I'm Losing me For You

                                                        Copyright 1992 by Ken P.

So you want me to show my feel-ings,

So you want a man-of-the times.

So you want me to tell you every thought,

That I have on my mind.

So you want me to love you ev-ry way

A man can pos-sibly do.

Well girl I don't know how much more

I can bend my-self for you!

I'm Los-ing me for you,

'An don't know what to do.

All the ways that you first loved in me,

Ev-ry day you try to change in me.

Can't you just some-how

Leave me be...I'm

Looooooooing me, For You.

(instrumental interlude)

So you told me to lose the Le-vis,

And make a change in my hair.

So I went out to see the barber man,

And bought fan-cy clothes to wear!

Then I told all my bud-dies

"soooo long..."

We've had a grin or two.

But some-where in the Bi-ble,

Says to thine own self be true

I'm los-ing Me For You,

Now I know what I must do.

Girl I don't have an-y choices now.

It's just more than my male pride al-lows.

We have ev-en lost the love some-how,

I'm looooo-sing YOU.............

..............................FOR ME!

Comment (0) Read More...

Corporation Fool

                                                       Copyright 1992, by Ken P.

I slip in the si-lence from home.

It's dark and cold there on the drive-way, a-lone.

I'm out be-fore my neigh-bor next door.

I hear the place he works ain't there no more.

Hard look on my face,

I am off to take my place.

A-nother day of play-ing Corporate Fool.

I'm no more than a

Corporation Fool.

Corporate fooooooool, Cooperate Fool.

A-nother day of playin' Corporate Fool!

Corporate foooooooool, Corporate Fool.

I'm no more than a Corporation Fool!

My brief-case is hea-vy with wood

Made in-to paper at some wood mill, for good.

To-day at the of-fice I Praaaaay.

I'll smile at the right folks and stay.

Mem-os to the boss, e-plain a-way our loss.

A-nother day of playin' Corporate Fool.

I'm no more than a Corporation Fool.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Hard look on my face,

I am off to take my place.

A-nother day of playin' Corporate Fool.

I'm no more..............

Than a Cor..............

..............Poration Fool!

Comment (0) Read More...

The First One To Leave Was Her Own Dad

                                  Copyright 1993 by Ken P.

Please, be kind

To my on-ly daughter.

The one to-morrow you will wed.

Ohhhh. she was born,

In a town just south of no-where,

And the first one to leave

Was her own dad!

Yea the first one to leave

Was her own dad.

It was then that we

Took on the wor-ld

Don't ya see.

Mis-ter, we didn't do so bad!

All a-lone,

I carved us out a home,

Where I gave my lit-tle pun-kin,

All the love that I had!

(musical interlude)

(so) please, be kind,

To my on-ly daughter.

The one to-mor-row

you will wed.

Ohhhhhhhh she was born,

In a town just south of no-where,

And the first one to leave

Was her own dad.

Since the first one...

It was was hard and it was lon-ly

Since the first one...

On-ly pun-kin there to hold me

Since the first one...

Wantin' some-one just to phone me.

Since the first one to leave,

Was her owwwwwwn

Own dad!

Comment (0) Read More...

Note; if you are not able to download the digital audio for this song, please enjoy the lyrics as a poem).

Hours Drift Slowly By

                                                                 Copyright 1990 by Ken P.

Comment (0) Read More...

Note; if you are not able to download the digital recording of this song, please enjoy the lyrics as a poem. 

Love At Any Price

                                             Copyright 1992 by Ken P.

I wake up ev-ry morning

Over and over a-gain

Roll over and take a look at you,

'T find out what mood I'm in!

Wjy do I put up with you,

You don't ev-en treat me nice;

I'm buyin' loooove,

At an-y price!

Do I love you?

Is that the question?

Do I need you,

In my sick way?

Do I want you,

That's more the issue,

But the bot-tom line,

Is do I stay?

(spoken..."like a brok-en record, over and over and over and over and over and over again)

Why do I put up with you?

You don't ev-en hold me nights.

I'm buyin' looooove,

At a-ny price.

Looooooove,

At too high a price.

Your lov'es too high

For meeeeeeeeeeeee.

At an-y price!

(spoken...I wake up in the mornin', over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, and...)

Comment (0) Read More...

   Any man who attends Al-Anon meetings on a regular basis will hear  stories of abuse told by women.  As they effect a hard look...a sort of common vacant stare into the middle of the room, it always gets really quiet in the meeting room.

   Yes, we all learn that alcoholism is a disease, and we work hard at accepting that alcohol's first victim when it reaches the brain is  judgement. We all know that this deadening of the humanizing chips leads to unpredictable behavior, emotional outbursts...the usual chaos that so often gets resolved by trips to the ER and the police station.

   After hearing one of these all-too familiar stories I went home and wrote this blues.

P.S. Soon you will be able to download a digital sound file and listen to this song. In the meantime, please enjoy the lyrics as a poem.

Long Damned Gone

                                                                      Copyright 1990 by Ken P.

Pain don't im-press me.

At least its fa-miliar.

And rain, rain don't rush me.

A wo-man can on-ly get so wet.

There was a time you could hold me.

Less with love, more with an-ger.

But I sur-vive with the dan-ger,

Because I'm Long, Long Damned Gone!

At first I cried to my Mama, cried to my pa,

Cried to the neighbors, I e-ven cri-ed to God.

(spoken, "...and everbody but God said things like")

"That man's your hus-band, the marks don't show,

He's got a good job, where would you go?"

Oh where, God where, would I go?

Framed by my family, betrayed by the system.

Can some-one some how help me,

And how man-y more women out there like me?

There was a time, we were silent.

Ground our teeth in our pil-lows.

Hey mis-ter some, now are wid-ows,

And now we're long, Long Damned Gone.

In-side we're Long, Long Damned Gone.

Inside (spoken..."and someday outside too")

We will be Long Damned Gone!

Comment (0) Read More...

   Codependent men are lonely creatures. They live in a state of isolation from the world, because constant contact with an addicted or alcoholic loved-one has for great blocks of their lifetime resulted in pain.  So real contact with another person has become synonymous with pain. In fact, any contact withanother person brings with it the risk of truth, and truth is painful, so codependent men avoid truth and contact altogether... even with themselves!

   I was ruminating on this isolation once while sitting in this little restaurant on a square in an East Texas town. To give you an idea as to how non-pretentious this establishment was, the name over the front door, burned onto a piece of wood, was  "cafe."  I was reading a music theory textbook about how to write a song starting with a "hook." As I watched my waitress dispense caffeine while strolling up and down the single aisle between the two ragged rows of green plastic booths I began to fantasize about how a codependent man might  slip into a world of fantasy involving this waitress. Her name was Edna, and, yes, she sported a tall blonde beehive below which her lower jaw casually mutilated a piece of Juicy Fruit gum.

   Just about this time Edna dropped a little green bill on my table with the words "Have A Nice Day, Edna" scrawled across the bottom. There were little circles over the "I's", and a Happy Face down in one corner. My first realization was that Edna had just handed me a wonderful "hook!" How many times a day does this happen? So I stayed a little longer, had a few more cups of coffee, and wrote the lyrics and melody to the song below on a napkin.

   I couldn't rhyme anything with Edna, so she became Marge. After having "Marge" set to music in Nashville, I've had years of fun with her.  She was played on a country radio station in Richmond Texas, and so many people called in requesting to hear her again that the station started giving away coffee cups as prizes that said Marge on the side!

    Hope you enjoy Marge.

Have A Nice Day Comma Marge

Copyright 1987, Ken P.

I strolled in-to a ca-fe,

for coff-ee and a stack.

I spied a brand new waitress,

from some-where back in back.

Her shape was kind-a cur-vy,

Her skin was white like cream.

Her name badge just said "Margie,"

She made my glasses steam!

(spoken, "yep, and it wasn't from the coffee either.

  Noooooooooooooooooooooooo!)

I knew she really liked me.

She hung around my booth.

Five re-fills for my coff-ee,

before my meal was through.

And then she pulled a num-ber

That gave my heart a charge.

Wrote on that bill right by me,

"Have a Nice Day, Comma Marge!"

(spoken; had little circles over the eyes, ya know. A happy face down in one corner)

Musical interlude

I thought a-bout my sweet-heart,

at home with all those brats.

'Bout yard-work ev-ry Sun-day,

'Bout bills and such as that.

Then stand-in' by a big 'ol cow-boy

While waitin' ta pay my charge,

I saw the bill he's holdin' said

 Have A Nice Day, Comma Marge.

(spoken, "You sure know how to hurt a guy Marge. Did I forget the tip? I'll be back tomorrow. Don't for get me Marge...pleeeeeeeeeeease!)  

Comment (0) Read More...

   My sponsor is working hard to expand me beyond the life I live now, which is almost exclusively "in my head." He tells me that I must transcend the barriers erected within me by decades of faulty programming for an American male and access the feeling part of me. In his words, "Ken, you can do all of the thinking you want, but until you start doing some feeling, you are limited. This is because it is the feeling part of you that 'drives your bus.'"

    OK. I've written over 40 posts in this blog site using almost entirely my head, so it is time to step out and make a sunstantial personal gamble. I did learn one acceptable means of expressing feelings as I grew up from the members of my nuclear family, and that was through music. Yes, we had alcoholism rampant...right down the street, and for literally generations back. But we still had our music, and almost every Sunday after church we would gather at somebody's house with guitars, fiddles, harmonicas, pianos, and some of the most incredible vocal harmony among cousins I have ever heard. Hank Williams' latest hit might be attempted braketed by Amazing Grace and The Old Rugged Cross, and in truth not a one of us could read a note of music. We considered people who had to have their music handicapped!

   Through our music, in spite of everything, we showed each other that we all loved each other.

   Since those early years, I've learned that music touches me, and others, sometimes at a deeper level than words. I've studied music now formally, played it on various instruments, and written it  for years. This work has rendered me capable of expressing feelings using the combination of composed music with lyrics (i.e., a song). Hey, it's better than not expressing them at all, and you don't have to shed all of those messy tears.

   In 1989 I wrote the song that I am attaching to this post to describe the feelings I remembered as I sat in the livingroom next to my now X-wife, who had been drinking since 3:00 that afternoon. In other words, I was totally alone.  In 1989, I still had fear of being discovered as a codependent man, so, in order to remain totally anonymous, I had the song recorded by a good demo studio in Nashville as a female vocal. Since that time, I have grown to accept my codependency, and to realize that lonliness is lonliness, whether your name is Ken or Katie!

   I'll include the lyics of the song here in case you cannot play the music for technical reasons and wish to view the piece as merely a poem. Also, if you can download the digital music file and want to read the lyrics as you listen to the country musc, that might make the song even more meaningful. I hope you enjoy my work, and feel free to pass it to anybody "out there" whom it might touch.

Note; very soon you will be able to download a digital sound file that will allow you to listen to this song, but in the meantime, please enjoy the lyrics as a poem!

Alone With You Sittin' Right Next To Me

Copyright 1989, Ken P.

Life was sweet, when I thought I had some-one.

We were young, and you thought I hung the sun.

But now we're home a-lone, you're on the phone,

or watchin' no-thin', on TV.

I'm Alone With You Sittin' Right Next To Me!

(musical interlude)

Ev-en when you're there, you're not there,

You sit and stare right through me.

Or you're pourin' down booze, you seem to choose,

Any-thing to set you free

Ev-en when we're lyin' face to face,

You're not here in-side my space,

I'm Alone With You Sinnin' Right Next To Me!

(musical interlude)

Ev-en when we're lyin' face to face,

You're not here in-side my space,

I'm A-lone With You Sittin' Right Next To Me!

Time's run out, it's sad for us to pre-tend.

IT'S MY LIFE! I'm sayin,'

Let's let us end.

There were no guar-an-tees, the used-to be's

Are not enough. I set you free, 'cause

I'm Alone With You Sittin Right Next To Me!

Af-ter years of pain, 'yea it's a shame,

I have to cut my losses and run.

Don't ask me to stay, each prescious day,

I could be havin' fun,

So you'll have to find you some-one else,

or just sit here by your-self.

I won't be A-lone With You Sittin' Right Next To me.

You'll have to find you some-one else,

I re-fuse to DIE HERE on your shelf,

I won't be A-lone With You Sittin Right Next To Me.

I won't be A-lone With You Sittin' Right Next To me!

If you have a second cousin who knows an artist like Dolly Parton (or maybe even Eric Clampton), please pass this music and the next 20 songs that I send through my blog. If they record the material and we make a few bucks, we'll spend them on building a decent half-way house here in our county!

Take care,

Ken P.

Comment (0) Read More...

We Codependent Men, We Mute Coyotes

By Ken P.

The coyote is a long, slim, sick and sorry-looking skeleton, with a gray wolf-skin stretched over it, a tolerably bushy tail that forever sags down, a furtive and evil eye, and a long, sharp face, with slightly lifted lip and exposed teeth. He has a general slinking expression all over. The coyote is a living, breathing allegory of Want. He is always hungry. He is always poor, out of luck, and friendless. The meanest creatures despise him, and even the fleas would desert him for a velocipede.

                                                              Taken from Mark Twain's Roughing It

   A codependent man is a man who is often a high functioning husband with a wife who has a physical, mental, and spiritual need for a mind-altering substance, such as alcohol or drugs. His wife's extreme need for her substance has caused her for years to manipulate this man by every means known to a woman who has stood up before institutions full of relatives, a respected preacher, and God pledging his total allegiance to her for life "...till death do them part."

  Almost all of the literature on codependency is written by women for women, leaving the codependent man basically unstudied. This is for a very simple reason. He is under everybody's radar screen because he has to be! Read on and learn a few of the reasons why such a man suffers like the retched coyote described by Mark Twain above...only he can't even howl; because of his disease, he is mute!

   Like the coyote, this man survives in a state of heightened diligence. He sees the other men as wolves running in their chosen packs. He sees the jocks, the golfers, the professional organizations, the fraternal clubs, the Little League Dads, and the men in his suburban neighborhood dressed in their crisp shorts.

   But the twin diseases of alcoholism and codependency have isolated him. He has no pack for protection. His preoccupation with an alcoholic wife has robbed him of the time and energy to form trusting relationships with other men, and he pays a tremendous internal price for that missing element. Here is why; because of hundreds of thousands of years surviving as the hunting half of "hunters and gatherers," somewhere down in his bones every man knows that isolation from the pack means death.

   It is not only his lack of time to develop relationships with other men that isolates this codependent man. His various defense mechanisms such as perfectionism and over-achievement serve to make other men shun him. There is also his underlying anger, mostly born of fear. Other men sense this. He is so obviously not at ease in his own skin. He over-reacts, especially to any slight criticism. Other men soon learn the basic truth summed up by a very wise counselor, who once told me, "It's hard to hug a porcupine!"

   So his ears are either perked in constant high alert, or flattened with anger and frustration. His frustration, though constant, cannot be voiced for an important reason; he cannot identify it!

   It is called denial. Denial is his most immediate and user-friendly shock absorber against the painful emotional shocks delivered at random from his first family during childhood. Studies show that most codependent men came from highly dysfunctional families that included at least one alcoholic or addicted parent.  All he ever knew was this existence, so that feels normal. He just went out and found a wife who would treat him the way the people who were supposed to love him unconditionally always did. A little boy can't win against big parents, and a beaten-down man can't win against an abusive addicted wife.

   So he becomes a mute coyote.

   He must remain silent like a mute coyote. Coyotes remain silent lest they draw attention to themselves. Attention, to a man married to an alcoholic wife is synonymous with pain, and avoidance of pain has gradually become his sole moment to moment purpose. His tail "that forever sags down" stays there between his legs because he is trying to make himself smaller. The wagging tail of his puppy hood...the spiked tail of high expectation, has been replaced. A wagging or spiked tail would destroy his "cover."

   If you can relate to this description, you may be another Codependent man. There is help.

   I am a man who has worked with codependent men for over thirty years as their "sponsor," helping them through the 12-step program called Al-Anon.  I am working with two other such men to reach out and help other men with this pitiful disease.  We are working through various means to establish men's Al-Anon meetings all over this nation, because they are so badly needed. As I write this, only 15% of those attending Al-Anon meetings are men, even though the current generation of women aged 14-22 are using alcohol, drugs, and tobacco at a rate that is higher than their male counterparts. Given this situation, along with the highest rate of alcoholism and addiction among the parents in our country's history, we see a future absolutely rife with codependency among its men.

   If you catch even a glimpse of yourself in this missive or if you suspect that you are enabling somebody close to you who has the disease of addiction, please...Call Al-Anon World Service Office to learn where the nearest men's Al-Anon meeting is in your area, or for information about how to start one!

Call 1-888-4AL-ANON.

Comment (0) Read More...

Every addict and/or alcoholic wakes up every morning with this bag of pain hanging over his or her heart by a rope that is so tight that it only allows the sufferrer to take short shallow breaths. This pain is a 'mixed bag of goodies, but unlike a pinata that yields treats when it is broken, this one just sort of exudes misery like a foul vapor up into the nostrils. 

Through the years the addict has, through trial and error, found ways to loosen the rope, and sometimes to even take the bag off and hang it around the neck of anybody nearby. This is why it is so hard to be around addicts...they are constantly trying to shift their pain to you, and they have evolved amazingly clever and subtle ways to make this sick transfer.

 If you are in any level of proximity to an addict, keeping that bag of pain off of your own neck is impossible...at least without  help from others who have 'been there and understand. We Al-Anons, Nar-Anons, and Adult Children of Alcoholics are the others. We meet regularly and share our experience, strength, and hope. We spend hours discussing this subject, which we call DETACHMENT.

After many years of attending meetings, we have come to identify three distinct phases of detachment which are as follows: detachment with hatred, detachment with indifference, and detachment with love.

There is no shortcut through this process for somebody who has spent decades having the bag hung around their neck by another's disease. However, an important point that needs to be made here is this; even detachment with hatred is healthier for both the addict and the codependent than no detachment at all.

What am I saying here? I'm saying please;  reach out and ask for help from the rest of us. We are meeting every week in community centers, churches, coffee shops, libraries, homes, and sometimes just in a circle out under a big oak tree in the sun to help each other. Call 1-888-4AL-ANON or click on www.al-anon.alateen.org to find out when and where there is a meeting just for you!

 Ken P.

Comment (0) Read More...