There is no difference between the New Zealand incident, and the shooting of school children. There is no place in the world for terrorism.

  The second incident is disturbing as I was scheduled to complete my Terrorism training last November, when i was involved in a motor vehicle accident the day prior to the training. Had I completed that training, I may not be sitting here waiting out another year to cycle through to complete the studies, which, would have opened up access to a line, or what I call, the W2 employment.

  Between those two events and the demons that live in my sleep, you would be surprised how little writitng has been done.

  However, there has been a revision of a major work, where one of my characters was based upon the most influential teacher of my life.

Go Home To Your Own Country

  It finally happened.

  I was told to go back to my own country.

  As a child I remember my grandfather, in particular, referring to the people from South East Asia as "new Australians". These were the same people that I rode the bus to school, played football, and lived in the military village with.

  I never understood the opposition to them.

  I never heard my father in law, who saw hand to hand combat in Viet Nam, speak harshly of them.

  While making a delivery at a San Diego Hotel I  was approached by the valet - who in hindsight, was policing the public street in front of his hotel. After being told to step away he uttered the phrase "Why don't you go back to your country."

  Inside, immediately, neither of the two staff of the hotel on duty were able to assist, referring me to the Hotel Manager. An email within 90 minutes outlining the incident came back with an "out of office" and I would have to wait till Monday.

  The manager eventually responded, touting the multicultural element of the hotel and their supposed extensive training, but failed to address my complaint. I asked her to review and get back to me.

  A week has passed and not a peep from her. It's as though, the incident never occurred.

  And further on we go.

Eye Will See You

Friends, Family and Followers,

  The last 45 stitches have been removed and the results are:

 - I get to keep my eye sight.
 - I do not need reconstructive surgery.

  A legacy of the Australian lifestyle, I am grateful to Suzi for vigilance of "the small dot" on my face, and to daughter Jillian, who while I was away at dad's, was the voice of reason to her mother when the prognosis came.

  For the Limelifers, starting One Drop Wonder means "eye will see you" in Denver

Demons, On Arrival

  Demons can come in all shapes and forms. For some, it's nightmares creating the sensation in their sleep. For others, it's a fear of depths

  For me, it's returning to a land that is unfamiliar. Unfamiliar as I still call the place my homeland.

  People I no longer recognize, places I no longer identify with, roads that did not exist. Feelings long swept away come rushing back with the only familiar demon I recognize.

  The water. The surf. The river. And the bay.

  168 hours is not enough.I shall need to return for less glorious reasons, but for this nightmare, 168 hours was more than enough time for the Demon On Arrival.