I've decided I need to tell the story of my life. I'm not sure that anyone cares to hear it, but I feel the need to put it back into written words. I kept a paper journal for years. My paper journal was stolen recently by tweekers looking for stuff to pawn for drug money. So now I'm going to attempt to replace it before my memories get any more blurry than they already are. The best place to start is the beginning I suppose.


I was born. This phenomenon is not unique. In fact, I'd venture to guess it's happened to just about every human that has ever lived. Although I've met a few at 3 am in all night diners that you swear were hatched, I'm certain those would be the exceptions not the rule. Anyways, I've never found anything very exceptional or unique about the circumstances. I believe it to be all too normal. Solidly middle class parents happily married living in the rural American Midwest. So white bread American its almost sickening. Well except for one little detail, the date. I had the glorious fortune to be born on Friday the 13th.

I'm not going to say that the date of my birth has had any effect on the direction of my life. I do however consider it to be a bit of foreshadowing.

When my brother heard the glorious news of my birth, he responded with the expected reaction of a loving brother. He screamed at the top of his lungs, beat the floor with his fists, and swore he was going to throw me out the window.I was born in the days before sonograms were standard. So using the best wives tales to guess the sex of the new baby, my family had come to the conclusion I would be female. This idea was so firmly implanted in their minds, they hadn't truly even considered a boy's name. My brother was dead set about having a little sister. Finding out he was going to have share all his stuff with a little brother threw him into a psychotic rage. You can't blame him too much for his reaction he was afterall only 3 at the time. However, the several attempts he made to choke me to death over the next year is another matter.

To this day I cannot truly say if this initial attitude formed a lasting impression on our relationship, or if it was merely a case of extreme sibling rivalry. The result though was a childhood of dodging. Yes thats right, I said dodging. I dodged snowballs, baseballs, and stones outside. I dodged action figures, forks, and metal tipped darts inside. I dodged punches, kicks, and outright beatings whenever we were alone. I dodged insults, lies, and accusations whenever he opened his mouth. I dodged arrows, bb guns, and eventually .22 rounds as we got older. The one thing I dodged that I remember most was truly the benchmark for poorly designed toys. The Lawn Jart was heavy, aerodynamic, and possessing a four inch long pointed steel tip. What moron couldn't see a potential disaster waiting to happen?

I found two safe havens of escape. The first was inactivity. I could plop myself before the television and totally ruin any plans he might have had by the simple virtue of being within yelling distance of Mom. Alternately I could sequester myself in my room and spend hours upon hours reading or having vivid adventures with my toys. This had both positive and negative effects on my future life. On the positive side I became extremely knowledgable from the sheer number of books I read, and I also developed a very fertile creative side solely from the need to entertain myself. Unfortunatly the inactivity made me fat, the books made me nerdish, and the creativity made me strange. I don't think I need to expound on the social options available for a strangely weird fat nerd. If you are unfamiliar with the attitudes of American youth on this issue I refer you to a documentary entitled "Revenge of the Nerds".

My second haven was found in a practical solution for jealousy. See both my parents were raised as farm kids and then later moved to the city for college. The farms where they grew up were 3 miles apart. My father being the oldest boy had an old world style duty to aid his father in farm work. This made my mother's family jealous, because although my family spent every weekend all summer at the farm, they hardly had time to visit them. Since both my parents worked full time it was quite convenient to ship both us boys to the grandparents for the summer. In order to appear fair we were subsequently split between the two farms. This arrangement assured no favoritism was being showed and insured that my parents would be compelled to make at least one visit a week to my mother's family. My brother being older, and by default more able to aid in farm work, was typically shipped to my father's side. I on the other hand was given over as a hostage to my mother's side.

Please don't misunderstand me, I was a very willing hostage. In fact I think back to that farm and the time I spent there as the most glorious days of my childhood. It wasn't the actual farm itself. Truth be told it was quite shabby in comparison to my father's family. My mother's family had the misfortune of having their original farm leveled by a tornado. My father's family had the great fortune of owning the best gravel pit in the county during the time period when all the dirt track roads were improved to the gravel roads they are today. So it wasn't the actual farm that I found so wonderful, it was the people.

I think that to know who someone truly is you need to know the people that shaped them at an early age. That sounds like a good theme for the next post. I think this is a good start on a long tale. I hope dear reader you've found this fascinating enough to come back and read more.