Weather the Storm

12^th August 2013

Dear Cassi,

       

I find it somewhat strange to contemplate that it has been a year now, or there about, that I have not had a sink in my bathroom. Having to wash my hands in the kitchen is something of an annoyance but the fact that pickles can choose to live this way that that Pony Girl can permit this to go on baffles me.

       

I’ve worked in places where the dirt and grime almost grow on your skin and great hoards of cockroaches play in open view so a dirty life in nothing to me. Still, it stands so far beyond my reason that when someone has the funds to live better then choose so difficult a situation.

       

I have to admit that I’ve made mistakes in trying to get this house back in order. I’ll be the first to say that, but I still wouldn’t have chosen this situation. That’s what happens when you deal with those of my blood relation, they’re all crazy and me, well, I just live here.

Weather the storm, little sister,

Richard Leland Neal

Dirt Shower

1^st April 2012

Dear Cassi,

       

My last letter brought to mind an event from my youth when I stunk. I was at Alan’s house and I didn’t like his shower. It was an old thing with smelly water and even after you got the hot water running when you switched the shower head on you got a blast of cold.

       

Now I was young at the time and never thought to just turn the shower on from outside the tub. Then, I was apprehensive about staying at that cockroach infested hole that the old man called home.

       

I wanted to go home. I wanted to go home and sleep in my bed and shower in my shower. I wanted to look out the window and not see chain link fences or broken concrete. That place in the inner city made me feel sick, and my stepmother’s cooking made me feel worse.

       

It was my last day there when my stepmother grabbed me by the arm and shoved me into one of the washrooms and wouldn’t let me out until I cleaned myself. As I have no recollection of being provided a towel or fresh clothes I imagine the shower freshened me for little more than half an hour. Well, I was home by the end of that day, and that made me happy.

Stay clean, little sister

Richard Leland Neal