my story..."the beginning"

i am hesitant to even write what will be a hugely multi-part mini-series that could take years. being that i don't have a job yet, just graduated college, and am currently bored to tears; i figured there was no better time than the present.

i was born april 14, 1984 in birmingham, alabama. there was nothing remarkable about the day of my birth other than i was 3 weeks early and was born with jaundice. being born with his had no effect other than i had a full head of really dark hair and looked very much like a mexican when i was born. i lived in a suburb called roebuck where the middle incomers were known to prowl. my childhood was uneventful. other than the normal trips, birthday parties, etc. nothing stands out except for two things. my mom was the church organist at roebuck baptist church. worse, my dad was a deacon and sang in the choir. i'm not trying to say there is anything wrong with either of these things but i'm saying i was basically in church 'round the clock since 9 months before i was born. i kid you not. this time in my life was very cool because from birth - age 6 or so i had a church family that saw me and interacted with me all the time. a lot of my precociousness comes from this i think. i was around older kids and adults more than kids my own age. so my vocabulary and attention span was already on a higher level than most kids. factor in my mom and dad read to me several times a day and you have a very interesting combo that set up a pattern that i seem to repeat to this day.

at the age of five an unfortunate event happened. our neighborhood went from suburbia to ghetto in a very quick fashion and the value of property dropped meaning my dad lost money on the house he had built for us when it came time to move. we had to move and all we could afford was that crappy townhouse that was pretty much the ghetto. at one point there was a murder in one of the nearby townhouses and a drug thing was definitely going on in the neighborhood. as a kid i didn't understand why my mom would make me play outside only directly in front of our door. looking back, the fact she let me play outside at all is astounding. in the midst of all this at age 6 my sister anna kate was born. i loved being a big brother and all that came along with it. i wish that had remained. it's only been since my sister hit high school and most recently college that i feel we have a good relationship again.

when first grade hit i started going to a private christian school. this in itself wasn't too bad but i started getting in trouble on a regular basis. the foundation of my trouble wasn't me being a bad kid, i was just really bored. the rate at which i learned vs. the rest of the class was off the charts. what would take some of the kids a week took me a day. so instead of being quiet, i started acting out. me having to sit through entire recess sessions became a regular occurrence. by the time 3rd grade hit my mom made the decision that would change my life. i was pulled out of school and became a home schooler. i know that most people's first impressions of home schoolers are; that of stupid kids wearing dirty clothes, with unwashed hair, and the permanent kool-aid stain around their mouth so i know what you are thinking (you thought i didn't?). thankfully, we were most definitely not that way and the pace at which i was able to learn became very rapid. i started mowing through work and was able to start some grades earlier due to my capacity to absorb, entertain, and retain schoolwork.

in all of this there were a lot of family problems that i wouldn't become aware of until a couple of years later. to close out this blog. at some point, our family decided to move to a small town outside of cullman, alabama that was called bremen. worse, in cullman county, there were several communities with the worst names known to man: brushy pond, good hope, holly pond, hanceville, colony, crane hill, and the area we were in...cold springs.

to say i received an education would be an understatement. to move from the monstrous town that was birmingham to a county where the main town was 20 minutes away and that town only having about 15,000 residents was quite a change.

to be continued.....