BLESSED with BIPOLAR

by Richard Jarzynka

Hallelujah knew that life could be better. Or, at least, he knew that most people believed that it should be better and he wanted to believe that, too. But he had grave doubts, grave thoughts, and an even graver feeling, a feeling that he had fought so long that it had beaten almost all hope out of him. And it was that “almost” that landed him in this strange place with no more than a flicker of fight left in him.

Hallelujah looked for all the world like he had everything going for him. He stood 6-foot-6 on a lean and power-wiry frame of maybe 220 pounds that had the steel-straight look of no more than 205. And his face seemed to somehow have a year-round light cream natural tan that was completely unnatural for a man with his deep red hair, curling at his neck and below his ears.

When his mind was right, Hallelujah was a bold, bright, and forceful figure that drew people to himself. Right up until the moment they fully regretted crossing him and his hazel eyes raged and his jaw clenched and he roared with all six-and-a-half feet of his fierce-fresh wildman self. And even then, somehow, they were still drawn to him.

But Hallelujah’s mind was not now anywhere close to right.

James, oddly, had much the same look as Hallelujah – minus the red hair. In fact, nobody knew the color of James’ hair. Just before coming to this strange place, James had shaved his head right down to the nut. Indeed, that was on of the things that landed him in the strange place.

James was just as tall and lean and strong as Hallelujah and neither of them was very old, but just how old, nobody knew. They were old enough to be in the strange place and young enough to look completely out of place there.

On the outside Hallelujah and James looked like they could be the same person. Even in the strange place, they moved like athletes. They didn’t walk. They strode. But James – of course – held his shoulders back a little farther and his head still higher.

In the space of one sixty second conversation with either Hallelujah or James people knew they were dealing with a man who could think – and had thought. A man who had studied much and learned voraciously – in and out of school. Even when they’d rather give their mind a rest. Even when it cried out for a rest. They couldn’t help it. The brain never stopped.

It would have been easy to confuse Hallelujah and James for each other – if not for the shaved head! But James did not just know that life could be better. He did not merely believe, like most people, that it should be better. James was a million miles per hour driven to force the highest, most, and best out of life – no matter what and right straight through the damnable thorn in his side!

And James saw the flicker of fight that Hallelujah did not know was still left in him.

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