Every evening, I would sit at my desk and catch up on reading and responding to letters. Once finished, I would plug my headphones into the radio that my parents bought me and listen to music. It was my escape to the world outside while I was still inside. Most of the time I would listen to the CDs I accumulated or borrowed.
Other times, I would just listen to the radio. One of my favorite stations was out of Kansas City. It was an alternative music channel. The hypnotic beats and rhythms of each song made me feel like I was back in the clubs of Houston. The lure to the night life and the mind numbing trance music was still strong. It is hard to explain why, but sometimes feeling nothing at all was better than feeling the pain of life and its struggles. This music could take me to that place.
For some reason, I decided to scan the radio stations to see if there was something else worth listening to. As I passed over each one I heard familiar pop and rock songs as well as country songs that were popular in 1992. Eventually, I hit a talk radio station that seemed like there was a heated discussion going on between two people.
One guy sounded like he was possessed or that he was trying to sound like he had a demon living inside of him. His voice would slip back and forth from somewhat normal, to an extremely low guttural tone. The show host was agitating him with Bible verses and talk about God. It was a very sensational exchange, but it captivated me. Not knowing what to think about it, but not being able to pull myself away from it, I continued to listen.
It was clear that neither of these two were going to budge on their viewpoints. During all of their heated debating, I gathered that host was a self-proclaimed exorcist named Bob Larson. The caller, Glen Benton, was from a Satan worshiping band called Deicide. Bob mentioned that Glen repeatedly branded an upside down cross in the middle of his forehead.
The whole show was certainly over the top and the validity of what was happening was pretty difficult to gage. It was definitely interesting. Other people would call in to test their mettle with Bob, but he always seemed to be able to talk over them with quick fire questioning and Bible verses. After which he would try to perform an exorcism over the air waves.
Even though I may not have fully understood what was going on in this show, I kept listening. As the show ended one evening, I decided to listen to the next program. It was called People to People with Bob George. It didn’t have all the excitement and drama as the previous show. So, I usually turned it off.
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