Wild Bill and the Wild Things Up The Back Passage

A true story from my youth

~ If you manipulate or control others to succeed, you have already lost ~

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Dear Wild Bill,

I remember my first encounter with you like it was yesterday.

You were as hard to the religious right as you could be back in New Zealand in the early 90’s.

You were an angry preacher, an evangelical man of God, whose hair ran wild in wispy streaks across a bald forehead, like dead weeds fighting for survival in a blazing hot summer sun

“There are people here,” you shouted, your voice hoarse and tired, “Who have been having sex up the back passage. It’s called sodomy. It’s an abomination. You need to stand up, come forward and repent right now.”

Silence. Not a soul stood and why would they?

Looking back at it now, perhaps my Aunt Jemima squirmed a little in her seat, I cannot be sure.

As an 18 year old, I slipped out of the church and checked the back passage behind the sanctuary. It was also quiet, no one was having sex there either.

Every Monday night, good people, poor people, people with all sorts of ailments came to see you Wild Bill, to get the healing you promised and yet in hindsight never delivered.

And they paid you so much money.

I just googled you Wild Bill.