Zeke: Stage One

By Ward J. Pyle

Who is Zeke? He's one of the most amazing people you will ever read about. His personal abilities and skills go far beyond what people consider admirable. As a youngster, his unconventional mindset and stick-to-itness astounds adults in his world. Zeke starts out in life as someone who really shouldn't make it, due to his predominant "fail

• Language: English
• Publisher: PageLink Solutions
• Release date: Apr 23, 2024
• ISBN: 9798990577121

Book preview

Acknowledgments

To my grandparents, Herbert and Mary, and Edgar and Alma; my parents, Mary and Bruce; my brothers, Scott, Grant, and Travis; and many other family members, many friends, and many neighbors that helped me through my early years. You didn’t condemn me for choices I made on my journey.

Thank you ALL for your support!

Prologue

For all people, there is a life in which they are a part of and cherish a lot of things that come with this journey. This story is of an individual who goes through life as a person seeking out what he thinks is the life he is supposed to live. The question in his mind throughout the journey is how to gain an existence filled with knowledge about certain topics of living and doing things that he has not learned from other humans.

This story should relate to some and may not be so relevant to others, but it should gain your attention at times and make you reflect on your own journey through life.

Always keep dreaming of things to accomplish and gain ground in a way that does not throw others aside to make yourself look good.

Be kind to others, as they will be kind to you in return; at least eventually.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One: A Humble Beginning

Chapter Two: The Power Emerges

Chapter Three: Baseball Days

Chapter Four: The Exploration

Chapter Five: Craziness Abounds

Chapter Six: Let the Games Begin

Chapter Seven: An Incredible Adventure

Chapter Eight: Scouting Around

Chapter Nine: Exploring Fifteen

Chapter Ten: Guilty, Buzzed, and Transparent

Epilogue

Chapter One

A Humble Beginning

There was this evergreen tree that grew about a mile from where I lived that looked to be a Redwood from that distance. We didn’t have a lot of good climbing trees, and in those days it mattered. One Saturday morning, Patrick, my brother, and I headed down to take a closer look at the tree. We knocked on the door of the people’s house in whose yard stood the tree. They were kind enough to let us climb and we were thrilled.

Look, Patrick, you can see our house, I said after we had climbed halfway up the tree. And the Johnsons’ place. And Old Man Miller’s farm."

"You can see everything from up here, dummy."

I wonder if you can see Eddie’s house.

That’s at the other end of the street. You’d have to climb all the way to the— he began. Hey! What are you doing? We’re high enough.

I suppose I listened as well to Patrick as I did anybody else. He acted like I’d never climbed a tree before. What made this one any different? Besides, I had already determined I was going all the way to the very top limb sticking straight out of the top of the tree. There was something about being up where the tree became fluid, where it blended in with the sky, nodding and bowing with the breeze. The air seemed clearer, the sun brighter. Anyway, I felt freer up there.

Come on, Zeke, Patrick said. It’s time for supper. It’s not that he was chicken, or anything. He just feared that I would get hurt. He was a good boy and cared deeply for our brotherhood. But he was not surprised when I did not listen and kept climbing.

Once I got to the very top of the tree, which stood 75 feet in the air, I stood on the highest outspreading limbs, holding on to the top sprout, and looked throughout the county as I swayed around and around. At some point I decided it was time to retreat to the ground, for reality had set in and I’d begun to contemplate that this adventure could have a very bad outcome.

When I finally came down, Patrick had already left and was half way home. Sarge stayed, though, and greeted me with wet kisses and a wagging tail. As he walked me home, the neighbors came outside into their yards to congratulate me on successfully completing my most recent death-defying feat. Some thought I was crazy, of course, but I shrugged it off.

People have this way of doubting others’ abilities—especially those younger or less fortunate—to overcome fears. Not me. That’s the story of my life. Facing fears, I mean. Or maybe they resist it because they are stuck themselves and don’t want to be left behind. Anyway, I accomplished a goal that I had been thinking about for a good while.

I was five years old when I realized I was special. I saw and sensed and felt things other kids didn’t. Adults too. Sometimes a thought that had crossed my mind materialized in the real world or an image I had in the night reappeared in the light of day. My folks didn’t know what to do with things like that, so they did what any other rational, conscientious parent of a rambunctious kid would do—they blew it off.

Funny that memory should have come to mind just then, on that dark August night, full of sadness and self-pity. I had always taken pride in using my knowledge of work and the world around me to make a better place for my family and friends. It seems my childhood premonitions had ceased to serve me at this point in life, for I had not been given the ability to foresee the underlying meaning of betrayal and demise.

I was by nature a kind and trusting soul, relying on positivity in the world. I had never allowed anything to persuade me to believe otherwise. But there was a demon that had been stalking me my entire life and now I was facing him like never before.

This demon consumed me, leaving me unsure of my standing before God. And somehow through the atmosphere that night, I found an overwhelming desire, belief, and faith in the almighty God.

I was a guy who had had serious issues and bad habits, and had nurtured very bad thoughts and perpetrated acts of all kinds—crude and illusive acts—for most of my life. Then I had spent the rest of my life repenting and feeling guilty about doing the wrong thing even though it seldom seemed to be not such a bad idea at the time. Of course, they proved later to be very bad ideas. Funny how it happens that way.

*****

I was born in the late 1960s as Ezekiel Thomas Powell. My parents were those of the humble Midwest—humble people with humble beginnings. My mother had begun her life in a battle to stay alive in circumstances that, at that time, most would not overcome.

She was born premature, weighing only three pounds, with a twin in the 1930s in a very rural part of Wisconsin. I recalled from my mother’s stories how they were transported from the hospital to their home in a shoebox. At that time, the doctors did not know how to deal with this type of situation the way they would many years later. Miraculously, my mother and her twin would come out of the situation quite nicely.

My mother and aunt experienced all of life’s finer moments, as a lot of people would, doing all of the things that normal kids did at that time.

Four years later my father was born in a rural part of Indiana. My father, Thomas, would also be a specimen of medical mystery, for he came out not breathing at all. At that time in history, the medical world had no other technique for dealing with a situation such as this other than to smack the newborn baby’s behind. When this action did not do any good, the doctors found themselves at a loss.

Suddenly, one of the doctors picked up my dad by the throat and proceeded to seemingly choke him violently. To his and everyone else’s dismay, this would prove to be a fitting start to life’s challenges.

Thomas would have some very trying times as a toddler, youngster, teenager, and adult that would seem to make most people feel like ending their life at a very young age. Thomas was forced at the age of three to take care of his next two youngest brothers, including feeding, diaper changing, and mentoring. Can you imagine how this must have been for a little kid to experience this kind of pressure and responsibility? This was not the end of the story. Thomas would not only help raise these two brothers, but he would also help raise thirteen more after it was all said and done.

Now, don’t misunderstand me; Thomas was not a saint by any means. But he did have to carry a cross that not too many people could carry.

Well, it takes extreme dedication to fulfill the daily tasks of fathering children that you have not borne. Thomas did his part of raising his siblings out of the sheer trust that his mother and father would someday give him his dues for being such a faithful and loyal son. That day would come only after he had left this world.

Thomas often had a belt taken to him for things that he would do wrong in the eyes of his father, who ironically did plenty bad himself. Thomas’s father had battled depression for many years, and it would eventually take him to a place where no one would ever want to go.

In 1976, he took his own life by hanging himself from the bunk bed post where two of his sons were sleeping. The weird thing about this moment was that he hanged himself where his feet could touch the ground very easily. He carried out this act for the extreme purpose to end his misery with the pressure of work and family issues. This man wanted to die so much that while all he had to do was put his feet on the floor to retain his life, he instead chose to hang by the neck with his own belt attached to the bed of his sons and suffocate for his demise.

Can you imagine suffering from the kind of depression that would cause a person to go through with such an act?

Hell no.

Why would anybody in their right mind even consider such an act? This type of action takes such dedication to the cause of carrying out such an event, but it also takes away from the existing family and the ability to receive the thought of life everlasting.

This family that my grandparents had created was one of a Catholic upbringing and background. This is something that you do not do! Every Catholic knows, as do those from most religions, that this is something that you do not carry out. The object is to be the better person and be a responsible citizen, parent, and mentor. When something like this happens to a family, it takes the wind out of everyone connected with it.

After Thomas’s dad did the unthinkable, the family reeled to overcome this huge obstacle. Where would they go from here? How would they cope with losing such a formidable piece of their family puzzle?

Thomas took over as he did when he was a child. His instincts kicked in, and he was bound and determined to make the family whole again. This turned out to be a struggle that would last until the time of Thomas’s death, many years later.

The year before my grandfather took his life, my little brother was born. So, as it turned out, my parents, who were not supposed to overcome their struggles of living through such trying times, would go on to have four beautiful sons. The first would be a blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy that proved to be one whom everyone would favor. He was the first and the best at everything he did. His name was Patrick, and he had an amazingly personable attitude.

Patrick amazed everyone around him because of his non-self-serving ways and his ability to do almost anything that he put his hand to perfectly. Patrick was loved by all.

I came next. I would be overshadowed by Patrick through my childhood days and into my teenage years. I struggled with this and, consequently, tried to find acceptance from older peers.

The third child was Grant. He was a very handsome boy with dark hair, dark eyes, and the features of a movie star. Grant could make anyone smile. Throughout grade school, he amazed and inspired his classmates, teachers, and parents with his wit and comedic genius. He was invited to more than one birthday party, not because he knew someone in a close friendship, but because they wanted Grant there to help make the atmosphere seem more likeable to anyone attending.

Grant lightened life to the point where one would think about writing a book about this amazingly delightful kid that no one could get enough of. Sadly, one hot September day, Grant would perish from this earth due to complications with a heart defect that he had been born with.

We struggled to understand why this could happen to our family. Questions typically arise from an event like this such as, Why was he taken at such a time? What would our lives have been like if he had stayed here? What kind of person would he have grown to be? Of course, an early exit from this earth prompts so many other thoughts and questions about the meaning of life.

The fourth child was William. William was fat and had a playful and mischievous demeanor. Among other gifts, he was very good at making himself disappear. He also had a way about him that would take others back in time to when they were kids again. And while he charmed everyone in the neighborhood, there was no mistaking that he could destroy their property if they let him have free reign. William was wild from the word GO!

William had many fans as a baby. Some were my friends. They were much older than William and did not play well with the youngster at times. When William was three, he was in a diaper for the last time, and it was time for my two girlfriends to have some fun. Shawn and Angelica thought it was hilarious to stick a water hose down poor William’s diaper. This scene of backyard, summertime fun would take the whole neighborhood to a new level of entertainment.

When William was between three and five years old, Patrick and I tormented him sometimes to the point of utter embarrassment. But we didn’t care about his feelings for at least a few moments in time. What we cared about most at this time in history was our desire to build fellowship within our little community called the neighborhood.

Chapter Two

The Power Emerges

During another night of drinking and feeling sorry for myself, I felt something I had not experienced before: the presence of something spectacular. I had had religious experiences my whole life and had always ended up with Satan riding on my shoulder. On this night, even though the devil was sitting with me, there came a revelation that would change me in a way that I would not fully understand at the time. Is it just another buzz night that is somehow different from all of the others, making me feel compelled to think about my existence and what it means? I wondered.

I was reeling on this overwhelming feeling of something not going the way I had ever experienced before, and it kind of scared me. At one point, I kicked back in my favorite chair by the fire pit with a well-built fire going. This place for me was one of solitude, an escape from the real world, and one of feeding my own interests. I reflected on the fact that this place where I lived was one that most people would give their right arm for. It was everything to me. It had every single thing that I had always desired about having a place of residence. There was privacy, remoteness, wild animal activity, interaction with the animals, no solicitors, a lot of respect due to its location, and a place that I could express myself in any way I felt inclined to. Wow! This sounds incredible, but very true.

There was a moment when I