MY WORDS BY BENNIE HICKMAN

Nov, 2024

         I was born December 17, 1986 in Louisville the city of Winston County. As a little boy, I remember that I never really had a family. I can remember when I use to live with my father. Up until the tornado incident that took his life in 2004. My mother gave me to my dad when I was real young, between the ages two and six years old. Life has always been hard for me, struggling, being that I'm a Black American. We was poor on my mom's side and on my dad's side too, but it was a lot better living with my dad than with my mom. My mom had an unstable life.

         I remember when I was living with my mom. We was living with other family. They might have 5 children, then you have the mother and father. That's seven people in one house. The house might have two bedrooms or might have three rooms and that was a tight situation. But then you have me and mom trying to cram our body in there so we could have a roof over our head. I would watch and be fully aware of what goes on around me. For my mom, as long as I can remember, she never had a job. Unless it was going to pick peas out someone's garden or gather scraps to take to the junkyard for a little money. And I use to help. Back then the cost of living was low and hard but fair. What I seen and remember the most was my mom getting high and drinking. I remember my first time getting high and drunk was with my mom. She used to give me beer to help put me to sleep. Now I see and feel that she did that so she can get high on crack-cocaine when she had the money. Then my mom and friends got locked up in jail for stealing beer.

         Dad came to the rescue for me. I went to live with my dad, 'cause he got tired and took me from my mom. But on some weekends, I had to go stay with my mom, which I dreaded 'cause I know the lifestyle my mom was living. My parent's turmoil went on. My life began unraveling. My first experience with drugs came when I went to stay with my mom one weekend. My dad used to drop me off at my mom and give me like twenty dollars, so I can get something to eat with from Friday to Sunday. Sometimes, I never got a chance to spend my money 'cause mom used to get it and say, "we got some food in the house."

         When mom and my uncles use to have company over, like their getting high buddies, they used to leave me and my cousin in the living room while they be in the back for hours. When they came out, their eyes was big like a half-dollar. I was playing around one night close to the room door and burst in the room with them one night and they was getting high. They pretending to try to hide it, until I went to my mom side and she was like, "Boy, you trying to be nosey. I got something you can nosey about."

         The first thing come to my mind was that I was about to get a whippin'. But no, my mom invited me to hit the pipe. Crack Cocaine. I was high as a kite. My eyes was about to pop out my head. I couldn't go to sleep, because I was trying to get to the next high. Then, when I went back to my dad, I tried to hide the fact that now I was getting high. I was at my dad's house doing good. My dad used to go out his way to get me whatever I wanted and needed. I always said that I'm a daddy baby 'cause I tried to be just like my dad. Plus, I tried to keep away from my mom and her ways.

         As I got older, I started getting into a little trouble, but my dad would help me escape my jail ticket. He got me to play sports, football, baseball and basketball. I was good in football. The others, not so good. And my dad worked for a man that was a farmer, State Representative of Mississippi District 43. He was a school board member, and I think he was in the gas business. He owned a lot of land. They took a liking in me, because I was my dad's child. I used to go working for him and his son-in-law, which was over at the sod farm. I used to call my dad's boss man "grandpa" and his wife "grandma". Because to me, they were like parents to my dad. From the outside looking in, they had the perfect life.

         Life at home was rapidly deteriorating. Any chance of a normal childhood was disintegrating. Back then, there was a lot of drugs and sex. By the time I was in the eleventh grade, I was heavily into drugs and was on my way to dropping out of school. Life with my dad was unrestricted, with little or no adult supervision. In 2004, when the tornado incident killed my dad, my life quickly went down the drain. I continued downward in my life of drugs and crimes.

         In 2005, I committed a burglary. Not one but three of them, to sell things to get drugs. I got caught and was sentenced to 20 years, 5 suspended and 5 years on probation. Going into prison is always an exhilarating experience for me, not a fearful one. It's a deep call in my heart, since I know what it's like to live in an emotional prison and feel there is no way out. I always been the type, when someone tells me not to do something, I end up doing just the opposite. I sit back sometimes and think about my past, remembering my parents' vio- lence, and realized I was following in their footsteps. All my life I had felt powerless and weak. I hadn't been able to change my circumstance or myself.

         I've tried over and over. I always tried leaning on the grace of God to help me break out of the destructive patterns I had known for so long. As a young boy, I didn't know how to articulate what I was going through. I didn't know how to come to my senses, start praying to God because he is greater than anything I will ever face.

         2012, I got out of prison thinking that I could make it, but my mind was lost. My sister-in-law took me in and tried to help me. She gave me a roof over my head with food. I was still in the streets, with family and friends, still getting high. I was smoking marijuana and snorting cocaine with people here and there, trying to hide from my probation officer. I was sneaking around with any and every woman that gave me a chance with her. I would smoke crack sometimes when I could get away from friends and family. But the main drug I was doing was snorting cocaine and smoking marijuana and stealing. After I was released the second time, I met a lady, and I was doing good, starting a family with a woman that already had two kids, and her daughter was pregnant with a baby. Then her teen son was becoming an adult. Life was good. I was working trying to do a grown man thing. But sex and drugs would appear back in my life. The woman that I was thinking of marrying would fight and break-up a lot. I felt that it was another excuse for me to go get on drugs.

         Then in 2016, my mom passed away. I went to the funeral but as I look back at life, it hurts that I never got to ask her all the whys. Now I finally realize that I'm angry with her and need prayer. I want to forgive her but come to understand now that the Lord heals the brokenhearted. His healing love will enable you to forgive. I must confess. I learned that allowing unforgiveness to remain in our hearts is like ignoring the erosion of your soul. Your heart becomes eroded. If we don't forgive, if we don't move forward, our lives are destroyed. I have heard and believed.

         There are two ways, however, to remember an event. One is by reliving it, allowing the pain, anger, fear, or bitterness to consume or control you. The other way is to allow God's process of forgiveness to be activated in our lives. Painful events are a fact of history. They happened but they no longer control us. I learned that both healing and forgiveness come from the hand of God.

         Now, I profess a great love for my mother. Boys growing up from such backgrounds use drugs to veil their deep hatred. Sometimes I often felt vulnerable and unprotected by my mother. I grew up watching her degrade herself. This generally led to boys having a disdain and lack of respect for women and harboring seething anger, which could have erupted into violence. Like I said, my dad took me from my mom for a better quality of life. And a job with his boss man, whom he met when he was a little teen after his or my grandparents had passed away. But like I said, after my dad passed away, I started coming off the tracks, and the question was why? See you can say, I was like a psychopath. I didn't care, liked to fight and always stayed in something. I had a bad temper, didn't know how to control my anger.

         Now it true to me and I have heard that I'm a go-getter, a good-looking guy usually. I'm good at working, I've overcome a lot in my life. This is the voice of experience talking here. I'm one lucky son of a bitch, and I know it. But I cut myself some slack and figure not to look a gift horse in the mouth, you know? Horses bite. I sometimes ask myself, how can such a smart guy be so fucking stupid? I sometimes feel unworthy. Maybe I didn't get it myself. How I could have something so perfect and throw it away with both hands?