Songs of Pain and Hope

(For the girl I lit the candles for)

I knew NYC would kill me. I’ve always avoided applying for schools or jobs there because I intuitively knew I wouldn’t belong.  And of course, that’s the only job offer I received after the PhD program for a field that I wasn’t interested in or had specific training for.

I’ll keep the details to a bare minimum, but it is a bit complex and complicated.  Basically, I had a job solely because of the Ferguson incident, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the death of Eric Garner.  Under heavy political pressure, the NYC City Council establishes the first ever Inspector General for the NYPD and houses it within the NYC Department of Investigation.  On paper, it is supposed to be an independent oversight agency tasked with unbiased examinations and investigations of the NYPD’s policies, procedures, and operations.  In reality, it is an agenda driven, politically motivated endeavor led by Mayor Bill DiBlasio’s former campaign treasurer, who ended up cleverly expanding his power, conducting fishing expeditions, overreaching past the scope of his mandate, abusing his authority, betraying DiBlasio, and eventually getting fired after a lengthy investigation.

In any case, before that all unfolded, I was hired to be one of their lead policy managers / investigators.  Long story short, I’m placed in a daily battle to maintain my integrity and sanity while getting undermined, backstabbed, ignored, and ultimately shelved.  Power, media attention. and fame make people crazy and there was no exception here.  What started out as a hopeful endeavor quickly devolved into a toxic, chaotic one.

After barely over a year at Investigations, I manage to escape to the NYPD where it is relatively peaceful and stable for around three to four good years.  It is still not an easy place to work at, but I am somewhat protected, valued, and even loved.  I handle their secrets and advise the High Command, no small feat and something I will always be proud of for the rest of my life.  It was like a family to me.  

Always heroes. 

Always NYPD.

But the winds of politics blow fast and fickle, nationally and citywide, and the administration changes again and again.  Over my five year tenure, I serve under three different Police Commissioners and almost a fourth.  The Department changes from within and many key staff are fired or forced to resign.  I gradually lose my protection and because of my skill set, knowledge of the Department’s inner workings, and my general inability to bend my knee, I go from valued asset to major liability almost overnight.  Over the course of my last year there, I get targeted, bullied, and had no choice but to leave the job.  They poison, undermine, and rip me apart so badly that one day, my ears are ringing and I walk out of the office and take a month off.  I can’t ride the subway without jumping,  I am afraid of going to the office, participating in Zoom calls, lose a ton of weight, I struggle to walk up to the apartment, interact with others.  And this is from someone who has gone to some very dangerous and unpleasant places.  I try to go remote, but it’s too late.  I’ve been checkmated and the damage is irreversible.   Because of COVID and my weird resume, I can’t find anything else.  The whole time this is occurring and I’m getting boiled slowly like a lobster, I had already been trying to escape with futility.  I get depressed and discouraged, and the rest is simply too painful to write about at this point.

But to summarize, I was playing with some big guns in NYC politics.  In the grand scheme of the universe, insignificant, but for the US and NYC (where everything is overhyped), high up. I wasn’t getting in the way of “small” people and wasn’t just the proverbial pebble in the shoe, but a major barrier. I stopped or at least slowed down some pretty bad behavior.

I’ve survived and solved a lot up to that point in my life, but this situation was by far the most difficult (and still is). I suppose in a way, I asked for it.  While I did try to have a fun, international job and then a boring, paper pushing compliance one, this was my destiny.  It is at times comforting to know that I did everything I could to change my fate (or at least I think I did).

The story that has always struck me is the one in the Iliad where Achilles is told by his mother that if he goes to fight at Troy, he is fated to die there.  His alternative is to live as a woman in peace on a remote island.  We all know what he chooses, a death with glory and honor over a safe, long life.

I’m neither a hero nor was I trying to be one.  But even as a younger man, I wished that one day I would be in a position to do something impactful, even great.  And in a way, a very real, tangible one, I did get that opportunity in NYC.  For those magical years, my work impacted millions of people from a hidden, behind the scenes position.  Many of my predictions while initially ignored, downplayed, or even laughed at, eventually came true.  But I’m truly proud I got to serve and protect the largest city in the US, and not in an insignificant way.  And for all that, I paid with a lot, more than what I expected and bargained for.  I truly loved the NYPD, its mission, its purpose, what it stood for, and my colleagues.  Losing them was heartbreaking.

No one really understood when I told them what was happening and had happened.  I’ve barely figured out how to tell people these days.  When you’re in the middle of the storm, you don’t see much in front of you other than the wind and rain.

While I lost so much and it is painful, on the most part, I don’t think I would or could have done much, if anything, differently.  I held my ground, fought the best that I could with all that I had – my mind, my heart, my soul.  Like other things I did, sports, music, teaching, other work positions, I left it all out there, all in, all out, and had nothing left in the tank at the end. 

One day, I will make more, if not complete peace with all this and the devastating aftermath.

(For the girl I lit the candles for)

I was going to open with discussing scenes from two movies – Forrest Gump and Good Will Hunting. But I think I’ll just say this one upfront – there was parental abuse – physical, mental, emotional. The parents weren’t like this all the time, only when stressed or things weren’t good  (which was unfortunately quite a bit). My father is from a wealthy family by Third World standards and my mother is from an extremely poor one by the same standards. It wasn’t a Cinderella story. When they were in a normal state, they looked ok, even good. But that’s how abuse works. It rears its ugly head when it wants to.

I really don’t let this part of my history define or affect me too much and have rarely spoken about the details.

But here it is.

I was caned repeatedly since I was a very young child. Almost all the time, it was for some minor or benign incident such as spilling a cup of water, crying before going to my kindergarten, or not getting a high enough grade on a test. My mother was the major culprit, she would look demon-possessed when enraged. My father would either look away or also take out his anger and frustration on me. My aunt, who helped raise me, had to hide the cane in order to protect me.

The physical abuse ended in 7th grade when I grabbed the stick my mother was going to use on me for another trivial or non-existent offense, broke it, and threw the pieces back at her. In her foolishness and poor judgment, she once rubbed chili peppers in my eyes to keep me from blinking. One time, I was playing too close to an iron and the consequence was my mother burning me with it.

The emotional abuse was longer-lasting. In addition to the yelling and screaming, both parents said things to me that others have described as cruel and evil – that I was ugly, that no one would marry me, that no one would come to my graduations, that no law school would accept me, that my work as a lawyer wasn’t good enough. My mother would barge into my room in the middle of the night while I was sleeping to ask whether I was saved. My father would just stand by and do little to nothing at all to stop or address her behavior.

They also made me at one point note down as a kid all the mistakes I had made during the day.  You know how I got so good at remembering facts from all my cases and other projects? This is one of the reasons. Most of the memorable things I did would mostly be ignored, downplayed, or even criticized. They were just really stingy with everything – affection, acceptance, praise, finances, love. They treated me as an asset more than a son. I sometimes joke that my brother dog gets better treatment.

I played two-and-a-half years in RM’s jazz ensemble, one of the best in the county and also in the pit orchestra for the spring musicals. If I count correctly, I played a total of eight times in front of a relatively large crowd. A good friend had parts in the musicals and his parents attended each of the performances. They heard me play my guitar more than mine did. My parents (and I think it was only my father) only came to one of these performances out of an irrational fear that I would become a rock musician (and if I was actually talented enough, may have been a happier life). On a somewhat funny note. I was made to sign a document stating that I wouldn’t follow the rock band route in exchange for being allowed to join the ensemble.

As the older child, I received most of the brunt of my parents’ behavior. I’ve also been left alone since I was 6 because they either didn’t have enough money for daycare for two kids or didn’t want to spend it. It was scary. One time, a man who was harassing our family and had previously vandalized our house made a threatening call that I picked up. I was still 6.

Terrifying.

When confronted with their behavior, my parents mainly downplayed, gaslit, or asked cheaply for forgiveness without real sincerity, repentance, regret, or accountability.

But I wouldn’t have it any other way. In a sad way, the beatings in all their forms helped give me inner fortitude, toughness, and strength to draw on at times. I’m also glad that my brother received a lot less. He doesn’t really appreciate or acknowledge it. But if it wasn’t me, it would be him. I could take it, like a dark knight.

This is also one of the reasons I dedicated a significant portion of my life to protecting others, especially those in a vulnerable or weaker position.