When I first heard this song...and then heard Mr. Stipe in back, I was floored. I was at a sailing meet on the River Charles at the MIT BoatHouse. My day was set on "stupid" from that moment-on.

Wow, several connections here...

R.E.M. and the Indigo Girls both are local bands...they have been in my music collection for a long time. I've seen both of them several times at venues large and small.

Also, I really used to be into sailing...not races, but cruises...out maybe 10-15 miles from the coast. My favorite trip was a 3-day single-handed handed cruise off of NC on a Cape Dory sloop. I rode the Gulf Stream off of Hatteras...it was really close in to shore at the time.

And...I recall seeing the boathouses on the River Charles several years ago when my wife and I went to Boston for a wedding. We stayed in the top floor of the Doubletree on Solider's field and looked out over the river...

Will

I've been asked by SO many people if I Still have any of those letters. I know that I destroyed them on one very surreal day in my teens.

It was probably about the time I pushed my new-found faith behind me, (knowing better than Him of course), and consciously decided to "go live life and do whatever I have to, to forget...pretend it never happened. If I say it never happened, then it never happened!"

As soon as drugs and alcohol were being use to squelch the abused personas, those personas never missed an opportunity to emerge and remind me of the reality I drag with me.

I always knew...I always felt, I'm going to have to deal with it some day, or this stuff will kill me. Sometimes stuff on the back-burner explodes all over everyone in the kitchen.

I remember writing poems about suicide. None of them still exists. Just as well.

Jude

I have written and re written memory's, thoughts, conclusion and fealings from me mostly,but also the fragments and the others. I have destroyed them all after a few days weeks or months. The letters and journals helped me figure out my thoughts and sort out all of the confusion. But they were a source of danger if some one found them. My family, coworkers, etc. Fear of freaking out a loved one or being betrayed, abandoned, black mailed, or even being laybled and ostracized by the comunity.... I always destroyed them all. Some times I would forget what I wrote and would find some of my writings month and years later. I was horrified if the wrong person would find them. So I shread.

But I could recreate most of it if I wanted to.

Could you recreat the letters? Not the same I know, your hand today not his back then. But you seam to rember how they felt back in the day.

I am glad you remember.

***TRIGGER WARNING*** element is in invisible ink. Mouse-over and highlight the missing text in paragraph 2.

I clearly remember. Mostly I was concerned with my sisters and mother and dog Lucy. I wanted people to know where which stuffed animals should go where, what major toys should be saved and protected and how. Which important toys should go to my friends. I remember all that....so vividly.

My son has my trains now. Its absolutely amazing to see some small items the train would carry. They instantly trigger memories of retreat - retreat from the violence for a time...a way to stay close to the bathroom (cuz of rectal spasms and blood) without being bored.

It was those reasons and violent nights that I thought I was likely to die. I had to have a post-mortem voice.