An Old Mini-Essay from 2004

ON LIFE’S GREAT MISSION Each of us has a gift. While I have been called blessed for my creative gifts, I envy those with a gift for the ordinary. They are my heroes – the ones who work hard and form the backbone of our economy. They by and large accept with good humor their burden of double exploitation – taxed from above to save those below. They have not time for lofty ideals, and yet without their sacrifice no one would. As great as my admiration is for these visceral wonders I have been forced to decline their noble calling. Very few are cut out for my job. One of my older brothers suffered for six years before he gave up writing full-time. I lasted twenty irreversible years in hell before I gave up my dream of an ordinary life and took pen in hand. While certain detractors have called my work subversive it is only a plain observation of life through my eyes. I know others share my view, but not my unique position to record it. Let me tell you that I have earned this position. Not only have I long experienced the tortures of the condemned, but I faced them head on and swallowed them. They have become part of my being, to be regurgitated in immortal words for the benefit of all, present and future. If my suffering can be turned to a force for good [who coined that one, CNN?] your taxes are not wasted. Again I did not find this job, it found me. I failed in my pursuit of an ordinary life and this is all I now have. If I must look forward to another twenty years of shelters and soup lines, let it be so that our children can look forward to better. © 2004. Essays by David Skerkowski. All rights reserved.
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