In the beginning...

Hello dear reader, how are you today? I hope you had a wonderful day by the grace of god.

Where should I start? I guess, at the beginning.

Do I remember my childhood? barely. Was it so bad that I blocked it all? No. Well, the good parts I remember I guess.

I was born in August of 1969 in the country of Peru (south america). I don't remember my father leaving me and my mother, all I knew was that I had a mother and no father.  I think I was 5 years old, old enough to understand what it meant when she explained it to me, that he had left us but that it was not my fault. It wasn't until years later after we returned from Germany that I found out he had left us for his mistress.

Germany... good memories there. I don't remember even the face of the man my mother fell in love with, but I remember how we left Peru with my grandmother crying at the airport the day we left for Europe. I believe I was about 7 years old.

It didn't take long for things to change, the kind German turned into a monster. I can still remember how badly he had treated her. I could hear the screams and how he abused her verbally and physically. I hated him, wanting him to disappear, It went on for a few months, until one night mother packed our things and we left to live with a girlfriend of hers, I think they were coworkers.

Mother worked at a hospital, I'm pretty sure she was a nurse and the way her friend treated me with kindness and always with a smile. I thought that she had to also be a nurse.

It did not take long for her to divorce, even tho she never mentioned the word, only that we would never be with that bad man again.

A few weeks went by before we moved into a small apartment in a tall building (at least it looked tall from the outside). I'm certain we lived in Hamburg.

There is where I met my friend Mike. I don't even know how to pronounce his name properly, decades have passed since then. Probably his full name was Michael, and his last name sounded like Lepa or something like it.

He was a blond kid, a bit older than me. Son of a woman that lived downstairs from us, we played ball, rode our bikes in the neighborhood and played with our toys every day. It was the most innocent and wonderful part of my childhood, something I held on to for many years, and still recall on occasion with fondness.

Every weekend or so mother would take me with her down to the local laundromat where I would run around (because I didn't listen to mother, like most kids do at that age) while she was taking care of our clothes. One weekend, I ran straight into the door handle of one of the washers. Next thing all I saw was red and hearing my mother screaming frantically.

I remember being in an ambulance, then waking up in a hospital bed with bandages over my left eye. My mother was sitting on a chair next to the bed. She told me I was lucky that I still had an eye, that the German doctors had saved me from being half blind.

To be honest, at the time I didn't understand it all. It took many years until I could understand how badly I had injured myself. Today I can feel the bone under my left eye, pushed in as if someone had hammered part of it.

A few weeks went by and everything went back to normal, back to school, back to playing with my best friend Mike, back to being a careless kid again. My mother did become a bit more protective then.

I wonder sometimes what I would've become had we stayed there. Until next time dear reader, I will write my next letter as soon as I can.

May you walk in the light of God.

Sincerely.

Luis

Letters of my Life

I've decided to put my entire life here, on this blog. Of course there is no way to describe everything in deep detail or it would take me another lifetime to do so. As to the reason, it is not clear cut. 

On one hand I want to think back to the things that have happened in my life, some have been horrible, some have been blessed. On the other hand I would like to share my life experience with others who perhaps can learn from my bad and good decisions.

But the most important reason is this, I'm 47 years old and homeless. I don't know if I'll be alive tomorrow.

I've considered how to approach this, and I think posting in the form of a letter to a friend sharing my life would be something I can accomplish.

Unfortunately I cannot guarantee daily or even weekly posts. It all depends if I'm near a public library or another open WiFi connection.

There are aspects of my life which are very painful, but I feel that I should be able to not only recall my experience, but also to remember how it affected me, positively and negatively.

God has a plan for everyone, I have no idea what my future holds, but I trust that god will guide me in the right direction.

God bless you reader.

Sincerely.

Luis