Things that Happen in the Shadows

The Shadow Journal

March 8, 2023

Truth or Happiness? Never both …

The first time I heard this phrase, I thought it fell into the hukum jazz people say. Yeah, but something about it grabbed hold of me. So, I sat down and let it speak. I felt ready with a pack of Luckies and a cup of java. I added a notebook and pen, just in case. Because you never know what will happen when you sift through fragments of random memories.

Taught to carefully example each fragment; I’m a dutiful student. I came up with the following:

The truth; the world is full of lies we are willing to accept.

Society acts as if we are okay when poverty is an addiction, and there’s rehab on every corner. Right next to the package store and across the street from the church.

On the bench at the bus stop was a man with a two-tone beard singing a melody of the Pretenders, Tom Petty, and ELO with a Gregory Issac flavor. A member of “the gap,” those who make too much money for benefits and not enough to live, stares straight into the madness of their existence.

Perhaps, Denial and Distraction are Huey Lewis’s new drug. Take a hearty dose of Denial, a familiar favorite, while waiting in line for the latest and greatest in distraction served happily in this free tablet.

~thank you for reading~