Day One of "The Crazy Horse Electric Game"

Life for Willie Weaver was a game: a hero to all in his small hometown.  When he is involved in a water skiing accident and receives brain damage from the crash, his whole life is turned upside down.  He can't talk correctly, his parents distance themselves from him, and his girlfriend leaves him.  When he leaves for San Fransico, Willie expects to start over in a totally different world, but finds himself trapped in a situation that changes his vantage point on life and his disability.

Willie lives with a man named Lacey Casteel, a bus driving pimp from Oakland.  Mr. Casteel is a complex individual, not fitting into his all of his expected social stereotypes and behaviors.  When he first meets Willie, he attempts to save him from a group of gang members.  Although, instead of helping him when he really needs him, Lacey comes to Willie's aid after the gang disperses with Willie's money and dignity.  Then, he offers to pay for Willie's bus trip back to Montana, and when Willie refuses the offer he lets him crash at his place.  Even after Willie breaks Lacey's arm and sends him to the hospital for beating one of the girls that work for him, Lacey seems to forgive and forget and allow Willie to continue to live with him.  When Willie mentions his ex-wife and her phone calls, Lacey seems to feel a genuine remorse or as much remorse as he can muster.  Drinking is another one of the activities in which Lacey is involved.  I believe drinking for Lacey is not out of the shear pleasure of the alcohol, but rather to wipe away the pain and suffering that plague his life.  His ex-wife calls constantly and destroys his self confidence by tearing him down bit by bit.  His life is one of complication and as I read I hope to discover an inner truth behind the actions and life decisions made by Mr. Casteel and the effect that those choices will have on Willie and his attempt at rehabilitation.

As I read this novel, I begin to contemplate the possibilities of this situation happening to me.  How would I act toward my friends? Would they continue to treat as the person I was before or would they become so enveloped in sympathy and sorrow that they would blind themselves to my true pains and sufferings?  Would my family treat me the same way? How would I treat them?  All questions that filled my mind as I read the pages in this book.  I would like to think that I would continue to have good relationships with the people around me and keep a positive outlook on life, but nobody really can answer those questions unless the circumstances actually occur to them in their own life.