Nowhere Man.

He is a nowhere man. He has no home and no land. He doesn't have family or friends to turn to. Only his vices will be there to welcome and entice him back. He has been dead to society for the last few years but dead to me for almost two decades.

January 18 was his release date. They opened up those gates and let him go with no path to follow. Where is there for a alcoholic and drug abuser to go back besides his habits? If he could he would will himself to die of loneliness, I'm sure of it. It is the fact that he still dreams of the past and being loved that keeps him alive and breathing every single solitary morning. The disease will claim his life eventually. Again i am sure of it. It has already taken the fire from his eyes and the purpose in his every action and every step he takes.

He was once a handsome man with a laugh so contagious it would fill the lungs of everyone in the room. He smiled at the sun and the sun seemed to smile back at him. But i cannot even recall those days anymore. Those happy memories were stolen from me, along with my love for him, when i saw him last. It was just a few weeks before he was caught for doing one thing or another again. Just a few weeks before he went behind those cement walls once more. He was so unbelievably thin when i saw him. A shadow of the man he use to be. His hair was streaked with grey and had a face that just read the story of all the struggles he had faced. It was like his story was carved into his marble face in lines and folds. I did not recognize this man. Only his smile seemed the same but when he grinned i could see gaps where he was missing a few teeth.
Was this the same man that would throw me up on his shoulders on hot summer days when i was too lazy to walk? Or read to me at night but never finish the book because he always had a better story to tell? Was he the same man that danced around the living room to Billie Jean with his socks pulled up and slick dance moves just for a few laughs? No that was a better man. A healthy man. I don't know who this stranger is but he happens to be my father.
And now he is out in the world and i fear for him. I am sure that he will return to his old habits. There is only two lives he knows how to live. Either in prison as an inmate or on the streets as an addict. And now that hes out i am just waiting for the call. The call that would say "There's been an accident. He didn't make it. And he's never coming home..."