Letters to Patti Ann (Chapter 1) "Down Grand Point Lane"

hi patti ann,

today is a great day.  i saw you practically running with no legs, somebody else's legs.  wow.  what a sight.  thanks for making me a stronger boy and a wiser man.  thanks so much patti for fighting.  it's your unique gift to the world.  when it is received it is the most precious gift.  hope you kick your feet up tonight.  your grande pointe feet.  

love,

dut

When the "So Long" years came to a close.  I couldn't really look back.  So much had happened.  Some of the scenes were horrific.  It's easy to judge myself when I look back at my work or writings and to think of myself as overdramatic but when I read my last letters to Patti Ann, it seemed apropos. 

    I avoided it for years.  I knew in my old Yahoo account I had saved every letter I had written to her.  And here it is, I'm here crying trying to "effing" put it all down on paper. Put it to rest.  It's so beautiful to me when someone comes to me professing their love for "So Long" because I was able find something beautiful and find some joy amidst all the horror.

  Patti Ann was a smart girl from the country who had that simple joie de vivre.  She loved her dad and kids and was an aerobics instructor in the 80's with those leggings that covered her beautiful natural legs.  I used to be proud to be her cousin when guys from the city would look at her in awe.  I always felt country because Grand Point was truly country back in the day.  The Pointe de Cannes they called it and the strange cars would pass by real slow on Sunday's to observe our simple little lives.  Mamere on the swing with chicken stew on the stove and all the bets were in.  All bets were on Montana and phoned in to Buck's bar.  That was "nip and tucked" like a local's lawn at dusk on a Saturday before LSU kickoff.  Everything in its right place.  Everything was still there.  Joey was throwing spirals in the front yard.  

  Joey was Patti's brother who would be taken from us in the coming years but that's a whole other story, that's a chapter....a lifetime. That life experience is the root of my record, "So Long" and Patti the fire beneath the pot of resilience.  I've never been one to turn from a challenge.  One morning in 1988, we were woken by Aunt Marie's screams and she came running into the bedroom hugging us...he's gone...he's gone.  Now I'm a person that can't talk before coffee and here it is all the screaming.  It was tragic.  It was a howling wolf at your door that wouldn't go away.  Your head was in its throat and that's how it was going to be.  It was loud those screams! When the dust settled, I was standing outside all dressed for school and my dad asked if I was alright and I just shook my head.  I stood in silence and vowed to live a great life and pay whatever the cost to follow my instincts and find myself.  

  Well it's Sunday and the Saints are playing their first game and that's enough looking back for now.  I guess the pot is boiling now and the word is out.  I'm flowing like Marie!  I hope soon I'll have the courage to read another letter.  I peeked at the next one and it was dated September 11, 2001 from Brooklyn.  The world was about to change.