A True Confession

This is a TRUE Confession.  At 4:00 A.M. this morning as the pitch black stared back at me with a light winter rain drumming out my thoughts, I felt the inherent need to Confess to you.  After five and a half decades, I found my PASSION. 
    Approximately six years ago I discovered, dare I say this, I have a talent for writing.  Started with lyrics, then poems and now books.  Which in my mind (the whole point of this blog entry), MY MIND, is one of the most ironic things I have ever know. 
     The reason?

I AM DYSLEXIC

     Last week I drove four hours to Lexington, KY for business, and on the way listened to a voicemail from my publisher (Monday Creek Publishing- Whoop Whoop) leaving me the phone number of a professor at Ohio University who specialized in Dislexia (that's how my mind would spell it... and yes I will poke fun at myself ((endearing coping skill)), even on a life molding topic such as this) who had read my recently published children's book "The Adventures of Coal and Andy; Charlie the Catfish". For those of you who haven't read it quite yet, on the back cover I profess I struggled with childhood Dyslexia.  As this phenomenon is her passion and major course of study, she wanted to spend a few minutes discussing my experiences.  As it turns out, like me, she is also a non-spelling, slow reading, number reversing, word switching, highly functioning, phenomenally educated, extremely intuitive, amazingly passionate person who is making a hugh difference in the WORLD.  This conversation changed my life.

     I want to know how this can be?  It has taken me years, I literally mean years of my life, to this day as a matter of fact, to understand that I am not a Retard.  That word hurts...  As a matter of fact, I've used it.  I've hidden behind it.  I've run from it.  I suppose in this day and age, "Developmentally Challenged" is more PC.  Not Stupid, Idiot, or Late Bloomer?  Worn all those tags, accepted all those adjectives, believed those labels... 

     Let me be clear, "Crystal Clear".  This is no "Woe is me" tale.  This is a TRUE Confession.  A proclamation I have found yet another True PASSION in my life.  And with this new found mission, I intend on changing not one child's life, as was my goal with "Charlie the Catfish", but copious gobs of crumb snatchers as well.  I'm going to tell you my story, with as many gory details as I can remember, in order to help the next kid get out of the box we are trying to put him or her in.

This won't be my only blogging topic, but certainly one worth tracking. 
     On my next post, I am going to turn off the spell/ grammar checks to give you an idea of who the man is hiding behind the curtain.
     This otta be fun!!