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By Root 1491 0

been wrong with me before, happened there, playing PingPong. I got very good, but I wanted to be the best and then that whole thing of being afraid, of worrying, of lack of confidence hung me up. It was the same thing I'd gone through in school and in music. I found that certain people have a lot of confidence. I don't know if it's something they really have or if it's a front, but it would really come out playing a game like PingPong. If I'd play a black guy and he'd start talking and ranking me, telling me how he was going to beat me, that would really unnerve me. When the blacks would signify, talk all that shit that they talk-"Yeah, baby, you ain't got no chance against me, suckah! I'm the king! That's my road game, jack!"-all that shit, I hated them for it. And I realized that it was a weakness on my part to allow that not only to make me afraid but to make me crumble. I would fall apart. And I would lose to a guy that I actually had more skill than. When I was able to relax and disregard that stuff-if I was loaded-then I could play over it and not let it get to me. And I'd destroy the person; I'd wipe them out; I'd win without question. So I realized a lot of things that were wrong with me in playing that game, and it was very interesting.

I think it was ten months that I was being analyzed. I began to understand my parents. I learned why they couldn't get along. I understood why my mother didn't want a child; it was a hopeless situation. I realized that. And I learned all this, but it didn't change my feelings. I felt that I wasn't wanted and that I wasn't loved, and I sort of liked that feeling. It was an excuse for me not to do anything. An excuse for anything I might do that was wrong. I could say it wasn't my fault: nobody cared about me so they couldn't blame me for being antisocial or being a little strange. If I hadn't been so talented, it would have been easier. I would have been an outright failure and a bum or a real criminal. But it just so happened I was picked by something, maybe I was reincarnated, but I have a genius that was given to me. I have a genius, however it's given, and I knew in myself that I was wrong in the things I was doing, and that made it even worse. That made me feel guilty. I wasn't doing what I knew I should do. But the pattern was set. The mold was cast. It was just easy, it was fun, and I liked it. I liked getting up in the night and sneaking away from Patti, who was clean and pretty, and going to an old, beat bar down on Main Street, putting my money in the juke box, and asking for "Cottage for Sale" by Billy Eckstine or "Ol' Man River" by Frank Sinatra. Sad songs. I'd sit in the bar and drink and fantasize being some way-out gangster, some murderer-lover. Dangerous. And I thought of myself as the most handsome person on the street. I thought I was so handsome that anybody who saw me said, "Wow! Look at that guy!" I believed that any woman that saw me thought, "Oh, Jesus, what I wouldn't give to have him!" That's why it was so far-out for me to be going into bars and, down alleys, following chicks, sitting next to ugly chicks in filthy movie places, playing with their cunts. It was a Jekyll and Hyde thing. It was exciting because I felt as if I was really a prince. I always thought of myself that way and still do. I still do. I stopped voicing that opinion because people think you're kind of crazy, but I really believe it. I believe I'm above anybody I meet. Anybody. Everybody. I think that I'm more intelligent-innate intelligence; I feel that I'm more emotional, more sensitive, the greatest lover, the greatest musician; I feel that if I had been a ball player I'd have been in the Hall of Fame. There's no question in my mind: if I ever became crazy I would probably be Jesus. But, unfortunately, I've never been crazy. I've just been totally sane.

I used to go to these psychiatric sessions high on nutmeg. My eyes were all red. He must have known. He was just very cool. He wanted to go through with it; he didn't care what I was. And, as I say, I learned all these things about myself,