Diary of a Philanderer

By Anthony M Wilson

For James, the antagonist throughout his life came in many forms. But none was so dominant as the one that came from within. So enjoy as he takes you on his unpredictable journey filled with entertaining moments enveloped in one huge life lesson.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 10, 2021
• ISBN: 9781664150973

Anthony M Wilson

Anthony M. Wilson is a native from the west side of Chicago. Throughout his life, Anthony has always loved writing, and with a number of unpublished books in his portfolio. He invites you into his first released story, telling the world by introducing to you one of his most controversial subjects and purposely challenging the readers’ social perception about the life of a philanderer.

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Diary of a Philanderer

Anthony M. Wilson

Copyright © 2021 by Anthony M. Wilson.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 01/07/2021

Xlibris

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Contents

Choices

In the Beginning

My First

Vanilla and Black Walnut Ice Cream

Accomplished?

High School

Reciprocity

A Crack in the Armor

Turnabout Is Fair Play

It Isn’t Me, Is It?

Gladiator

You May Kiss the Bride! Both?

Off We Go into the Wild Blue Yonder!

Remember the Alamo!

The Roaring Twenties

Shots, Shots, and More Shots!

Land of the Morning Calm

Slippery Slope?

Too Close to the Painting

Help Wanted

Position Filled

Sports Fans Are Universal

What Is My Addiction?

I was told who I was, and who I would become long

before I became who I was, and who I would ever be.

—Anthony M. Wilson

It was a very cold night, and I remember having on a heavy coat and feeling the brisk air against my eyes as the rest of my face was protected by a scarf. My mom had it wrapped tightly around my head, creating pressure over my ears and enabling me to hear my thundering heartbeat through them. I was wearing my favorite coat, which was a dark gray four button up, with a little fur around the collar. Of course, the fur wasn’t real, but it was real to me, and I like the way it felt around my neck. My memory also brings back to being carried in haste through the front door by a person who was lingering above me. His size overshadowed me as his arms scooped me up, carrying me around like a small stuffed animal. We hurried into a lobby of this small multifloored building and scurried into a small elevator, which had a little window in it and a sliding iron gate. The window was too high for me to view through it on my own, but in this man’s arm, I could see through it clearly. I could feel us moving in this box behind that gate and see the walls also moving through the small glass window. I could tell we were going up, and the feeling was weird, but I wasn’t scared. It was many decades later when I had shared this memory with my mother, who gracefully enlightened me that I was a mere two years of age when it occurred. Who would have thought that, at two years of age, I could recall the details of those precious moments? She detailed that the shadowing presence was my dad, a distant thought at this time, especially to how far I have come. Yet it was a reminder to me that even during the earliest stage of my life, how important the role of my dad was needed in order for me to see.

Choices

I learned early in life that there are a few choices we never get to make. They were made for us without our influence and created a moment for us to adjust from first entry into this world. See? We do not get to pick our race, nor do we get to pick what gender we are born with. We don’t get to pick what environment that envelopes us from our first breath. The selection of our birth parents was never given, and the good and bad they press upon us were not asked for. Yet our siblings and social circle bombarded us from birth, and many of them would have never been our choice. As a result, we had to take on whatever those circles brought and that was unfortunate because my being a black boy from the inner city, my culture was filled with lessons learned I never asked for. Bombarded with behaviors and responses to life I should not have been taught and the deception? Whew. Lawd, man. I was deceived! Deceived to believe that it is the creation of our core that defines us, but my counter argument is and will always be that it does not define us but shapes us.

In the Beginning

Remembering those early moments brought back emotions into clarity as to who I was, what I had been doing, and who I have now become. One thought opened a row of memories that revealed themselves as a spring bloom. From that thought, another was born, and from that, another—a string of memories and emotions collaborate to remind me of my journey. It is a journey worth remembering in many instances that, with them, I should remain teachable for they are filled with many lessons but also filled with many questions. Many of my younger years were harmless. I was your typical child during my school-age years. While growing up, looking at girls as just one of the gang was quite common, and looking at them beyond that would have been abnormal in my circle of male friends. My first impression of girls was from my home. I was raised together with my sister, who just a few years older. She did not display anything that would change my perspective of girls for me. She was cool, so in my mind, all girls were just simply cool. My mom was sweet, a church lady and a homemaker. She stopped working during my adolescent years to take care of the home. She was a singer and, wow, did she sing! She was always in the choir, teaching Sunday school at church and, of course, ensuring that the home was ran smoothly. My at-home dad, on the other hand, was not my biological father but my stepdad. He was a good Christian man, by today’s classifications, and in my memories, I would have to agree. He was my first impression of what a man should be. His work ethic and love for God stood out like a lightning bug flying in a completely dark sky. He was not one for taking us to parks or being there to support the things my brother and I was a part of, but hey, nobody is perfect, right? He would come home and bring his check to my mom, and I had never seen or heard him have a problem with that. His trust and commitment to the family was a seed I cannot deny was planted in me. Being so young, it was all about impressions more than reasoning, and for that, I loved him and all that he contributed towards my life. As I grew older, I began to understand more of the actions that were seen, and I appreciate how it had carved a fixture in my behavior. However, my view of the quality of man actions had become altered. I cannot put a finger on the when of it, but I can trace a circle around it, and within that circle, something shifted.

My First

I remember my first kiss. I know that does not sound like much, but I believe the events that happened afterwards began a series of events in my life that set me on a path that I can’t remember if I had ever jumped off. I was around the age of nine or ten, and the children in my neighborhood loved to play a game called hide-and-seek. The concept for the game was a team would turn around and count to twenty without peeking. While they were doing so, the other would hide in a designated radius agreed to by both teams prior to the game beginning. There was a timekeeper who managed the time agreed upon by both teams to complete the task. The goal was for team A to find all of team B members before the time master called the time. We established borders to hide, and we were divided up into teams since there were so many