Isn't that ALWAYS the way it happens?

Valerie is 19 years old, or 18. It doesn't really matter in the scope of her life. Her mother was not married to a guy when she was conceived, and the father soon was gone to prison. This girl has grown up without a father.

She has grown up in the lesser neighborhoods of West Tennessee.

She has bloomed into a young woman that grown men look at with lust and love, depending on the man. Her eyes are like Elizabeth Taylor's eyes, and her frame is an athletic girl from the streets, complete with curves and all that stuff.

Valerie has never truly known the PATERNAL love of a father. What she HAS known... has been love for sale, love for rent, love for lease upon terms of lease for own.

I know everything that has gone wrong with her life. But I don't see it from the perspective of a man who wants to screw her. I see it from the perspective of a man who TRULY KNOWS the tribulations and trials of the victims rights movement, and the pro life movement, and the sociological implications of a girl trying to make it in capitalistic America in the new century.

Now, I ain't got all the answers.

I jes keep trying to keep on up to the New Reality.

She's got no decent father.

She's got no decent uncle.

She's got no decent brother.

Her safety net is lookin' slim.

But it ain't up to me; it's actually up to her.

But there's a part of me that already knows her choices, and that around every turn there is a DEAD END sign.

So I can only hope for the best.