The System

by David Ash

My journey begins on April 18, 2007. It spans to September 25, 2010. The three years could be described as driving down a normal street in Anywhere, USA. However, its Halloween every night. It all began when I was injured in two traumatic car accidents which occurred weeks apart. Following the accidents, my thinking is at times normal, at times erratic. During this period my aunt, who was a force throughout my early childhood on and off, re-enters my life after I see her at a local grocery store. This aunt of mine is directly opposed to my mother who only did good for me. My aunt, having since childhood brainwashed me into her way of thinking which involved a religion that she took way too far, tells me to leave my parents and go on my own. Once again pulling me away from my mother and leading me down another bad path, I spin completely out of control, losing everything. As my life becomes worse and worse, so does my mental state due to the trauma of the accidents. After various delusions and a medical mishap, my delusions spill over into what I can only describe as The Twilight Zone. Soon I am led from that dark place to what I refer to as The System, referring to the legal system. Waking up thinking I'm in a movie about a bank robbery, I wake up in the morning and proceed to go to my local bank. Not needing money as I had fifty-five thousand dollars in a nearby financial institution, I believe upon arrival that all the people in the bank are actors and I must play my part in the movie as a bank robber. What results from this terrible and unfortunate situation is serious jail time, time in an institution for the criminally insane, as well as a civil hospital. The stories of people in these places and the sights that I see there, as well as the process through these many legs of The System that I, my parents, and my legal team must navigate to free myself, are truly extraordinary. Its a modern day One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, only to an extreme, yet with a more positive ending, as I'm cleared of all the charges. I end up with no record at all as a matter of fact. I the words of the Judge in my case, when the charges are dropped, "in this case, justice was served."

314 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 13, 2013

About the author

David Ash is the publisher and poet behind the Haiku for Life series. He first learned about haiku in sixth grade and his undergraduate degree in English Literature from Georgetown University focused on 20th century poets such as e.e. cummings and T.S. Eliot. Ash later earned a Masters in Liturgical Music from Santa Clara University. He has been a clerk, secretary, teleprompter typist, financial paraplanner, proposal writer, newspaper columnist, ad rep, newsletter editor, and art gallery owner. He was also a music and/or liturgy director at various Catholic parishes for 17 years and is still a composer and hymn writer. He is an unabashed punster, and it shows in his haiku. Ash's first book of haiku was published when he was almost the age that Basho was when he died. He lives in Mukilteo. Washington with his wife and son."