Hello Leah,

At certain times of my life I’ve met a woman. On several occasions, her eyes were looking directly into mine, not in an intrusive way. I met her stare and fully consented. I undressed her using only my eyes. I liked it. In fact, I was loving every second of it. She slightly smiled as her delicate gaze penetrated mine, and the eyes played their silent tunes consisting of heat, excitement, lust, and curiosity. I was breathless, completely paralyzed, unable to move an inch as we were seeing into each other’s souls. Our thought process was synchronized and enormous amounts of information was exchanged. We were having eye sex. Right there in her office.

Leah, I have feelings that you might have experienced something like this. I know you love to flirt ;-) The weekend and several months after March 18th, 2016 were not easy. I lost the best job I ever had and the woman I loved on the same day. I am not going to go into any details, use your imagination. I gave it some thought if I should ever contact you again. The answer is ‘yes’, however, don’t worry since this is my last attempt to contact you. I was going (still going) through internal struggles on the scope of the letter. I have two versions of the letter. Both are true but they are so different. It is up to you which version you like.

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Version 1 (a rewrite of Ronnee’s letter)

In late summer of 2014, I received two simultaneous offers through a local placement agency specializing in finance. I chose to work for a company called Imagin (medium size medical manufacturer). I was hired by a very attractive lady named Leah. She was in her late forties, had been married for twenty years and had two daughters. I am not sure about the marriage. Her husband never took her on vacation without her in-laws. I started to like her at the initial interview. There was longer than normal eye contact between us on several occasions. It did not feel like an interview at all. It felt like a nice conversation with a sweet lady.

I remember my first day at the office like it was yesterday; I was waiting in front of the finance section of the building. And there she was, opening the glass front door, wearing a certain dress. She looked absolutely stunning. The dress was not long, but not too short, either. She knew exactly what she could get away with. In my mind, it was a welcome party exceeding my wildest expectations. At first, I tried not to get distracted too much. She was still my boss and I wanted to do my duties as best I could. I had to learn the processes as fast as possible since the temporary person was leaving soon. Therefore, I kept to myself and focused on the work. Leah approached me and wanted to flirt on many occasions. I liked it, I liked it so much that I was unable to react the way she would have expected me to. I mostly kept silent. I’d never experienced flirting in my life (way different from when you are fifteen years old), it was so new to me. It was gorgeous, electrifying, and indescribable feeling.

On a daily basis, she smiled at me, was relaxed and made me feel great about myself. She eventually stopped the verbal flirting. We never discussed job performance. It was always understood that I would do my part. She did not have to supervise me. In her office, I really enjoyed us having prolonged eye contact accompanied by silence. It was perfect since she kept the window blinds mostly closed. On one occasion, I was sitting there across her desk. I started to undress her using my eyes only. I moved very slowly from her waist until our eyes met. I had a feeling that being any closer, something magical would have happened between us. I’ve always felt there is a deeper connection once you look through the eyes of a person. This was the longest eye contact I had experienced to that day. It felt so good until I was unable to take it any longer. I was the first to move my head. She did the same and smiled a little in a very satisfied way. This only happened one time.

In May, a few weeks before my vacation, I asked Leah to have lunch with me. Oddly, the two of us had never had lunch alone. Her face froze and eyes widened. “I can’t today,” she replied in a surprised way. “Let me know of a good time,” I said to her in a non-caring way. She never brought it up again.

I returned from the European vacation in early June 2015 and wanted to see Leah to tell her about my trip. I missed her since we hadn’t talked for almost two weeks. As soon as I entered her office, I noticed the pictures of her daughters were no longer there. “Hi Joseph, how was your trip? My last day at Imagin is in two weeks, sorry,” she said, without any kind of emotion.

All of a sudden, I felt a huge weight on my shoulders, I could hardly keep my eyes focused. The world collapsed around me. I thought I was in a twilight zone. Of course, I pulled myself together fairly quickly, then asked her a few questions, wished her good luck and left the office. I knew in the back of my mind this might happen someday. “Why so soon, why this soon? She promised a few weeks ago to teach me corporate income tax,” I thought to myself. In those two weeks, I had difficulty concentrating and completing everyday work-related tasks. At home, my mind was somewhere else until my wife and aunt, who was visiting from the EU, asked me what was wrong. I kept waking up several times a night. During this period, I realized that I fell in love with Leah a long time ago. My mind was in a great dilemma; should I tell her how I feel about her or should I continue to maintain our professional relationship? I chose to maintain the current relationship and asked her the next day, “Leah, I would like to work for you again. Once you settle in, please let me know if there is an open position on your team.” She smiled a little and explained the circumstances of her new company, Weyland. Due to the corporate headquarter relocation from Michigan to Atlanta, a brand-new tax team was currently being built. “Director of Federal Tax and Audit” was her new title. She was a manager in her present position. She had already hired her tax manager, Cody. “He is great,” she said, and smiled again.

In early July 2015, about a week into her new job, I received an email from Leah asking me if I would like to interview at Weyland and work for her again. I could not believe this and read the email several times. The answer was, “Yes.”

On the day of the initial interview, Leah greeted me at the lobby reception area. I had not seen her for several months prior to this moment. Our eyes met at full stare for a few seconds at close distance of about a foot. We did not blink at all. It was hot, lustful, and exciting. We were so in tune with each other. “Was this the interview?” I thought to myself. The interview process was a joke. Everyone was really friendly and I was not asked any technical questions. It didn’t feel like an interview at all. Everyone knew that I wasn’t qualified for the position. Corporate income tax is way different from sales/use and property tax.

My first day at Weyland was on October 19 2015. I was hired as a tax specialist and had an exciting career ahead of me. My mentor/teacher was the person I was in love with. “Perfect, nothing can go wrong.” Those and similar thoughts were constantly racing in my head. I was really excited, but nervous at the same time. I was looking forward to having a nice conversation with Leah. Oh, it was so long since the two of us had spoken in private. I had a brilliant plan; I was going to thank her for hiring me and offer to buy her a lunch. We were finally going to have a private moment together, away from the office. I was so sure the answer would be “yes” since she indirectly already promised me shortly before departing Imagin.

All this went to shit; during our conversation in her office, she wanted to flirt verbally. Again, my responses were “the silence.” After several attempts, she was irritated and gave up. I proceeded with my plan and asked the question. She gave me the “What the fuck are you thinking?” look and I left her office shortly after, disappointed and embarrassed. “I failed my teacher again. She was probably looking forward to finally flirting with me verbally. What a disappointment. I fucked up so badly. Why was I so preoccupied with that stupid lunch?” These were my confused thoughts. From that point on, we hardly ever spoke.

Manager Cody was in Leah’s office daily. They spoke for hours and had a great time. Unfortunately for me, my cubicle was close by and I was forced to listen to the conversations. I was not jealous of Cody. He was a great person with an amazing personality. I was more disappointed in Leah; she was the director and able to set her own rules. To this day, I can’t figure out how she was able to get me the job. It was a great job and I was not qualified at all. She knew that I enjoyed talking with her. She never invited me to come to her office and talk for at least a few minutes on some sort of regular basis. I understood that I was not working for her directly and things were not going to be the same as before.

I was four levels below her and of course was not able to “hang out” in her office. The VPs, other directors and managers surrounded her office. At Imagin, it had just been the two of us. I missed that setting so much.

The position involved substantial travel to Michigan until March 2016, the deadline for legacy to current tax team transition. I felt bad for the Michigan team, especially after I met everyone in person, because they were all losing their jobs. This was due to the following reason. Also, here is some background info on the company.

Bill Weyland founded the company from nothing in the 1950s. He built the first Weyland house and sold it for $10,000. The company grew to become the third largest residential builder in the USA with over $6 billion annual revenue in 2015. Bill always placed strong emphasis on his employees. It was not unusual for someone to work at the company for thirty years. Weyland was always a Michigan company, a great company to work for. It answered the “American Dream” question for many people. Bill retired from active operations in 2010. A couple years after his retirement, Peter Douglas, CEO since 2003, announced behind Bill’s back the company would be moving to Atlanta. He made the announcement in the Michigan office, in front of all the corporate employees. It was a short announcement and he and his security guard left abruptly. According to rumors, Peter wanted to live in Atlanta to pursue a career in politics. Some of the employees were offered jobs in Atlanta. Why would anyone want to move? Especially if all their relatives lived close by. None of the eighteen tax department employees, including the VP, accepted offers. After the facts became known to me, I wanted this guy to disappear from Weyland as fast as possible. It appeared Peter did not care about his Michigan employees. They were just numbers to him. He cared about himself and apparently only loved himself. In Atlanta, he hired a custom builder and not Weyland to build his mansion. That is like Ford’s CEO driving a Ferrari to work. It was an insult to everyone at Weyland. It makes me sick. In my opinion, Peter was the worst of the worst.

By January 2016, everyone in Atlanta was hired. The group was getting along really well. Everyone had great personality, an unusual feature for a tax accountant. The last trip to Michigan was in January 2016. This was the best trip to date. Apart from work, it looked like Leah and I would finally open up to each other again. Flirting aside, it was necessary so we would be able to work together going forward. About eight of us went to a karaoke bar. Leah tried to verbally flirt with me for the last time. I blew it again. She spent the rest of the evening around Cody. I played pool with a manager named Ricardo. The next day, an even smaller group went skiing. Leah and I finally spoke in a friendly and relaxed way on ski lifts and in the cafeteria. This was the best day at Weyland so far.

The first day after we returned from Michigan, I went to see Leah in her office. “Can you please consider mentoring me? I know we talked about it before,” was the initial question.

“Yes, like I will everyone else. You need to get with the managers and do a good job if you want to score some points with me,” she replied. We had never had a performance-related discussion before. This threw me off but I kept pushing my luck.

“We had a great relationship at Imagin and I miss it.”

She smiled to herself and said, “So you’re not getting it, right?” I could not believe my ears. We talked about a few more things and I left her office.

At that point I realized she may have actually enjoyed having me around. She knew I needed her and couldn’t do anything about it. Every day at that office was emotional torture. She had to know I heard most of her conversations. There is only so much a person can take. Everyone has a breaking point. “Maybe if I tell her how I feel about her, she would figure out a way of not hurting me anymore,” I said to myself many times.

On Wednesday, January 23 2016, first thing in the morning, I remember the conversation word by word, like it happened yesterday: “Leah, I need a few minutes of your time.”

“OK,” she said. I closed the door and we sat down.

“I started to have feelings for you in January, a year ago.”

“Really, you did?” was her initial response as she smiled a little.

“Yes, I did, and I was hiding those feelings as much as I could. You are married, I am married, that sort of thing. Then you left and just the thought that I would not be able to see you and talk to you was overwhelming. I actually thought more about you than the job. What a mistake! When you hired me for the second time, I was not able to handle the situation and look what happened. I am not sure when was the last time this happened to you, but you can’t even think clearly. The last time it happened to me was with Romana, ten years ago, and I ended up marrying her. With you, it was never about promotions, scoring points, and money.”

“Well, thank you for telling me this. I have to think about what to do next,” she said, as her body began to shake a little bit. Leah then reached into her drawer, took and opened a bottle of pills and shoved the bottle into her mouth. She then ran outside, probably to a restroom.

Not knowing what to do, I went to my desk. In a few minutes, I realized I had said a little too much. I wanted to see if she was OK and went back to her office. She was resting her head on a desk so I was unable to see her face. “Please don’t do anything. I’ll get together with the managers and stay out of your way as much as possible. I am over this,” I said. She then slowly raised her head up and down in agreement and was crying silently. I tried to keep cool as much as possible and continued with daily tasks. I periodically glanced into her office to make sure she was not overdosing on those pills. I hoped she didn’t swallow any. 

The next morning, the VP of tax, Karen, called me into her office. She calmly and in almost a friendly way, asked about the incident. I truthfully explained the situation with as little detail as possible about the feelings I had for Leah when she left Imagin.

“But you don’t have those feelings for her anymore, right?” Karen asked.

“That is correct, I don’t,” I replied.

“Good, because she does not have those feelings for you and even if she did, you would both be fired. She can’t manage you anymore. Ricardo will be your new manager, effective immediately. Nobody will know the details and we will move forward.”

I could not believe that I wasn’t fired. I was expecting that outcome 100%.

After this conversation, I kept to myself and concentrated on work. Leah, however, was walking around the office in a fast, almost irritable manner. You could tell she was not doing too well. I hoped she would not fall apart. On Friday afternoon at 3 p.m., she had a meeting with Cody and my new manager, Ricardo. I am not sure what was discussed but nobody returned to their desks and it was already way past 5 p.m.

On the following Monday, Cody and Leah walked in at the same time. Leah took a much longer route around half of the floor so she did not have to pass my cubicle. (This continued almost every day.) I knew she had broken down and told the details to Cody and Ricardo. I was able to see it in their eyes, the way they were looking at me. I was able to see the fear in their eyes. At that point I knew my days at Weyland were numbered.              

It was a fucked-up situation; a director was accommodating an entry-level employee four levels below hers by taking a longer route around the floor to her office on a daily basis. All communication, verbal and written, went indirectly via managers. I was not allowed to enter her office under any circumstances. It felt like she had an office restraining order against me. I was really sad and felt awful that things had turned out this way. From that point on, I was in pure survival mode. I tried to maintain an image of an outgoing employee fully devoted to his work. I went out with some members of the tax team to lunch almost every Friday. I helped everyone as much as possible. This lasted until the middle of March.

On March 17 2016, the whole tax department was scheduled to have a working lunch with the CEO, Peter Douglas. The whole team, especially the VP, Karen, was excited, but nervous at the same time. It is unusual for the CEO of such a large company to devote two hours of his or her time to such a small group. The meeting was held in the main conference room next to the CEO’s office. The meeting was a lunch/PowerPoint presentation hosted by Peter and, lastly, questions asked by employees directly to the CEO on any subject.

I had one question prepared, “As a leader, are you still continuing to learn and develop or are you reaching, or have you reached, a certain point where you can say to yourself, ‘I’ve seen it all, there is nothing that can surprise me anymore.’” To this day, I don’t know why I prepared such a long question.

My turn came and I asked the question. “As a leader, are you still continuing to learn and develop or are you reaching, or have you reached, a certain point where you can say to yourself—”

Peter abruptly interrupted me and made the following comment, “I am one foot in the grave.”

I immediately began to laugh. It was a genuine laugh but I laughed loudly. Out of the eighteen-person tax department, I was the only one who laughed.

I was fired the next day. They were not able to fire me for that reason, therefore a couple reasons were made up: 1) I described in detail what my wife and I were doing in a Jacuzzi while vacationing in the mountains. Not true. I only said to Cody and Ricardo that we were playing in the Jacuzzi and to use their imagination for the rest. Anybody can play in a Jacuzzi. This was clearly a gray area. 2) I showed a picture of my naked wife to a manager named Phillip. Untrue, I showed him a picture of my wife dressed in lingerie. This was a Victoria’s Secret picture mailed frequently via catalogs. I knew I was being fired, but maintained my position in a meeting with the HR Director. When I left the building, it felt like a heavy boulder just fell off my shoulders. I felt so light and free. I was so happy this bullshit was finally over. When I arrived home, I broke down and cried loudly. I realized that I would never speak with and see Leah again. It is extremely difficult to get rid of those feelings no matter how hard you try.

On Monday, March 21 2016, Weyland’s board director, Kristopher Scully, Bill Weyland and his grandson, had a private meeting with Douglas to tell him to step down by the end of May 2016 or “There would be a war!” It was all over the news. It gave me such pleasure to see this person go one business day after he fired me. All the legacy Michigan employees finally got their revenge. Bill Weyland lost a few battles, but ultimately won the war.

The next few weeks were not easy. I was unemployed, unable to focus and thought about Leah on many occasions.

Version 2

I liked Leah since the initial Imagin interview and fantasized a lot on how to get into her panties. Of course, I had to remain professional. “I have a wife and two kids to support, this is not worth it,” I reminded myself frequently. As time went by, it was proving increasingly difficult to keep my eyes and thoughts away from Leah. I loved the way she looked and behaved. She was the perfect woman of “split personality.”

First side: she was devoted to her family, community and most importantly to The Church. She was THE woman of the household who paid most of the bills since her husband “worked from home.” She was the dream of any man with open eyes who would be able to find her qualities.

Second side: internally, she was not too happy with her present life. Her daughters were almost independent (not financially, of course) and her husband was boring. She became a workaholic spending most of her life buried in spreadsheets and negotiating with the IRS. She was a tough negotiator, especially when dealing with men. :-) The good news was she had Cody and Phillip around. They both flirted with her, made her laugh and in general filled the missing side of her life. Why not spend twelve hours a day at work with such a fine group of people? I don’t think she was fucking them but who knows.

Back to me; as mentioned, I liked Leah from the beginning. I liked her for who she was. I was able to bypass all the endless filters and see through her eyes. I was able to find her soul and read her mind. This was only possible because I truly loved her. Love is the most powerful force in the Universe. It is a beam of light. It is energy that has gravity, therefore, it is able to distort time and space. That’s why I felt so attracted to her and time did not exist every time our eyes met at full stare. Love created everything in every possible time and dimension. It created all the known and unknown universes. Without love, there would be just an empty space. Love has endless possibilities and anything can happen when you are in love. Love is God and God is love. I did not care she had gray hair when she forgot to dye it. I did not care that she had wrinkles when she forgot to put on make-up. She had a great personality, petite body, big tits and cute ass and of course beautiful face with large smile (mostly). Oh, I wanted to have sex with her so badly.

The good news was my wife and I started to go to swingers’ clubs effective summer 2014. The agreement was to “do it” three or four times per year at the most. At first, she was not too thrilled about the idea but eventually warmed up and became the wild one. “That is great, I can’t believe she likes doing this. My wildest fantasies finally became reality!” I thought to myself in a very satisfied way. Forbidden fruit always tastes the best, therefore, you should “eat it” only sporadically. This helped to keep my eyes and thoughts away from Leah and focus on the family and work. Also, my wife and I always had a great sex life with lots of experimentation. I could not ask for a better wife. She is the whole package; I have fun with her, can talk to her about anything and we have similar interests. We both love kids. The last ten years of my life were truly amazing. I will always love her. We are now connected because love is eternal and cannot be destroyed.

So Leah, what is your story? What do you want to be when you grow up? Do you want to be the workaholic not fully satisfied with her personal life or do you want to be the person with THE true split personality? The person who has everything: The Church, the family, the career and, of course, the perfect and open sex life. Well, it is time for you to make some changes. Unfortunately, nobody is getting any younger. :-(

Life exists everywhere in every time and in every possible dimension. Everything is based on the law of cause and effect. For example; if you choose not to eat a piece of bread in the morning, what’s gonna happen? The bread will decay and that’s the end of the story. Hypothetically, let’s say you wake up one day and kill your husband. What’s gonna happen? Your life, your family’s, and the lives of everybody you ever knew would be over as you know it. At this point of singularity, you unknowingly created two dimensions. One after the shooting and one if you just woke up and ate the piece of bread instead of the shooting. Consequently, there are infinite amounts of dimensions and universes. Every decision you ever made and will make in your life creates reaction. You created the world that you know around you, not anybody else. You and nobody else is responsible for your actions and associated consequences.

Why don’t we create another dimension? One day, we will meet for a cup of coffee and I will tell you the following, “Leah, I know your dark side. Everyone has a good and bad side. This is the ultimate power struggle between the good and the bad forces of nature. It is more or less the same story of every single person that ever walked this Earth. Here’s your dark side. How would you like to fuck your daughter’s boyfriend without her knowledge? He is a jerk and she will eventually dump him anyway. You would like that wouldn’t you? I know you like young guys. I have experienced this with you ;-) If we put our heads together, I am sure we can manage it. How about getting Tom to fuck my wife? You could finally be the director you always wanted to be. You could direct him what to do. You could teach him a lesson. He deserves it anyway. I don’t think Cody’s wife will do the job. Although, I agree with him that she truly is beautiful. How would you like to eat my wife’s pussy? Most women are bisexual anyway, they just don’t know it. My wife likes Tom and you. She already agreed to everything I told you so far. Or, all four of us could have dinner and some ‘fun’ together.” The possibilities are endless. Use your imagination.

You have the power to create your own dark little universe and you can choose the people which you want to include. That is the real power. This game is not for the weak. It is only for the strongest of the strongest. Fuck the CEOs like Douglas. In reality, he’s weak. He lost the war with Bill. Why not create this universe/dimension? I can help you with this. Why not Leah, why not? You called me the Devil at the Christmas party anyway. :-)  I can be your employee, or your Angel, your Devil or your God. I can be anybody you want me to be. How ironic is this twisted marriage of the beauty and the beast. The possibilities are endless. It is all up to you. Do you want to listen to some person that sells bullshit stories for 10% of gross income or do you want to finally listen to yourself for a change? Just think about it. Just think about it really hard. You have all the time in the world. Once you make up your mind, just call me. You still have my number right? It is (404) XXX-XXXX, in case it was “accidentally" blocked. That’s all I have to say. My coffee is getting cold and I got to run to pick up my kids. Hopefully, I am going to make love to my wife tonight. Please at least give me a credit for selling you this idea! If I try to sell you a pen just tell me that I can’t do it. . . She then closed the door of her black Lexus, and was gone, gone forever in her own little dimension and I was stuck with paying the tab. . . What a bummer.

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Version 3

There are always exceptions to any rules so I have one more surprise for you. I just thought of another dimension/version 3. Why don’t we just stay professional? Let’s cut the bullshit and treat ourselves like ex-colleagues. Why don’t we have a cup of coffee and discuss indirect or corporate tax? V2 would probably get me lost really fast since I only learned UNICAP. We both love the details, right? ;-) Or we can just say “fuck the details” and live a little for a change. We should really listen to Trump. He promised at the inauguration that all the bullshit is finally over. {OK the secret is out. I am writing a novel. It is a science fiction/reality, autobiography, suspense and of course a love story. Nobody has done anything close to this. I finally found a niche in the market. Hopefully, I will become rich and famous like my favorite actors. I need inspiration because I am no Shakespeare. Can you keep this a secret and help me with it? I will give you % from the net earnings (that’s after taxes and before the BS deductions) from the book and possibly a movie. I will of course change all the names/characters. Everything will remain confidential. It’s been a year and your career is safe. I will not talk. That’s a promise. I think I’ve proven myself to you over the past three years. You have been a great teacher. I learned everything I needed to learn. . . ;-) We can take it easy at first with small baby steps. Don’t ever forget about time management. Your other dimension has to remain intact. If you don’t want to help me, I totally understand. In that case please destroy the letter. In any case, however, please delete the part that is in the brackets above the brackets. Oh. . .I gotta stop writing. All these details are driving me nuts. So, am I a lunatic or a genius writer? A coin always has two sides.} 

In case you don’t reply at all, you will always have a place in my heart as long as I am alive. . .

Half a century has passed and you still have the spirit of a young woman. Don’t ever lose it. It’s a beautiful thing. Happy Birthday.

Truly Yours

J.    

​

On Monday, I went to Carithers Flowers, chose a nice bouquet of pink and red roses to be delivered with the letter the next day. At the gym, pictures on TV screens were moving faster than normal at unpredictable times and a treadmill in front of me partially turned off then on. While listening to Pandora radio, different artists and songs were displayed for music I knew very well. I chose to ignore the discrepancy and pressed “thumb up” every time my favorite song was played. After the workout, I drove to Starbucks to purchase a small cup of coffee with cream, no sugar, and decided to listen to some rap music. It’s been years since I heard a rap song. The rap music played on the radio was not the best.

I went to Sope Creek Park to drink the coffee and to relax before driving home. I switched from FM radio to Pandora and typed “Snoop Doggy Dogg” as the new station. “I wanna be a motherfuckin' hustla, ya betta ask somebody,” said a middle-school kid to his teacher before an actual song started to play.

I knew something was wrong and thought, “Wait a minute, that’s not the correct order of the verbiage. There is another middle-school kid who answers, ‘I wanna be a fireman,’ to his teacher before the second kid says he wants to be a hustler.”

Someone definitely hacked the phone to play games with me. Again, I chose to ignore it, closed my eyes, relaxed, and listened to a few Snoop Dogg songs not heard since the Nineties.

Back in 1994 Czech Republic, Snoop’s album Doggystyle was huge and the “Who Am I” song played endlessly on MTV. One day, after emptying the “Flash” slot machine in the Stardust casino, I purchased the original Doggystyle CD. The graphics on the CD cover were interesting but I couldn’t understand anything except “Beware of Dogg” and “parental advisory, explicit lyrics.” Sadly enough, most of the words were not in the dictionary; the sentences didn’t make much sense. My English teacher looked at the CD, read over the texts, smiled and said, “Sorry, I can’t help you with this.”

When it comes to rap, Snoop’s Doggystyle and Dr. Dre’s The Chronic are absolute masterpieces. For me, at least, it’s not gonna get any better than this. In early Nineties, I wondered if the person photographed on the white CD cover was artist/real medical doctor combined. In 1995, my high school chemistry teacher, coach Puckett, joked with the class, “I wonder if Dr. Dre is a real doctor?” At that time, I had already received a much-needed culture crash course and knew the answer.                                                                                               

In the evening, I had a meeting scheduled with my Greek friend, Nick, and his dad at Suburban Tap tavern located a few minutes from home. We were discussing the possibility of forming a company to renovate and flip houses. Nick kept quiet most of the time. The dad was really friendly and we mostly discussed a situation in Greece and world politics in general. During the conversation, my eyes started to hurt and I became suspicious they may be dilated. I was walking across the tavern and the pictures of TV screens were moving faster than normal. In the bathroom, while looking into a mirror, both eyes were fully dilated. I tried the usual trick: to place a finger in front of my face and focus on it with my eyes. This didn’t work. I returned to the table hoping nobody would notice. The dad left after a few minutes. 

“I have to tell you something. Several months ago, I suffered a nervous breakdown,” Nick said, and was not happy about the situation.

What a coincidence, there was another friend who had suffered a nervous breakdown. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing and asked him to repeat the sentence.

“I suffered a nervous breakdown. The doctors put me on a bunch of antidepressants and other medication. I am doing much better, can function, but working at the school is not helping. I’m thinking about doing something else. At least Kerry is fully supportive,” Nick said.

“I wish Romana was as supportive as Kerry but she is not. We’re heading toward divorce and there is nothing I can do about it,” I said.

We talked back and forth on how everything happened. I told him my side of the story less the inner thoughts. “I have plenty of time these days. Why don’t we hang out more often? You should not be alone while in this state of mind,” I said.

Suddenly Nick awakened, jumped up a little and his facial expression changed from depressed to very happy. “I appreciate it, buddy,” he said, folding and extending his fist toward me to do the same, so I did.

“Are you fucking with me? Come on, Joseph, are you fucking with me?” he said, in the happiest possible tone of voice.

It looked like he knew my secret and wanted to hear everything buried in my mind. The tennis opponent, Donnie, came to my mind. “Are you fucking with me?” I had said to Donnie in a similar tone of voice to Nick’s.

“Are you ready to go?” Nick said, effectively interrupting my thoughts.

“Yes, let’s go,” I said, while being happy the conversation was almost over.

In the car, I thought more about what just happened.

“Either my Friends have somehow influenced Nick or he and his dad were forced by the NSA to scare me and to dig information out of me.”

For a few minutes, again I wasn’t sure which scenario was the real one. More thoughts justifying both scenarios were entering my mind until the following idea: “Can we control the weather? – No. The lightning striking a tree and the beam of light hitting my face at the right moment, and the loud owl. No, the NSA doesn’t have this ability. They use fear and terror to intimidate people, not nature, not the beautifully sounding owl.”

I reassured myself the Plejaren Friends and not the NSA were behind everything and drove home. To prove to myself I will no longer be scared or have any doubts about what is real, I searched for the Aliens movie on Netflix. The search was done indirectly by typing Bill Paxton or Sigourney Weaver. No luck, Aliens was not available for viewing. I was relieved. There was a chance my thoughts could spiral out of control during or after seeing the movie.

​

The next day, my wristwatch showed a few minutes before 10 a.m. and I had a strange feeling the flowers had been delivered to PulteGroup. The thought of Leah reading the letter entered my mind right at 10.20 a.m. That morning, I researched more about Eduard Albert (Billy) Meier and came across a section called “Spirit Teaching.” I read a few of the articles, which described in detail many values such as love, compassion, and peacefulness. The readings also described recommendations on how to effectively handle challenges on a personal and global level. I came across a book written by Bill in 2008 called Goblet of the Truth and read a few pages. On page IX, this line is written, “Originally, he had intended to undertake this eminent and highly expressive transcription in the year 2017.”

“Why 2017, does the book have something to do with my recent problems? I definitely need to read it to make sure,” I said to myself, and scheduled daily reminders on my calendar to read ten pages of the book, a section or two of “Spirit Teaching” and to learn more about the world’s religions.

Filing personal income taxes was an ordeal this year. A $16,000 sum of Pulte income was entered into TurboTax and a refund of $8,000 was instantly calculated by the system. A person doesn’t have to be an accountant to realize something is wrong. I was anxious and pulled the computer’s electric wire out of the outlet. After the computer restarted, the system came up with exactly the same calculation. I scrolled down through all possible tax exemptions and saw that churches and religious organizations have many exemptions unavailable to everyone else. There are so many loopholes and deductions that clergy practically pay very little income tax, no Social Security and Medicare taxes. These people only take from society and don’t give anything back. I remembered a story my ex-boss, John, told me about eight years ago. John was the owner of a collection agency I worked for while going to college.

​

Boss John’s story

According to John: “Back in the 1980s, when you didn’t pay a portion of the phone bill related to 900 numbers, the phone company would disconnect your phone. We bought 900 numbers wholesale indirectly from AT&T to run phone-sex chats. We even purchased numbers costing $25 and $50 for the first minute. There was so much money coming in, we seriously considered starting a church. If you want to be in a money-laundering business, open up a church. This is the greatest legalized pyramid scheme in the US.”

He also worked for the Mafia in a sweepstake scheme where a person was guaranteed to win one in five prizes after paying a $2,000 award fee, which later went up to $5,000. The business had an annual gross revenue of $35 million.

Per John; the more money you ask for, the more legit your business looks. Four prizes were of high value, such as a new car, but the last prize – a diamond ring appraised at $10,000 – was actually only worth about $10. You can have anything appraised for whatever you want. Most winners, about 99%, received the $10 ring. The organization was getting names of people who loved to gamble and win, sometimes paying $100 per name. One of the lucky winners was a federal judge. To play it safe, the group decided to give him a prize that actually had value. John purchased a brand-new John Deere tractor worth $4,000 and personally delivered it to the judge’s home. He was the happiest person when he saw the price. The scheme was semi-legal and the feds were not able to outright shut the scheme so they disconnected the phones. The mob brought in a semi-truck with a satellite dish to beam a phone signal to the office.

John left the organization and started his own scheme, which was outright theft. His employees were asking for $9,999 checks (to avoid raising a red flag with the IRS when cashed) but no prizes were ever delivered. He had an employee who did nothing but open P.O. boxes. Once a check was received, the P.O. box was never used again. John came up with business process improvements and legitimate business addresses of mom-and-pop stores, doctors or tire places, that were used to receive checks.

“We would call a business,” John recalled, “and say that a FedEx envelope was mailed there accidentally and a person would go there to pick it up. One time, a doctor was suspicious and refused to give my guy the envelope, so he jumped over a counter, grabbed the envelope from the doctor’s hands and ran away.” We both laughed loudly.

“The FBI later told me it drove them crazy that checks were mailed to legitimate businesses,” John added, and we laughed some more.

Within a few years, John shut down the operation and retired. His luck ran out when he loaned $30,000 to a friend who used the money to buy weed and ratted him out once arrested. At least John was able to blow $1.5 million in six months with a stripper girlfriend before his arrest. Out of the sixteen-year sentence, he only served three years since he kept fighting many of the bogus charges.

“There are no cliques in federal prisons. Upon slightest suspicion of a clique, the members are shipped to different prisons across the country. My cellmate was Gene Gotti, brother of John Gotti. He was getting the latest editions of new books and said to me, ‘John, read this and tell me if it’s any good.’ So all I did was read books. The prison was in a secluded location surrounded by woods,” he said.

“That’s like being in a resort. Were you able to lift weights?” I asked.

“We actually had steaks once a month and the gym was really nice.”

John was a well-connected individual and upon his release secured himself a $65,000 marketing position for Sports Life Fitness health club in Atlanta. He did very well and was promoted to marketing director. The gym franchise was purchased by Crunch Fitness and John was responsible for marketing the opening of its premier location on Akers Mill Road. John reminds me of Jeff Mathis, except for one difference – he can function and take care of business when he parties.

In the early 2000s, John built two additional rooms in his house. Coincidently, drummer Shawn Drover installed sheetrock in the house shortly before joining the band, Megadeth. I liked the house addition; John's office was upstairs. The downstairs had a full bar, pool table, and a stripper pole. How perfect was this twisted marriage of his work/life balance. 

​

(In September 2017, I went to work part-time for John as a debt collector. Sadly, his wife Sheila was diagnosed with breast cancer and had passed away in 2016. I remember her as this sweet lady who always asked me about my family. She gave me a beautiful baby dress on the day Teresa was born. John is a fighter who never gives up. At present, there is a twenty-one-year-old stripper girlfriend living in his house. :-) I’ve never met her because she sleeps during the day. He is probably going through ridiculous sums of money but who cares? In his mind, John is living “the dream” and needs someone to help heal his heart and soul, to forget about his beloved wife. That’s all that matter.)

​

In the afternoon, my wife and I had a joint session scheduled with therapist, Patricia. Romana kept talking the whole hour, recycling the same five problems she’d had with me over the past ten years. I just sat there and looked into an empty space. Patricia only said a few sentences and mixed in words that didn’t make sense. I knew something was up and kept quiet until the end.

“I don’t know what else to do. Romana keeps repeating the same issues over and over again, no matter how many times we’ve discussed this. I went to the gym one evening, asked my mom to put the kids to bed but she didn’t. Romana came home at 9 p.m. and saw Mom cooking and the kids were running around – OK, this never happened again. I loaned $2,000 to my mom behind her back – OK, it never happened again. She has problems with my mom – OK, we fired her. She has a problem with me going to the gym three times a week – OK, I go one weekday night and twice on weekend days, when she’s at work, and the kids go to the gym’s daycare. I refuse to give up something that makes me feel good. I have been consistently working out for twenty years. She complains I didn’t make enough money while at school seven years ago – OK, I pay most of the bills these days.”

I finished explaining the situation and Patricia deeply exhaled; exactly in the same way the nurse in Kennestone did when Romana left me in the hospital. I became nervous; there was another room adjacent to this one, the room I had never seen. It could have been full of doctors eager to take me away to a mental institution at the slightest suspicion of saying anything that happened in January while being hospitalized.

“That’s why Patricia exhaled. She exhaled in relief as I had proven to everyone I am mentally stable,” I thought.

Patricia walked us out of the room to a hallway and removed a stick placed under knob that held the door from inside, so no one could get in from outside. Being disturbed by a maintenance person was her explanation.

​

In the evening, I received a text message stating someone would like to share lottery winnings with me. I was stunned and deleted the text message. Teresa and Julia insisted that I watch with them a computer-generated fantasy/thriller called Coraline (2009), and I did. This was an interesting fairy tale with an exciting plot about a hidden alternate world, a sort of parallel reality. I enjoyed the movie until the “other mother” told Coraline that buttons would be sewed into her eyes. I became light-headed, had chest pains and found it difficult to breathe, excused myself and went straight to bed.

“Yesterday, I wanted to watch Aliens. What would’ve happened then? I can’t even handle a kid’s cartoon,” I said to myself, and fully understood I was not psychologically ready to handle the truth, to be certain about the correct scenario regardless of circumstances. I wasn’t fully cured from what happened to me in December and January. “How are the girls doing at Argos? Did Leah like my letter?” I thought, breathing deeply to get over the chest pains while falling asleep.

​

On the morning of March 23rd, after breakfast, I began to have slight chest and facial pains. Going to the gym was the only thing on my mind, regardless of the feelings. “I better take it easy and walk for a while,” I thought, and drove to the soccer field next to Sewell Park. I exited the car and immediately felt worse; not able to breathe, dizzy, light-headed and ready to collapse any second. I couldn’t drive back home. The rush hour was in full swing, the road to the house was jammed. Wellstar East Cobb Health Park was about a mile away in the opposite direction. I drove the car as fast as possible until an intersection was in my sight. I then drove in the opposite direction, while honking at everyone, and crossed the Robinson Road/Roswell Road intersection at a red light.

I left the car running in front of the main entrance, went inside as fast as possible and told the receptionist I was about to pass out. A nurse took me in, told me to lie down and relax if possible. Two nurses entered the room: a blonde who was friendly and tried to calm me down, and a black-haired nurse who didn’t say a friendly word and asked me questions in the most formal way possible. This reminded me of the January hospitalization, of the Heaven and Hell, the Good vs Bad. I was afraid everything would eventually spiral out of control; I would move deeper and deeper into the gates of hospital Heaven until a mental institution or death was reached.

The symptoms eventually subsided, severe panic attack was the diagnosis. I must have been lying there for at least an hour before everything was close to normal. I became fully aware of my surroundings and breathed normally. Romana refused to pick me up and referred me to a psychiatrist. While being discharged, I was given a large brown envelope and told to go see a psychiatrist located at 2151 Peachford Road, Atlanta 30338.

​

I was walking the hallways of the clinic towards the main reception area and noticed a woman looking like Jessica who was sitting on a bench, not too far from me. She got up and walked away before I was able to see her in greater detail.

“We parked your car by the urgent care entrance,” the receptionist said, and pointed outside to the parking lot area.

“I better leave now before my symptoms worsen,” I thought, and walked outside to find the car. I started the car, entered the address into the phone’s navigation and left the clinic. I drove with no problems, but my mind was somewhere else.