BETWEEN GRIEF AND NOTHING

Paralysis is a haunting and terrifying tragedy that permanently changes the lives of its victims and families. Normal life ceases to exist for a quadriplegic. Coping and surviviving with an unmoving, unfeeling body is an imposing emotional and physical burden. No one looks at a paralysis victim without an impulse of pity for that person and fear that it could be he or she in that wheelchair. And everyone asks the same questions: What is that life like? How are the bodily functions I take for granted performed? Can paralysis victims have a sex life? If so, how? What if it happenned to me?

The increasing number of American men who marry Eastern European women has become a unique phenomenon since the breakup of The Soviet Union and advent of the internet. These men have various motives: A young, exotic, trophy wife. A less independent and more obedient wife. And love. These women also have various motives: A better and more prosperous life in America. A green card that gives them a freedom and independence they have never known. And also love. But do these marriages succeed? What are the cultural conflicts involved? Are there scammers for gullible and desperate men to discover before, or after it is too late? And are there horror stories of deceit and violence?
The title of this manuscript is taken from a quote in William Faulkner’s short story, “The Wild Palms.” “Between grief and nothing, I will take grief.” This manuscript is an autobiography and begins with an establishing identity and setting of my life, family, and culture in rural Alabama. The voice and prose is distinctly Southern as I am, myself, so. I introduce readers to my world and the life I knew beginning in 1957. I describe my family of destructive, alcoholic men and forgiving, durable women. The reader will learn about the distorted dreams I conjured amid the quirky, and often humorous life of rural Alabama. A life of rebellion against the tyrannical Pentecostal religion my father converted to. And, an honest portrayal of my first experience with alcohol, first sex, and first love.

I vividly detail the trauma of a diving accident that broke my neck, leaving me a quadriplegic at seventeen years of age: the drowning, desperate ambulance race, and the emergency room where I saw an x-ray of my spinal column clearly severed. I continue with my transferal to a hospital where emergency surgery was performed to save my life. And I relate the pain and agony I suffered with a tracheotomy, tongs drilled into my head for traction, and pneumonia. The readers will follow me through four months in a rehabilitation center where I encountered inhumane treatment, was introduced to the crude realities associated with paralysis and bodily functions, developed friendships, witnessed hilarious incidents, and experienced sex as a paralysis victim---an issue that many literary critics remark as one too often “fudged upon” by evasive, celebrity writers.

Readers will languish with me when I return home and impose a depressed, hermetic existence upon myself. I relate my isolation from the world of “normal people,” refused friends to visit, and immersed myself in the Pentecostal dogma of seeking a miracle for my crippled state. My experiences with hopelessness, deteriorating health, anger, and the frustrating burden upon my family are chronicled accurately and openly. I relate my slow and measured reemergence into society and the loyal family and friends who guided me. Readers should become inspired as I finally accept my paralyzed condition and begin to enjoy life in the swamps of Alabama: learning to drive a car, experiencing love and sex after ten years, and a quadriplegic who tried to return to his wild youth with alcohol and dangerous friends.

I will introduce my first wife, discus our relationship, and the marriage that ended after nine years. I give attention to my years in college and the teaching degree I earned that provided my first job at forty-one years of age. The rewarding relationships I enjoyed with students and their complete acceptance of me as a “wheelchair bound teacher” should engage a young audience and educators alike. And I openly reveal the end of my first marriage and the self-blame I attribute to myself.

Apart from the book’s early focus on the eccentric Southern environment I grew up in and the trauma of quadriplegia, the remaining focus will be a thorough revelation of the growing phenomenon of American men who seek and marry Russian women through internet introduction agencies. Since this is a relatively recent occurrence that many Americans are curious about, I document every aspect of meeting a Russian woman on the internet: proposing to her before a personal meeting, falling in love with a woman I only knew through emails and phone conversations, and securing her fiancée visa to arrive in the states. For curious readers and pros