Brownstonelit's Blog

6/28/10
There are times when silence is golden.
Then there are times when silence is just silence.
This is not one of those times.
There are times when silence sits heavy upon the air and the weight of it crushes your chest- squeezing the life out of everything you thought you believed in, everything you cherished and everything that is less than real oozes from the pours of one’s reality as little more than toxic waste.
This is one of those times.
There are things in the works that can no longer be stopped or pulled away from. The pendulum that swings has been swung, the counter balances weighted and the karma set to be delivered.

6/27/10
The package did not arrive again today… but oddly enough… a telephone call did! Shall I tell you of the contents of the conversation? I could… but then I’d have to shoot you! Nah…I’m just kidding- but hey, somebody else wouldn’t be if I did tell you!!!!

Be grateful I can keep a secret. It will keep us all safe and alive just a little longer. By the way, I have a riddle for you. What’s tall and white and acts like a time machine when you look under it? Can’t guess?????

Keep trying!

6/26/10
The day breaks and I am anxious for what it will bring … for today it just may bring a long awaited package. A package that will take this investigation to a whole new level. A package of such small measurements that you will certainly ponder its worth and yet, it will contain the golden key to the heart of this thing. Think dear readers… think.
What could be so important to this case as to keep me so focused for so long?

Charley and I had a small chat late last night. He is as anxious as I!
Do you understand, “… a picture is worth a thousand words?”

One day very soon you will understand dear reader… you will and you will be amazed!!

6/25/10
What if I were to tell you that things are happening behind the scene that I cannot share with you just yet? That people and places are being looked at very closely. That some of the people are dead… but some are very much still alive. Maybe even some who read this blog on a daily basis- trying to keep one step a head.
Do you suppose they are smart enough to know that a card laid… is a card already played and that they are already behind before they even read this? Like maybe… 44 years behind?
Hmmmmmm…. think about that with your morning coffee.
I know I will!

6/24/10

With so much happening on the personal front, Charley has been kind enough to allow me the chance to get a hold of my world before moving on with his. The package did not arrive yesterday and so I am still here today to write about a few things. Those of you who have been with me since the beginning will have possibly sensed this- those of you just arriving on board, need to go back to January and catch up.
Throughout this project, I have been given clues to direct me to the shooter. These three are the most important.

From the first session; “…male energy- law enforcement…”
From an interview; “…the top and bottom shells in the barrel were spent…”
From another session; “… he is kicking and screaming at me and he doesn’t even know me…”

Still waiting for the package…

6/22/10
Yesterday was the first day of summer and the longest day of the year. And for some that merely meant more hours in their day to swim, play tennis or lounge in the sun. For me it meant waiting for precious information to make its way to my door. While it is a few days later than I originally thought it might take place… the information is now on its way to me and so I wait patiently for its arrival.
Still looking for the man in the fishing boat…
The young girl with the blonde hair that fell in a ravine…
The man who drove the fire truck…

No longer looking for the woman who was raped out by the VPD lake house…
Nor the meaning of the cheese cutter…
Or the man who died of a heart attack in his bed at 61 years of age one week after Charley was murdered…
And I finally figured out how Tifton played such a big role in this thing…
And why the #19 and #1545 are so connected to one another…

All this to say that the clock ticks… the hour approaches… and the expectations are high that soon… very soon, I may no longer be able to write at all about what I have learned. When you suddenly see this page go blank and stay blank.

You will know the package has arrived!
Until later then…

6/21/10
AP
“…HELENA, Mont. (June 15) — The aging Frank Dryman, a notorious killer from Montana’s past, had hidden in plain sight for so long that he forgot he was a wanted man.
In an exclusive jailhouse interview with The Associated Press, Dryman detailed how he invented a whole new life, with a new family, an Arizona wedding chapel business – and even volunteer work for local civic clubs.
“They just forgot about me,” said Dryman, in his first interview since being caught and sent back to the prison he last left in the 1960s. “I was a prominent member of the community.” Frank Dryman, 79, a notorious killer from Montana, is back behind bars after skipping out on parole and evading authorities for 40 years.
That is, until the grandson of the man he shot six times in the back came looking…”

This is a portion of an article I read the other day. It was interesting in that I found there to be a great many parallels to this story about Charley. Especially the part about hiding people and things in plain sight—hidden in plain sight for so long, that they think the world has forgotten that crimes were committed.
Charley hasn’t forgotten…J hasn’t forgotten and me?
Well, you know by now how I feel about a scavenger hunt… don’t you?

6/18/10
One of the things mentioned in a recent session by R was that the investigation would take shift in direction between the 14th and the 17th of June. In fact a small shift did occur on the 16th. I will wait to see if this is what R or Charley had in mind, or if there is something underway from another angle I have yet to navigate. None the less, tomorrow is Saturday and it should be a lovely day for a ride in the country—a nice long ride.

I have a few inconsistencies that continue to plague me…
There is a report from the Sheriff’s Department, pulled from a personal memoir that never mentions that the Sheriff was there that night. Yet in a reading from R, they present that the Sheriff was there- silent standing under an umbrella in a downpour… watching, waiting and making certain his a__ was covered. It bothers me too, that there are no timelines mentioned in this report, other than the initial 11:00 reporting of the phone call by two boys to Brooks County. A call that was later remade to Lowndes County. What bothers even more is that there is no date reflected on this report. Odd, don’t you think? An official document- with no date, no timelines? Including what time the photos were taken. Everything is very open to interpretation. Now, 1966 isn’t that long ago- so why the lack of accountability and yet tons of ambiguity? Why would you leave a report like that so open ended?
In fact, all the witness statements are recorded over 9 days after the event. Why is that? Aren’t statements taken that same time as the crime for a reason? Accuracy? Allowing one the ability to vet and verify a whiteness’s innocence and/or culpability?

Too much time… too much time is built in between the crime and the witness statements. And the report refers to 8 crime scene photos, yet there are only 6 in this file. Why? What or who was reflected in those other photos, that it became necessary to remove them from a file- even a personal one? There is one redeeming quality to this report. Being, that its owner had both pages of the GBI Crime Lab report in tact. Page two, which is the most important page of all- ballistics! Now, why the GBI could not cough up both original pages to their own report is a real focus of interest for me. Why? Because this Deputy Sheriff got it from them in the first place– didn’t he? Wouldn’t they of all people and organizations have a complete copy of their own findings???

I have many questions my friends… 157 pages of them and they all begin and end with those who did the investigation to begin with. How is it that 44 years later, a widow’s journal,two buckets of information and whispering ghosts who now lay beneath the sandy soil the perpetrators still like to call home– give away more information than those who claim to have been first responders that night back in 1966?
Bet you’re just dying to know why…

I know Charley did.

6/16/10
Charley wanted me to write about his death, but not until I had been acquainted with his life. The amazing thing is that Charley told me who his killer was up front. The journey of confirmation was for me. He understood I needed to be invested in this and you cannot invest in a thing without some sort of emotional exchange. The trick becomes in the balance… It is so easy to lose your soul in something like this. To trade emotions for information- to bargain with your sanity for want of just one more clue- one more definitive. I recall R telling me this was just the tip of the iceberg. At the time I thought, surely there could be nothing more important than finding out who the shooter was. But R was right… while that was indeed important; it was not the pinnacle of why I was chosen for this. This is a process- for me, for J and for you the reader… to read between the lines and to research our own lives as we research his.
I could tell you I know what OSTRICH stands for and while that will send some into overdrive- it is just a part of the larger puzzle. I could tell you now what MOT stands for, but that too simply adds pages to my report. I can tell you where and what #19 is- where and what #1545 is all about and that those still alive will shudder in their boots knowing these things are no longer secret.
I can tell you now that Charley’s murder had little to do with moonshine. Curious isn’t it??? An ATTD (ATF) agent is “killed in the line of duty” and it had nothing to do with his job, nor even necessarily because of his alleged mistress. I say alleged, because she never loved Charley– she merely played with him. She and her associates were incapable of love, but that is not to exclude her from this mess- for infact- she was just as Charley declared her; a manipulator, the suspected, the key to all this.
I can tell you in the beginning I could produce nothing but bile for this woman. Later as I saw her spend her femininity as commodity, I could muster only pity and shame at her associations. I could not understand how she as a female could be so disconnected from her heart or her integrity- but it was because she had exhausted both. Then in a later reading, R explained that there appeared to be a history of sexual abuse in this woman’s early teens; a father, stepfather, or an Uncle perhaps who forced sexual favors from her at a tender age. While one sin can never truly absolve an individual of committing another; the ‘good girl gone bad’ moniker seems to apply rather aptly here. So while G and her crew of boy-toys as Charley liked to refer to them, were emotionally unavailable, they were however capable of collusion and murder. Later you will learn Charley was murdered over the basest of human debauchery—
You guess which one.

6/14/10

I promised I would share more and I have been a bit tight lipped about a good many things of late, so let me see what I can pull from this pile and we will have a closer look together.
Do you remember back in the beginning when all this started? I had just finished my other book and it was off at the publishers awaiting final edit approval and cover art approval… I had watched the movie Julie and Julia and thought perhaps I too might write a blog about my experience. A blog about my researching a suspected homicide. J had asked me to write a book about what happened to her father that night back in 1966- even though she, her sibling and her mother had never been able to crack enough shells to make a pecan pie of the thing. To tell you the truth, I had no idea exactly how many shells I would be able to crack… or what path all this would take when and if I could. What I did know was me. And I knew from the git-go that I could write this story- but only if Charley would conscent and promise to be right there beside me. It never dawned on me that I would have to wait so long to begin in earnest. After all, I vomited 7 chapters right up front- then stalled. Those of you who know me, know I never stall. I never balk. So why the hesitation? Why the delay, I wondered and that was when the gravity of what I was about to do took me to heel. Charley wanted more than a story- he wanted the truth. Now, as a writer my genre is historical fiction. And the funny thing is, every time someone asks me how I plan to write this thing, I can still only reply… as a historical fiction. The kicker here is- the truth in this case is the fiction! Do you understand? Everything reported and allegedly proven in this case has been the lie…everything. So everything I might write when putting pen to pad must be the truth. Or, what part do I play as an author in this?
Unlike R, I am another kind of medium- I am the wordsmith-the conduit for truth from the grave to paper. And not just from Charley’s. There are so many who step forward and speak for themselves or on his behalf. We think we are an island and that what we say or do affects only those within our immediate grasp or confidence… and yet look at the reach of boney fingers so far in this case- or any case where the victim is never heard. Valdosta’s slumber must be heavy and besmirched with the souls of those who perished for the want of others silence. It is a wonder one can even breathe in such a place without coughing up the worms of truth.

I think about Charley’s family. J was an individual I had known for years on a much more casual basis- now well voiced in this matter I realize how she had contained a heartache so grievous and so well- that I never suspected her life to be anything but happy-go-lucky. In my unawareness, I have made that mistake about others as well. As time goes on I realize that I too must present to others as even and blessed… and yet what is real and what is image for any of us? How well we come to know ourselves and yet how ignorant are we of others- even those closest to us? I think back to a year ago and the murders here in Athens at another theatre in town and now see the breadth of the wake that horror wrought amongst friends and community. I think about the information that freely danced from salacious gossip to blatant truth and think of those families as I think of Hazel- Charley’s widow. How too in the blink of an eye her world was changed forever.
Of how the morning found her baking a chocolate cake, the afternoon, arguing with her husband and the night someone coming to her door to tell her that her husband was dead. No piece of cake to say I’m sorry, no make-up kiss to navigate the lonely night. No resolution to the argument, or salve for the marriage placed eternally in limbo. No chance to salvage one’s dignity or repent one’s sins. No cup of coffee to break the ice. Nothing for him but loss. Nothing for her but doubt.

Can you image the internal hell suffered on a hourly basis without the luxury of release? This broken woman had two small children to survive for- to comfort, to embrace. Two small children to explain to that daddy never meant to leave them. I go over in my head the first session where Charley disgorged his venom first, then immediately with compassion and remorse redirects R to his loss. How R is overwhelmed by his emotion and emptiness. Even now I find I am hard pressed to find words to convey to you the impact of this man’s grief as it pierced the veil of time and the rim of my heart.

I know you want the name of the shooter. I know you want details and identities. I know you want to know the whys and the wherefores of such a villainous act… and if I told you now, your heart would sink at the depravity of those whose hands were in this. The crime in and of itself is a disgrace; the reason is beyond deplorable and the shame is without margin. What I want you to remember in all this, is that aside from the adrenaline and the intrigue— these people were and are real. Not just to me- but to each other. This is about a man and a wife who were denied the luxury of private emotional combat. Children who became collateral damage and coffee table fodder for those who held their breath, but not their tongues… lives that were traded and ransomed for people’s ego’s and reputations.

Let me quote you from one of my own works… The Knot…

“Jane: The memory of that morning would divide and define the way I saw truth for the rest of my life. Fact! I saw the end of my world in the end of that cigarette in more ways than one and…
Ryan: You took that saw…
Jane: Yes… I did. I took that saw and like the man on the horse, I cut the truth in half. Two halves made a whole and I … and everything innocent I had ever known, along with the memory of Emory’s face… crawled right through it and escaped. Until today.”

Ignorance may be bliss… but Knowledge is power.
signed,
No longer ignorant