MY STORY TO TELL

A LOST LOVE REEMERGES

As I learned that life continues, I also learned that good things can come from bad events. As I learned to live life without my best friend, I learned that I still had one best friend (outside of my kids) that I had not considered since my very early youth, my mother. She too was hurting and grieving. My father was her everything. They were married when she was just 18 years old and he passed away just two months before they could celebrate their 42nd wedding anniversary. It was during this time that I became close to my mom. Closer than I ever could have imagined was even possible. My father was just 65 when he passed away and my mother was 60. She still had a lot of life left to live and she didn’t know how she was going to handle the business, the rental properties, everything there was to handle without my father around. I knew it was my time to step up and help my mother, so I did. As I did, I found myself having a connection and a bond with my mother that I truly had desired to have for all of my life. I had suddenly found something I had searched for since I was just a child. It was the mother I knew before Lindsay was diagnosed with Autism. She was back! I was so happy. I spoke to my mom every day; we would talk for 30 minutes or longer. I would help her with things, she would help me.

During this time of healing and growth, I had made the decision to no longer work for my in laws and to start my own business. My mother was in full support and had given me $100K to start the business. It would be taken from my inheritance and I was ok with that. Let me back up just a little though.

During this time, mom helped me get this business off the ground and I helped her with my father’s business. Prior to starting my own business, it was my mom’s hope that I would take over the family business and it was mine as well, but with my father’s passing, I would have no one to show me the ropes. Dad had one gentleman that had worked with him for over 20 years and everyone loved him. I was hopeful that he would be able to help me transition into the business. One Saturday though, Mom and I were down at my father’s office going over the books and the jobs that were still outstanding. As I was looking over the contracts and the money that had been paid and money still owed, it was looking good. We both were encouraged with the amount of money that was still outstanding. I assisted my mother in collecting the money. While doing so, we suddenly became made aware of the fact that the gentleman who had been helping run the company while my father was sick, the same gentleman who had been working for my family for over 20 years, was stealing from the company. He had embezzled hundreds of thousands of dollars. I went back and found hundreds of thousands of dollars that he had embezzled from my father and the insurance companies. My mother and I presented the evidence I had gathered to the local police department. When they brought him in, he admitted to it all. Instead of proceeding with a legal case against him, my mother decided it would be better to work out a payment plan with him. Problem was if he filed bankruptcy or didn’t pay, we really had no recourse. Then again, if he was in jail, he couldn’t pay us back. We knew he owned 5 acres of land on our family farm that was given to him and he sold that to one of my cousins and gave that money to my mother. He paid her for a few months, but then I believe he declared bankruptcy and she was out all that money. She recovered very little. With the discovery that the one man we thought could help me learn the ropes was embezzling money, my dream of running the family business was lost forever. Fast forward to June 2006 and that is when I started my own business. It was and is still called HE Abrams Corporation. HE stands for Hannah Elizabeth, my daughter and of course Abram is for my son. I named it after my kids because they were and are my life.

During the next year to two years, I helped my mother with my father’s business dealings and she helped me with my business. It was during this time that I paid my mother back over $40K of the original $100K she had given me. We were doing well, not great, but well. The most important part of all of this was my mother and her belief in me. Her pride when talking about me. Something that had been lost on me since I was around 6 or 7. She would tell people I was her rock and I was always looking out for her. It gave me a sense of pride that truly is hard to describe. I knew my father had to be smiling down because I was finally being the man he had raised me to be for so long. It just took me a little longer to be that man that I am sure he had wanted. You live and you learn, I learned a long time ago I can not beat myself up for mistakes I have made in life. If I did, shit I would never leave the house. I was finally loving life again. Things were good, actually things were great. Well everywhere but at my own home. Stephanie and I were still just not doing well. She would be helping at the office and the two of us really did not see eye to eye on things. Marriage is tough enough and then add together working together and being around each other 24/7, damn it man, it makes it hard as fuck.

Even with shit going south at the house, things were going well with the business and especially with my relationship with my mother. I wish I had the words to describe how much love, pride, happiness, I don’t know what to call it, but my heart was so full from making my mother proud of me. This was probably the first time in my adult life that I felt my mother was proud of me and truly loved me. Now please know that even though I felt this from her, she still refused to show me any physical love. Meaning her hugs, were still one handed, around the shoulder, no love in her hugs. I never truly felt a loving embrace from my mother as I did from my father. That always bothered me and makes me fully embrace my kids. I promise you this, I may not be able to give them the world, but I can give them my love. I let them know they are loved. Abram, even now at 17 is pretty good at accepting my hugs and love. I believe he appreciates it and even Hannah accepts them for what they are, love. They know their dad loves them more than life itself. I am far from perfect, but I love my kids unconditionally and will always be there for them. ALWAYS.

This chapter is probably the shortest, not for any particular reason, other than I do not have the verbalistic ability to accurately describe how great this time of my life was. The greatness was 90% attributed to my relationship that had evolved with my mother. It filled me with love and in return let me know I could open my heart and love again without the fear of losing that person.

In 2008, my business was hurt by sanctions that had been put in place by our current president and my business started to struggle some. I was now looking at every avenue to cut costs. I remembered some advice my father had given me. He always had tried to get me into the fire department life and I always refused. Stupid I was. The advice my father always gave me was if you ever start your own business, go to work for the fire department. It will give you a salary, insurance and a pension so you don’t have to bleed your own company to provide just for you. So, when my business started to slow down and a recession was looming, I made the decision to listen to my father.

I began the process of becoming a firefighter at the age of 34. In July of 2008, I was hired by the largest and busiest fire department in the State of Alabama. I was older than most of the recruits, but that didn’t really bother me. I had never had a fear of failure. Only issue was, I was older, I smoked and I was out of shape. I had let myself go for a while. It was during this time that Stephanie informed me she was no longer attracted to me due to my weight. I was a good 20 or 30 lbs overweight. I wasn’t obese by any stretch but I was heavy. Well as always, I let hate fuel me and I used this time in recruit school to get me motivated. Since we did PT like the freaking military, I utilized this to my advantage. I quit smoking the day recruit school started. I went through 5 months of recruit school for the fire department as well as EMT school. I finished in November and reported to active duty. I was a “probie” (a probationary firefighter) for the first year. I was able to be fired for any reason during that first year. Once I finished that first year, I had passed the national registry for my EMT license and I was secure with the fire department. I decided, I wanted to continue my weight loss campaign and continue to get into shape. I would not let myself forget what my wife, Stephanie had told me about not being attracted to me. Which was a total slap in the fucking face considering she had carried the pregnancy weight from Hannah for years and never once did I ever say anything negative to her about it. NOT ONCE. Fuck me though, I saw how it was. I learned right then; she didn’t love me. You do not say that to someone you love. You love them regardless, you love them in spite of their shortcomings, you love them through the rough times. You certainly don’t kick them when they are down. So, with that fueling my drive, I ended up losing 50 pounds, which I was really, really skinny. I was exercising nonstop, eating basically nothing and feeling in the best shape of my life. I even went and finally got my tattoo, my first tattoo. A tattoo that was drawn by one of my recruit classmates. A firefighter tattoo! I knew I wanted it when I saw him draw it during recruit school, but I told myself no way in hell you get that until you survive the probationary period. I held myself to that standard and I once that first year was over, I treated the new slimmer, sexy self to a tattoo.

Being a firefighter is not easy. After almost 13 years, I am still with the fire department and I will touch on that later. It did give me another sense of pride and joy because I was truly following in my father’s footsteps. As he had spent 40 years of his life as a firefighter. My only regret was I didn’t do it sooner so he could witness it. That still haunts me to this day. Also, I wish I had him to talk to him about some of the calls I have gone on and the things I have seen. I would truly ask him how he handled 40 years of it. It is not for the faint of heart. Once I finish this telling this story, I am going to delve into working as the Sergeant on the busiest Apparatus in the State of Alabama.

Anyway, life was good on all fronts except for the home life.