my life, as i know it
where to start...alright, i was born on may 6th 1980, at four in the afternoon, at st. vincents hospital on riverside avenue in jacksonville florida. i was 6 days earlier than expected. and was ill on birth, i had a hernia which the doctors took care. i was brought home and everything was fine. about three months later i was taken to the hospital for dehydration, and 6 months after that i went again for dehydration. when i got out of the hospital that time it was right before my 1st birthday. my parents said i was born with a calic [sp?] and they would have trouble getting me to sleep, so they would take me for rides in the car and that would put me to sleep really easily. i've always lived nextdoor to my grandparents, on my dads side. before i was born the house my parents owned caught fire and burnt down to ashes, so they got this really nasty house nextdoor to my grandparents. i was the only child my parents ever had, but my mom was always ill, and my dad was just a carpenter. they wanted to spoil me, but were limited to what they could do for me because of lack of money. but they made up for it with love. i also had an extremely close relationship with my grandparents since they lived right nextdoor. they were like my second parents. only they were the ones to spoil me. around when i was 3 or 4....my mom was nextdoor at my grandparents, and my dad was at work, this neighbor next to my grandparents, her older son..i can't remember his name. he was watching me while my mom was nextdoor. and i was playing with the dog we had at the time. putting this large cardboard box over it and lifting it off, having fun. well, obviously the dog didn't find it fun because as i lifted the box off of it, it jumped up and bit my right cheek, causing it to just dangle. the guy picked me up and ran nextdoor to my mom and grandma, whom then ran me up to this medical center down the street from me. during that time, i was informed later, that my uncle was called to come get the dog because as soon as my dad found out, he would slaughter the dog. while i was there, i remember laying on a table, screaming and crying.and my mom and dad were next to me. and the doctors were having trouble trying to put the stitches in because i was screaming so much. and my dad told me "if you be quiet and let the doctors do what they have to, i'll take you to get a new toy after they're done" i shut up immediately and just sniffled. through most of my childhood i wouldn't eat a lot, i always got full easily. i've been skinny my entire life, and it wasn't that i don't like food, it's just my stomach i suppose. when i was younger though, i wouldn't eat veggies, only some. and most things my parents cooked, or my grandparents, were really nasty. in my opinion, i didn't, and still don't, like the way they cooked. so this is were the spoiling kicked in, if i didn't like something, my grandfather would take me to get a happy meal from mcdonalds. i became quite the mcdonalds fiend. at the age of 5, i started kindergarden, never been around too many kids when i was younger. so it was a new experiance for me. i remember, as my mom went to leave on my first day, i started crying because i had never been left like that. but it turned out to be ok. all that year, i was a good kid, never got in trouble. always did my work and what not. i didn't have many friends. i do remember though, there was this one girl i liked, i thought she was pretty, and so did this other boy. and we used to both run up and kiss her on the cheek when the teacher wasn't looking. i think that was a start for my insecurity. i began to think she liked him more and all this, which i find rather stupid now because i was 5, what did it matter. during that year, my mom became really sick, and went to the hospital. she was there sick for months, and for 2 weeks she went into a coma, when i was 6. my grandmother would get me to sing songs and record them to play for my mom while she was in her coma. my mom told me...that near the end of the coma, she passed away the doctors said. for a moment. in that moment, she said she saw bright light, and her mom (whom died in her arms on her 12th birthday) walked up to her, looking stunning. and told my mom, it wasn't her time. she told her she had a son to help grow to be a man, and they he needed her. and she kissed my mom on her cheek, and my mom could hear the singing my grandmother recorded echoing in the distance...and her mom turner her around. and she woke from the coma. after this,. the doctors found my mom had a hernia, because she was coughing a lot after she woke up and got a hernia from that. the doctors have yet to fix that.... around that time, some neighbors moved nextdoor to my grandparents, whom grew to be some of my best friends. the lady who moved in had two kids, on 4 year old girl named esther, and a 2 year old boy named jim. throughout the next few years, in school i was an a-b honor roll student, always did my work, and was sort of a teachers pet. when i was 8, i got the chicken pox and was home from school for two weeks i think, i remember...i itched and popped a few on accident. one on the tip of my nose, which scar'd til this day. and a mole on my chest, which bleed severely and i had to go to the hospital for. and years afterward i got teased for how it looked when i didn't have a shirt on. later on that year around my birthday, my parents got me a puppy. a blonde cockerspaniel, named moonshine. also that year, my great grandfather on my moms side died. and he was somewhat rich, like the only person in my family who was. and gave my mom tons of money. and his old trailor, which we moved over behind the house and then had our house tore down and we moved into the trailor. as i was going into the 3rd grade, i had made a really good friend in 2nd, named josh...and he invited me over to stay the night one night, and he had a nintendo, and i fell inlove, i had atari's and what not. but i hadn't seen this, i begged my parents for the longest time to get me one, and they finally did. and that became my life other than school. i just would play videogames. during the 3rd grade i made my first less than b grade, we had a science teacher come in and would teach that subject herself, and she was much harder than my normal teacher, and i got a c..i felt so horrible. then i got grounded for it, my parents never would spank me or beat me or anything. just take everything away i had. oh boy, i forgot the mention how much music was a huge part of my life, all through my childhood i was influenced by what my parents listened to, classic rock, acid rock...and when we finally got cable when i was 6, MTV...*sigh* back when it was good. i loved the 80's, such a high point for music. i loved most everything i heard back then, music was just so amazing, except country, i hated country even then. it reminded me of cowboys and rednecks, which for some amazing reason, i never liked. same as sports, my dad never really tried to play sports with me, nor did i ever ask him to. i was suffice with my video games and toys. around this time, another neighbor moved in, nextdoor to jim. his name was mark, and he was a year older than me i think, hard to remember. but it was someone i could go outside and play and normal kid things. he thought jims sister esther was ugly, and would tease her about it, and being under the influence he was "cool" i would too, and so did jim. a few months later, this peopel across the street moved in. with two twin boys, and a girl. all around my age.mark got to know them and said i should meet them, of course my parents had never let me cross the street, becasue the street i live on is heavily populated by cars, and im their only child they were worried. so finally they let me and i meet them, the boys were cool. buck and roger, (what a choice of names eh?) but their sister, i dunno why, she struck me as amazing. but she did mark also. but i never knew how to treat girls or anything yet. so i was really shy around her, while mark would flirt and what not. mark had gotten buck and roger to tease esther too, and my friend josh would come over, and tease her also. i can't imagine how bad that was for her, but years later i regreted it. eventually around the age of 9, mark moved away. so i became better friends with buck and roger.and around that time, my mom went into the hospital again, she was really sick, had emphaseema [sp?] and serouisis [sp?] of the liver and numerous other problems. the reality of what was wrong with my mom didn't hit me right off the bat. i remember...around when i was 10, i asked april to the movies and stuff because my dad said i should. he knew i liked her. as i remember that was the only time she ever said ok, after that she never would want to go do anything with me. this is around the year i was in the 5th grade, i began doing horrible in school, i never did homework, and i wouldn't pay attention, i wasn't a diliquente or anything, i just wasn't focusing on anything. my mom was in the hospital from 89-91, i remember going and seeing her, with tubes in her throat so she could breath. in ICU, looking at me with such sadness in her eyes, such pain.....hardly able to speak...thats when it hit me, and i couldn't go see her like that anymore. my dad would go visit, and i wouldn't want to. i would just want to stay home. and my teacher at the time became really worried, she said she knew i could do better but i wasn't and she wondered why, she talked to my dad. and eventually they had me go to counciling about it. so i started to do better in school and do my work. my mom got better and got out of the hospital. she had to quit smoking and drinking because she was so weak and sick because of that. her and my dad used to argue before she went into the hospital that time, and all through my childhood before....all i remember is they would scream at eachother, and i would just sit in my room crying, having to hear everything they said. it wasn't the screaming, it was what they would say to eachother out of anger mixed with alchohol...and the fact that they didn't even consider i was there listening. i would just get up and scream at them to shut up, and fall down crying...that was the only thing that would make them stop. for the time being. so after my mom got out of the hospital, my parents "seperated" supposedly, in reality my dad just moved nextdoor with my grandparents, his parents. about the time my parents split, buck and roger's parents moved. so i just sat at home playing nintendo again, being raised by my mom more now, and her half-sister, who i choose to have no relation to. my moms side of the family never care to visit, or call and say hi, never give a birthday card. never invite to do anthing, unless they need YOU for something. so i don't like to speak with them. so for the next few years, i was brainwashed, by them, everytime my dad would come over and upset them i would be told how to not be like that, and how to treat girls and what not. how to not be like every other guy, that all guys are jerks and allllll this wonderful stuff. during the summer after 5th grade, i was at my neighbor davids, whom i just met because he lived nextdoor to where buck and roger lived, but i never knew..we became friends, and he had a trampolene, and i was other there jumping on it and landed wrong, and sprang my ankle...and ruined my entire summer. i just sat at home. the next year, was a big deal to me going to middle school, i was really excited, but that excitement died quickly. a new neighbor moved in where mark used to live, and had a song a year older than myself. but he knew all the popular cool things, and had nice clothes, and his parents made nice money. his name was jeremiah, he was even worse about picking on esther, and more influentual upon me and jim because he was bigger than us and would threaten us if we disaggreed with him, but that wasn't until later, none of us knew he was like that at first. this is also the year i got my super nintendo, for christmas, which became my bestfriend for years to come.that year at school was hard for me, i didn't fit in well, i was just a dork that no one ever pays any attention to. and this is when my insecurity came into play, because i wasn't one of the "cool" guys, and girls didn't talk about me or didn't seem to have any interest in me at all. but my nintendo was always there for me when i got home, and thats all that mattered. that and music. during 7th grade i remember, i started to get some better name brand clothes, learning what jeremiah had told me, but not much because we didn't have a lot of money. that was the year, i got really into art, and it was my favorite class, but there was these guys in there, that didn't like me. because i smiled too much and didn't talk to girls. little did they know i was too scared of rejection because i felt unwanted by girls thats why i didn't talk to them that much. so there was this one guy named ben, who was taller than me and would pick on me pushing me around calling me gay, and a fag. in gym he would pick me up and throw me around.all because he assumed i was gay. that became a daily thing for that year. also during that year, at home, jeremiah would reak havok upon jims family. not in a physical manner but more mentally. jims grandmother was sick and stayed with them, she had al-heimers [sp?] and was basically gone. but jims mom was even more poor than my parents. so she couldn't afford to have her taken care of. jeremiah found it amusing to torture this poor woman, because of her mental state she knew nothing of what was going on. i cannot begin to described the stuff he would do, and get jim to do, plus jim's cousin tj. i refused to participate in it, and thus began them picking on me for being a pussy, but i didn't care. i recall one instance clearly, and something i was proud of, jeremiah was messing with me and jim, and tj was jeremiahs little sidekick. and i got pissed and spit right in jeremiahs face, he sat there shocked for a moment, and i took off running to my house and ran inside. oh, i forgot to mention, earlier, around when i was 10, i was walking to the store with jeremiah one time. and there is a baptist church right next to my house, but my parents never went to church nor ever enforced any religion upon me. we were walking and this kid i knew from elementry school invited us to come to church that night, it was a wednesday, and they had dinners before church, it was like 3 bucks for all you could eat. me and jeremiah, being the pigs we were. went home and got 3 bucks a piece and came back for the food.we became friends with the kids there and started going regularly, only to the wednesday meetings for the kids, rarely we went for the actual church preachings, because it was so utterly boring. i eventually got saved and baptised and all that fun stuff that any good little christian boy feels is right, or should i say, is told is right. all this time my mom was doing great, it was the happiest moments i remember of her, she was never sick, always doing good. never smoked, or drinked. kept the house clean. was happy, talktive, and caring. then near the end of 7th grade, her half sister came back into the picture, and thought if my mom wanted to smoke, hell why not? and gave her cigarettes behind mine and my dads backs. she also figured why she was at it she'd get her some alchohol too. jeremiah had moved near the end of my 7th grade year, but his mom was friends with jims mom, so they would come back and visit a lot, because they didn't move to far away...yet. but someone moved quickly into the house that jeremiah lived. and these people had a son 3 years older than me. he was 15. i'd never had a friend that much older before, and he had sort of long hair, and listened to the music my dad did. plus newer music i had yet to of known of. so i thought he was really amazing, i looked up to him. he told me i should grow my hair long, and got me listening to metal. music like tool, and metallica, pantera, testament. plus all the old rock. his name was anthony. around this time, my cousin billy...whom i began to look up to a lot...he came over more often and was quite the shocker for my entire family. wearing black clothes, shaved head underneath, dyed hair, piercings galore. and girlfriends to match. i'd never seen anything like that, and it was astonishing, i loved it. but the rest of my family besides my parents and grandparents, and his parents. hated it. they would talk about him during christmas at my grandparents....and my dad would bitch them out saying how dare they say stuff about family like that. and from billy, i got the idea of shaving my head underneath and letting the top grow long, at age 12, and have had that haircut ever since. that summer after 7th grade, just after it ended, a week later, i was at anthony's and jeremiah was visiting nextdoor. anthony hated jeremiah with a passion, because of how he treated me and jim, and anthony was much bigger than jeremiah, so he told me to go get jeremiah and tell him to come over, he was going to beat his ass. so i went and told jeremiah to come over, and he said he would in a few, as i went back over to anthony's him and his friend were in a tree in his yard we all used to climb, only it had rained earlier. so i was climbing up it and my foot slipped, and i fell and landed wrong, on my right ankle again. only this time i didn't sprang it, i shattered it. i screamed and cried. anthony helped me up to his front porch and ran inside and got his parents, my mom and grandpa came nextdoor. eventually they realized i had broken it because of the massive swelling so quickly. so my grandpa and mom took me to the ER. i was screaming the entire time, i'd never felt such agony. the best part of that day, was when the nurse came in with the shot of dimeral, i didn't think it was going to work i was still screaming, my mom laughed and said good night i screamed back at her "good night?!" and i passed out from the drug. that once again, ruined my entire summer. i was stuck at home, but this time anthony and jim would come visit and hang out with me as so i wouldn't be left alone. jim hung out a lot, i got my dad to take me to rent games and i just would sit there all summer until i finally got better. but during all that sitting there, not being able to shower as much and hanging out with jim. and letting my hair grow out. i was combing my hair one day, and saw a bug, i had no idea what the hell it was. so i ignored it. i didn't realize that summer i had also had a huge growth spurt, and grew about a foot taller. so when i went back to school i was much taller than everyone. i became more friends with people from school in 8th grade, found more people who lived around me. but still was too afraid to talk to girls, and even worse. my voice was changing, horriblely. it cracked over and over constantly. quite embarrassing, and more so when everyone in school teased me about it. and laughed, including girls. so i just remained silent most of the time. and did my work. during that year i also found, that bug wasn't just nothing, it was lice and i found out that it isn't something easy to get rid of. but my hair was growing long and i refused to cut my hair, i used the shampoo's all the time. also i hung out with jim a lot staying his house. not knowing, the source of where the lice came from. its hard for me to remember most of that year, i remember at the beginning of the 8th grade, my ankle was still tender so i had a doctors note to not have to do anything in gym, so my coach made me take health that semester with all the girls. which....was quite odd, but i found cool, i didn't have any guys picking on me and i was in a room full of girls for an hour a day, heh. but i just sat there and didn't talk as usual. i became good friends with this guy named jamie who i went to church with and school. he was into video games as much as i was. i didn't talk to my old friend josh as much, because he was into the rap scene as it was birthing and growing. and i was becoming a metalhead, the two sort of clash. later that year i met a friend jamie had met, kris. and kris's friend hal. i became very good friends with kris. around this time i moved from my moms to my grandparents, im not sure why, i believe it was the constant smoking and drinking she did that upsetted me. i spent the whole next summer hanging out with him, we were inseperable.he had to move before school started for our highschool years. probably about 8 miles from my house. so we would end up going to different schools, but i refused to lose him as a friend as i had everyone else. i would get my parents to take me to hang out over there afterschool, or pick him up. or he'd has his parents do the same. we were both video game addicts. thats all we did, both to shy to talk to girls. for school wise that year. i failed miserablely. we had more classes than i did the year before, i wasn't ready for all the work that was thrown at me, and this was around the time my mind began to wonder off a lot. i was put into some magnent program classes, and i wasn't even in the program, i was taking ecology which is a 12th grade science course, in the 9th grade, and all the homework and everything. i just said fuck it, i didn't do anything at all. i passed spanish class, and economics and american goverment. thats all i did pass.i didn't have friends at school, and worse yet the girls there talked to me, but liked me "just as a friend" because i was a nice guy that listened to them, pfft. as if that wasn't enough, i had to deal with the fact my parents couldn't understand why i wasn't doing anything, they tried to ground me tried everything. treid to get me to do my work. i didn't want to and nothing could make me. one of my few friends from school that year, near the end of that year. killed himself, which was hard for me to understand, i couldn't see he was having problrems. he shot himself in the face with one of his dads rifles... that summer was fun, i hung out with kris, and learned more about metal music, had fun playing video games and hanging out with my friends. the next year, was the worst year of my teenage life..the beginning of my second year of highschool started out fine, so it seemed. besides it was the first time i repeated a grade. that year in highschool was something new, we had just started block scheduling. so we had four classes a day, i had graphics 3rd period. it was an easy class, cool teacher. but a lot of black guys were in the class. i have never and refuse to be racist. but i hate ignorance, and those guys were full of it. one day after 3rd period i went into 4th, i had algrebra, and i went into my backpak and realized my walkman was gone, i used to bring my walkman with me everyday. it wasn't anything amazing, like 10 bucks at k-mart. but it was all i could afford. who ever stole it, was kind enough to leave the tape i had in my walkman in my backpak. how sweet *smirk*. at the end of that week, in 3rd period, i saw one of the black guys sitting there, with my walkman listening to it, had it sitting on the desk for me to see. and i just stared. i'd never been in a fight before and i was about to, i just found it rude and ignorant that he was tryignto start something with me. he looked at me and said what? i replied with "you know...i know you stole that from me the other day, but you don't have to show it off and rub it in my face that you did" so he stood up and was like "then come do something about it?!" i stood up and said "naw, i stand no chance with all your friends right there, i just think thats childish of you" and i walked out into the graphics room. throughout that class that day, all these other black guys, who weren't even in our class came in. funny how when a white guy is in trouble no one cares, but a black guy they come out of the woodwork. at one point this one guy came up to me and said "ey man, i heard you called my dawg a nigger?" i have never called someone that and refuse to. so i told him i didn't and i wouldn't. he said alright and walked away. later on in that class, one of the seniors i was friends with, some how stole back my walkman and handed it to me. he then told me to follow him and his friends after class that they would walk me to my next class so i'd be ok. stupid me, as soon as we got to the main hallway i split from them and went the way i go to class and while walking down the mainhall i got blind sided from what i was told, all i remember was walking, blacking out, and waking up on the other side of the hall on the floor. i didn't feel anything though, because i was uncouncious through it, but the chorus teacher had seen what happened and new one of the 4 guys who jumped me.i was took to the office. as they found the guy who did it. and i talked to the dean, who was extremely nice.the guy they caught i'd never seen before in my life, and he told the dean i called him a nigger, that was his excuse. after it calmed down some the dean asked me if i wanted to go home or go back to class....honestly. i was terrified to go back to class, so i called home, no one was home. or my grandma was but she was sick and couldn't come get me. so the dean asked where i lived, when he found out i was like 2 minutes from the school, he offered to give me a ride home, which i thought was really cool. so i got home and my family freaked out, my dad wanted to kill the guy, but...my friends, teased me. saying i got my ass beat and laughed, so i just stayed inside and played videogames. the rest of that year, i would not go back to school, in fear of something happening, terrified that those guys weren't finished. the days i went back just after it happened, i got stared at by every black guy there. like as if they all knew eachother or something. plus being teased for not coming back to school, even from the teachers. i just stayed home, no matter what. my dad took away everything i had, he tried everything. to make me go, eventually i just wouldn't talk to anyone, i just sat in my room and cried..in fear. after time my dad finally stopped trying, and told me once i turned 16 if i was quiting school im getting a job and all that. so i agreed, i just didn't want to go back to school. for an entire year i sat solitude from people. except kris and jim and esther. later that year esther started liking kris and i didn't think anything of it, but they got close and i felt left out then, because she didn't like me anymore. all i heard was how "hot" kris was. i got really depressed over the year, esther fucked with my head, tearing mine and kris's friendship apart, and she knew it. she wanted it. when i turned 16, i went and dropped out of school, and started to work with my dad, heh, didn't last a week. manual labor isn't for me. the heat from being outside and the amount of work they do for the little amount of money they make, isn't worth it to me. and after being away from people for so long, and realizing if i didn't do something i would be stuck like my dad, i decided i'd go back to school the next year. that summer was hell though..me and kris's friendship was falling further and further apart, and now was becoming a hatred. and esther enjoyed it, she felt like we were fighting over her, until the end of summer. i had an idea of something to help me through the school year, something to make people leave me alone and not want to do anything ot me or talk to me. because of my strong love for the crow, i was going to wear all black, all year long, every single day, and i got my moms dad to get me a black leather trench coat, that i also wore every single day, that was what really worried people i think. the fact i wore it in 90 degree weather, heh. only too school though, it helped. but right before school started back up, all the angst between kris and i was at its highest point, jim came over and wanted me to go school clothes shopping with him. so i walked over there and kris was there, he came outside and esther and jim were trying to pull him back, he wanted to fight me. i just stood there and watched and laughed at what he was saying, because it was so hard me to understand how someone i thought to be my bestfriend, could be like this now, he got up in my face and asked me why i was smiling and shoved me, and something clicked and i shut down, and just tackled him and beat his ass hitting him over and over, he never got the chance to hit me, jims mom came outside screaming for us to stop and as we stood up, i knew kris had knee problems, so i kicked him right in the knee with my steel toe boots and he feel as i got pulled away by jims mom. after that, i never talked to kris, and esther had seemed to of liked me, but sort of not. i started school, and met this girl my first day, in my algebra class, the first girl i'd ever seen dressed in all black clothes, manson shirt, black hair, pale skin. she asked me if i knew all these bands, i had no idea who they werre because i wasn't "goth". but she actually gave me her number and was the first girl who showed interest in me, so i was in complete shock and extremely happy. i told esther about this, and it seemed esther knew the girl, and hated it. so esther wouldn't talk to me and hated me because of this. i didn't care, i was happy someone finally seemed to like me. so the rest of the week she talked to me, and invited me to this club that we used ot have in town called eisteins a go-go, that was all ages, and played a lot of good music. even goth, industrial, and early ebm. plus other music because all sorts of people hung out there, skaters, goths, early ravers before it was trendy. i'd never been there but i came to find out that was were my cousin billy used to hang out when he was my age. and even rogue of the cruxshadows used to hang out there. so that weekend came around and i hung out with her, it was the first time in my life, i'd never wanted to play videogames, that i was having so much fun being with people. but after that weekend, she didn't talk to me much, and then she left school for some reason or another. so i just went on with doing good in schoool, trying to fix what i'd screwed up the years before. esther started liking me again or so it seemed, she would show interest in me then be really mean and call me names and make me feel worthless. she at one point got so mad at me, that she had some thug friends of her, try to kill me. luckily that didn't happen, during this time was when my music taste changed as well as everything else about me. i had just heard about the cruxshadows, when they were just local in florida, and i had a copy of their tape made. it was very different, but i loved it. so emotional, very fitting to how i was feeling. i was off and on with esther sort of that year, i consider her to be my first girlfriend, because she was my first everything...even though it was pure torture for my mind. she would get me to hang out with her friends, and she was tease me about my size and how i preformed in bed, infront of everyone, making me feel horrible. though now i know im not that bad, she was just being a major bitch. she's changed now, but then i suppose it was her being young and just angry with the world that caused it. but through her torture led to me feeling even more insecure around girls. during that year at school that, i saw the most beautiful girl i'd ever laid eyes on in my life, and i told my friends they didn't think much of her, but i did. i couldn't just walk up to her so i didn't do anything about it. just would admire throughout the year the few times i saw her. but i think fate was working for me, because at the end of that year i got put into a class with her and didn't even know. i was sitting there the first day of class near the back, and she came in and sat in the table next to me with her friend. but i was still to shy to ever say anything. and the class we were in was stupid the teacher was a moron so i didn't do anything, it was a lame art class. i love art, but this teacher, isn't a good teacher, so i just slept everyday and sat there with my headphones on listening to music. because she would let the class listen to music, and of course, no one listens to anything i like so i would just put on my headphones and drowned them out. one day, i got put into some project with her and herfriend and find out her name was meredith, but because i didn't plan on passing that class, heh, i didn't help with the project. i told her from the start i wasn't going to but we became friends in a sense, of atleast knowing eachother. she signed my yearbook that year and put her phonenumber in it, i knew she was friends with this other girl margie, that my friend kyle was really interested in. i was friends with kyles cousin derek, and me and him called meredith to get margies number to call her about kyle, because we knew kyle would never ever call her. or try to get her number. the idea i was just calling her didn't even hit me. but meredith asked for my number so she could call me back, saying she'd like to talk to me. i guess she was bored..im not sure. but she called back and we talked all summer, i had to go to summer school that year just to pass, but i did, and i finally got passed the 9th grade. and after talking to her so much, i finally got the nerve to ask her out, only she said she didn't know. she wouldn't tell me why, i found out because she was afraid of what her parents would think being that they were super christians. and i was like mansonite, in all black, with my lip pierced (which i forgot to mention). i had gotten my lip pierced for my birthday by my cousin billy's wife angela. but i was bound and determined to be with meredith, something about her, she was just amazing to me. i finally went to church with her one night and met her parents, and boy were they shocked by me, she was told by her dad that he couldn't believe she associated with people like me...heh. i later took my lip ring out one night and even got a nice shirt to wear and put my hair in a pony tail to "attempt" to look nice for her parents, i got home and my lip ring wouldn't go back in so i lost that. and meredith started hanging out with me more and more as we dated in secrectcy of her parents at first. now, from all that, all the hanging out with jim i used to do, had quit, due to the fact esther had gone totally psycho on me and i was sick of it. and coming to find that was the source of the lice, but because my hair was so long, i couldn't get rid of them easily. and one day, meredith said she found an egg in her hair and she did her hair. so i cried that night, because the next day, i was going to cut my hair and do whatever it took to get rid of them damn things. my dad got me this lethal shampoo that can only be used 3 times or it will cause major damage to someones brain, but, it seemed to work, i got rid of them and never had it use it more than once. so i lost my long hair, and i wanted to lose the all black look i had grown acustom to, i wanted merediths parents to like me. so i changed for them and for her. it was the first time in my life i'd been inlove, and i spent every day for the next year with her, or atleast talking to her on the phone. my live revolved around her. i also began learning more about gothic and industrial music from billy and angela. and life seemed much better than it had been. i'd just turn 18, and was trying to cope with the fact all the people i grew up with just graduated while i still have 2 more years left, due to my stupidity. right before the new school year started, meredith broke up with me, saying she was going to college and she wanted some time alone, and she knew we'd have to split up because of her going to college so she said it'd be easier now than later. once again, the reality of it didn't hit me right away. about a month later, i saw her before school one morning and she had a huge hickey on her neck, obviously from someone else, and i fell apart, all my happiness shattered and disappeared. after realizing i changed for no reason, and having forgetting who i was as myself and not as a couple with meredith. i felt i needed to find myself. but i went about it the wrong way, seeing as i had lost most of my friends over that past year, and everyone i knew became druggies, i felt like i should try it, first i tried pot, and liked it, smoked it for a while. during this time i started dating laura, who lived by my friend mike. i feel now that it was sort of a rebound thing, but i liked her a lot, or so i thought. she was very hardcore for me havign a job. and i have trouble of finding a job. i tried drugs around that time with her, because of the people we hung around, acid, which i hated, doesn't go with me...ecstacy which i loved. it gave me back that happiness i once had, and made me feel great, or so i thought. i did that ever weekend for 6 months of my relationship with laura. and that was basically the strong hold of our "love", or atleast when we admited to eachother we thought that, when in reality, on ecstacy you love everyone, and it alters your thoughts and emotions, i don't regret doing that..but i've learned from it. during that drug usage time i had gotten a job at UPS, was there for a week. before a friend of mine needed some help at this store she was managing, an adult novelty store. i didn't care about what was sold there or not. it paid decent and had the least amount of physical labor possible for me to do. i worked there for a month, during so i took my G.E.D. test, and aced that. after about a month a of working there. i was robbed at gun point by two black men, then sprayed in the face with pepper spray. needless to say i quit that job after that day. i didn't have a job for months afterwards, but i got a lot of piercings, tattoo's i nthe meanwhile. after i quit doing drugs in june of '99 and laura was suppose ot of quit also. i focused my attention more on trying to get a job again, and i finally did at the end of july. at this place called parsec, a railyard. best job i ever had, but i worked all the time, rarely had time to spend with laura because of her schoolinh and her working. when she had time off, i was working. around november i got really ill, with the flu. i hadn't been sick in a long long time, and i had to work so when i wasn't working i wanted to rest. and laura got sick of me being sick and would get aggitated by it and bitch me out because i was sick.and i figured since my job didn't want me to get well and wouldn't let me get a day off, i quit, i was sick and i wanted to get better. i finally got some medication and started to get better. when the worst thing i could of ever imagined happened to me. 6:30am on december 20th of 1999, i was rudely awakened by my grandfather banging on my window telling me to come help him, my grandmother had fell. being i was woke up that early i was gripey but i got up and got dressed and went nextdoor. only to see my grandmother laying on the floor like she was asleep, not moving. and my grandfather told me to help him pick her up and put her on the bed. i got behind her and tried to pick her up, but she was too heavey. as we laid her back down i put a pillow under her head. my grandfather left saying he was going to get the fire department to help. i sat there alone with her, staring...at her. telling myself she was ok. then i noticed she wasn't breathing, and i was just thinking over and over, this had to be some nightmare, it wasn't happening, she couldn't leave me.....my mom came over, and looked at her and started freaking out, crying, i had to comfort my mom. then the fire department came, and we went into the dinning room, and i could hear them in there...my mom and my grandpa weren't paying attention, but i hear so clearly from my grandma's room...... "she's dead....". my heart stopped. but i couldn't think of it long enough before my mom heard and started crying, i had to comfort her, as they told my grandfather and he just sat down in his chair, and just stared into space....lifeless. they had been married 51 years, and she was gone now...i had to call my aunt, and tell her, and have her cry to me, as she told me i had to go find my dad and tell him because he had no cell phone or pager i had to drive out to were he worked and find him. as i drove there i fell apart, crying uncontrolablely, wondering why this was happening, just wanting to be able to wake up from this nightmare. i had a cd i'd just gotten with wumpscut - angel on it, and i'd never really paid much attention to the words before until then. hearing what he said, made me cry more, but it was so beautiful, it was perfect, i listened to it over and over as i drove to find my dad, finally i got paged by billy. he told me to come there and that we'd both go looking for my dad so i wasn't alone, as i got to billy's i saw my dad was there, and for the first time in my life. my dad ran to my and cried in my arms...screaming "why?!". as we got back to the house, my entire family had shown up, and they'd already came and took my grandmother away. i'd quite smoking cloves when i got sick a few months before, but when i got home, i was so stressed and shaking i walked to my dad and said "i need, a fucking clove....." so he gave me the money to go get a pack. when i got back, my grandfather wanted to speak to me, i went inside and he asked me if i would be a paul bearer for my grandmothers funeral, she wanted all her grandsons to do that for her. and i said yes, i'd be more than glad to. billy and everyone kept telling me i didn't have to, after what i'd seen. that i didn't have to if i didn't feel i could..i didn't care how i felt, i knew, if i didn't do this i would regret it for the rest of my life. my grandmother ment the world to me and if that was her final wish, so be it. the next couple of days were a blur, i went to the viewing the following night, and left early after seeing her inside the casket, it was too much i couldn't stay. the following day was the funeral. my dad had told me and billy ahead of time, my grandmother loved me and him for who we were. so we can dress and wear our jewelry how we wanted, be ourselves for her...we both dressed up nice in our own ways. and went to the funeral, we sat up front, and listened to the preacher say what he had to say, about how special my grandmother was, to a lot of people, she reached so many people...there were people standing outside because there were no seats left. then they had the final viewing, as everyone finally left, the paul bearers got a final look before my grandfather did, and they closed the casket, as i went up there...my grandmother looked so beautiful, i reached down and touched her hand, it was so cold and stiff. so lifeless, it sent chills up my spine. the closed the casket, and pulled it around for the paul bearers to take into the hearse..as soon as we slid it inside, i turned around. and hugged my moms half-sister, it didn't matter who it was i fell apart, i cried and cried and cried... i finally got control of myself to go get in my car and light up a clove and follow them over to the cementary. as we got there, all the paul bearers had to lift the casket out of the hearse, and slide it onto the bars where it would be lowered into the grave. we were all given a rose to lay onto of the casket. and i just sat there and stared at the casket, trying to comprehend my gradmother was in there, and that i would never see her smile again, never hear her laugh. never feel her hug me when i did something she was proud of. never, again would i feel her love......as they lowered her in, and started leaving. billy and i sat there and watched, never spoke a word, just watched, and chain smoked. i smoked about 5 cloves while watching them bury her....until they put the sod over the dirt and eventually told us its ok to leave now...after that day, my life was and still is changed. i've been depressed and haven't gotten any better, just worse and worse. about two weeks later, laura thought of this brilliant idea that if she broke up with me, it would encourage me to get a job. too bad i was beyond depressed and her breaking up and leaving me, wasn't the key to solving that. the fact she even considered that to be a good idea upset me to the point of not even wanting her back. this is around the time i got my friend mike to download palace onto his computer, and my internet addiction began. mike told me about somethings laura did while we were together that i didnt know of. he knew i didnt want her back, so he thought it would be best to tell me now, because he wasnt going to ruin anything. supposedly during my working and illness, she was so stressed out, and the friends she was hanging out with, i didn't like. but she had no friends and i wanted her to be happy, so i let her hang out with them. during this time, she started doing cocaine, and a lot of it. mike found out because she came to him wanting some because she needed it so bad. knowing she did this, hurt even more, that she lied, and would make me feel bad daily for being sick, and not having a job. and saying she was glad she quit doing drugs, yet she was a coke addict...with people i hated. i eventually got her to confess this to me, without letting her know mike told me. for the next year, i eventually got a job in march, back with parsec, and kept that until august and i quit again. from that point on i haven't had a job, and since laura, i have yet to have had a real relationship. during september of '00 though, this girl i met online..lenore, came to visit me and stayed with me, she was the last person i've been with...intimently. she stayed for a week, and she had to go back home, after words i don't know, i suppose im stupid, selfish, or spoiled. but i thought i would never see her again, i rarely saw her online so i kinda broke things off, and haven't heard from her since. i'd met this girl jade, around that time, and i thought she was the girl of my dreams, and i fell inlove once again, that feeling as i had years before, i was going to visit her. my life was going good, i didn't have a job, but i was getting my happiness back. in december of '00 i got to see the cruxshadows for my first time after 5 years of waiting, it was the most magical night. and i'll cherish it forever. in february i went to visit jade, i was going to stay at my friend davids house. they lived near eachother in louisiana. i had never been out of florida before, much less out of jacksonville other than orlando or somewhere near. but i drove there, 600 miles, alone. i drove to louisiana, i got to davids house, and it was a blast, i still miss him, in person, he's the little brother i never had. the next day, i was going to see jade, the girl of my dreams. i was so nervous, i woke up and called her early the next morning, she told me to get online while she gets ready. i got online, and she said check my email, i looked, she'd wrote this long poem, about how she'd lied, she wasn't who she said she was. she sent me pictures for months of this girl i thought was who i could of never imagined could love me, and truth was, it wasn't her.those pictures were someone else, i was lied to, yet again. travelling 600 miles, for a lie...i tried to push that aside and i still went and saw her, but after being lied to, and not being near my home...i missed my parents...i missed my mom. i had to call each night, and hearing my mom....made my miss her even more. so i left the folllowing weekend, and came home. after all this, i finally became friends with meredith again, but just friends now. which is great, i've lost most my friends because of my depression, but no one understands me as well as meredith does and she always listens to me and pays attention to what i say, and honestly i think, she is a blessing as a friend. she's met the man of her dreams, who came her to visit her a few times and shes gone to england to visit him, before she finally moves there. he's amazing, they're perfect for eachother. he's just as deep and understanding inside as she is. i'm going to miss her as a friend when she leaves, but atleast i know they'll be happy...i don't know what i'm going to do though, after she leaves i'll have no one to talk to anymore. i guess i'll just have to get out of this depression...and, that's basically up-to-date, everything else is on my journal.