Down by the Riverside

The 9/11 World Trade Center tragedy forced me to think about life and that which is truly important. Soon afterward, I left the corporate world and the Chicago suburbs to return to the place of my youth - - the very place to which I swore I'd never again return. I came back to Phillips, a small town nestled in the Wisconsin north woods. Surrounded by the national forest, Phillips is a town comprised of friendly people supported by a hardboard factory and a logging industry. Mother was alive when I arrived in 2001. The following summer, I took her golfing on the 4th of July. Independence Day was also Mother's birthday. Golfing with her was the most enjoyable time we ever spent together. She referred to me as "the white Tiger Woods." Several years later, my mother passed away. She died from alcohol poisoning. For she died as she had lived. The words written within are as painful to recall as they were to live. Childhood is precious, a time of innocence. That's what I'm told anyway. I wouldn't know from personal experience. "The physical wound from abuse is temporary. The emotional scar, however, is permanent."