I am so glad that nobody recognizes me. I’m just a regular guy now. Just walking down the street is a pleasure now that nobody recognizes me. Nobody recognizes me. “Nobody recognizes me! Hallelujah!”

I look around me. A couple people stop to stare at me. But the rest go on as if nothing happened. Boy… I cannot believe I said that out loud. But it is so amazing. Nobody recognizes me.

Then again, it wasn’t really me they all recognized anyway, was it. It was my father. We would walk down the street and people would stare. A couple of people even spit on him. On me too! And I never did anything to deserve that. Just being my father’s son. That was enough to earn their ire. And it was enough for them to believe that I earned their hatred too.

I remember the papers, ha, newspapers, I remember them. And then the internet always commenting on my father. On what he had done. And they thought I was cut from the same cloth. Even though I was only a child. I had no idea what my father had done. I had barely been born when he was on trial. A mere babe when he went to prison.

I had no idea that he had bilked people out of millions of dollars. Not millionaires or billionaires. Not people who others thought could afford it. My father had cheated regular people out of their life savings.

Oh sure. He had paid his debt to society. He had spent all of my formative years in prison. Out of the spotlight. But when he and I walked down the sidewalk together after he got out, it was as if he was still cheating. Cheating not just those he cheated before, but everybody on the street. And it was like I was cheating them too.

That was years ago, but I still remember those feelings. I remember being humiliated by the stares and the jeers. Yes, and even the spit. I remember it finally dissipating as I grew older. And after we had moved from where I was raised.

It’s funny though. If I was going to place blame on anybody for the way I am now, I would blame all those people who jeered and stared and spit on us. I would blame their unforgiving hearts on who I have become. But I smile as I think about the truth. I smile because I know how to do what my father did much better than he ever did. And I can do it without anybody knowing who I am.

I am so glad nobody recognizes me.