Please Oh Lord, forgive your lost child.

howdy folks, Yuk, yuk I tell you I am a new man and I owe it to my sweet Vivian. Ole Tim's been a single guy his whole life, I tell ya. Sure I had girlfriends but I ain't ever shared a home with a gal. It's not like I have much of a choice these days, yuk, yuk. Being happy and in love after my absolute worst year with failed sobriety has really made me appreciate life more. I can actually be happy without the Devil's Brew. Old whiskey has cost me a lot in my almost half century here on God's green Earth. I spent 1,378 days of my life behind bars. 93 days in hospitals or rehab clinics. Lost 4 jobs including a twenty one year career with Con Edison. Done over $100,000 in property damage. Destroyed at least 6 motor vehicles. Lost my drivers license forever. Own nothing 'cept the clothes on my back. Alienated my only living relatives and Good Lord forgive me, killed two people. I don't like to talk much 'bout that last part. Sweet Jill, such a precious young Angle. I was a young lad of 16 and didn't have a care in the world. If you could smoke it, swallow it or inject it and it was bad for you, not to mention illegal, I tried it. I tried it all. But nothin' took a hold of me like my Mamas favorite, aged whiskey. If I weren't stone faced drunk I was at least buzzed all the time. Jill was a party girl, she liked to have fun and she played fast and loose if you know what I mean. She was 18 going on 19 and decided this young buck was somethin' special. I wasn't! I was a stupid drunk, know nothin' adolescent, nobody could tell me a thing. Well after ditching school one Spring afternoon we went up to Bald Eagle Rock. I had borrowed Jimmy Solucci's green Mustang and we tore up the road. We were a late 1970s Bonnie and Clyde, I tell ya. "Cept for the guns and the robbin'. So we got wasted that afternoon, smashed wiskey bottles against the rock and watched the sun go down. That's the last thing I remember. I remember Jill's freckles, her tanned skin and long auburn hair that smelled like a field of wild flowers after a Summer Rain. I remember her belly button peeking out from under her almost long enough top and the patches on her blue jeans. But I can not remember her eyes as hard as I may try. When I woke up in the hospital they told me we had come down the hill with no headlights on and hit a truck head on. I had a concussion, a broken wrist and glass in my eyes, I was blinded for a week. The cops asked me who was driving. Now the God's honest truth to this day I don't remember. It seems we were both thrown from the wreck and well, I said Jill. Two days later they told me she was dead. Massive blunt force trauma to the head. Her skull had been crushed. My sweet Teen Angle. You think ole Tim learned his lesson. Like in them little films they show you in high school. Don't drink and drive, right? No. I now had guilt and sorrow and I dealt with it Kisper style. They way Mom dealt with dad leaving her with no money and two hungry kids to feed. Old Whiskey! Alleluia and Amen! In the following year I nearly drank myself to death. Till Peggy and Ken got me in the Navy after the school felt bad for me and gave me a pity diploma. Uncle Sam's Navy saved my life but Ole Tim's future had more pitfalls in store and even though I was done with the bottle, the bottle wasn't done with me. I had a lock of Jill's hair I kept for many years. I braided it into a small loop. Kept it in my pocket where ever I went. When I felt especially bad I'd put my hand in my pocket and twist it between my fingers. One time I broke a store window and when they arrested me and confiscated my personal effects they took it and burnt it.

Springtime wildflowers softly grow...
Where is my Sweet Angle? I don't know...
I was weak when I was supposed to be strong...
A fateful ride and now you're gone...

You in Heaven, though sad and blue...
An' every day I try to go on without you...
Unfinished dreams and a young life lost...
And that Old Whiskey has such a high cost...

Oh Jill... How could I kill...
My sweet Jill?
Heavenly Father take pity on me...
And let her run wild and free...