I came from a lower-middle class family, and my life was nothing special. I was not a prodigy, I was not born into wealth, and I had nothing left to me from any relatives. It was just my mother, my father, and my grandmother- everyone else was not interested in talking with us, probably because of my dad…but I don’t want to get into that right now. Born here in Ventura, I was born into a really relaxed world, and I have grown up with relatively low cares, though it’s anything but a care-free life. From my youngest days, I remember every Sunday, my dad would wake up at 4:00 AM, leave to go golf with his buddies (me excluded) Come home at about eh, 12:00, and hop on his motorcycle and leave again, with his buddies, until about 7:00. During the week he worked 4:00 AM to 7:00 PM, so really, he was never home, and when he was, he was only a part of the family (if you could say that) for about 2 hours, then off to bed, without my mother. Wonderful father figure.
My mom, what can I say? I love her. She was the only parental figure in my life. Yeah, she is not the perfect mother, but she’s given me so many opportunities growing up. Whenever my parents would fight, they were both completely inebriated, and it was scary for me up until I was about ten. When I was ten, I started yelling back when they would fight, and my father never changed. After my objections in these family affairs, and talks with them when I could get them to listen to the only kid in the house, I got my mom to completely give up alcohol for about 3 years. These 3 years were (almost) golden. If my dad wanted to fight, my mom would just shut him up, end of story. My father never changed.
In late 2012, tension in the household was at an all-time high, and my dad put the last straw on my mothers’ back. It does not matter what happened, I know, but what it was, led to a very nasty, brutal, depressing divorce. For the next two years, I saw my dad one Sunday a month. Granted this time was very little and far between, he was still my father, and without my mom in his life, we could get along kind of O.K. (Also- he was not allowed to drink or smoke within 24 hours of picking me up) I had just started to love him again- but he picked up a dangerous hobby he had once held. Motorcycling. This, ultimately, led to his demise, and my father passed away at the start of 9th grade.
Earlier I mentioned I have had many great opportunities thanks to my loving mother. So when I was 4, I told my mom, (me being a huge spongebob fan) I wanted to do karate (along with me already playing soccer.) Well for my fifth birthday, my mom enrolled me in Tae Kwon Do, and that lasted for seven years, and I learned a lot in that time. I got up to my first degree black belt, and then it slowed down, and I stopped learning as much, so I decided I wanted to quit. After this, I was hesitant, but I picked up playing ice hockey on the in house team, and progressed really quickly, moving up to the travel team, Riptide. I am still playing, and still loving it, I can’t see myself stopping soon. When I was nine, my grandmother bought me this thingy. It was an expansion pack for a flight simulator. Without the simulator I could not play with the expansion, so thanks to my grandmother, I wound up with my own flight simulator. Well after I found I was taking it more seriously than a game, I told my mom, I wanted to fly in real life, so she enrolled me in flight lessons at the age of ten. Everyone at the airport was reluctant to take me on as a student, because well, I was 4’5 and ten years old, I could not even see out the front of the plane, but one guy, Joe, took me up, and was amazed at how much I already knew on our first lesson, and we kept flying. Well Joe got a callback to American Airlines as a senior captain after a year of instruction with me, and left forever. What now? That’s when I met Michael, Michael is unarguably one of my best friends, albeit he is in his sixties. I have been flying with him for almost 4 years now, gathering so much experience under my belt, and a lot of good times as well. I have been told I’m ready to solo, and get my license (hell, I have been told that since I was 13, it’s just truth still.) He noticed I take things on quickly, so he moved me up to flying tailwheel aircraft, and I took it up like nothing. It came naturally to me, I guess you could just say I have a knack for doing things well, as I have done for a long time.
So that’s the rollercoaster world I came from. Very uncertain, a lot of sadness, but also a lot of good times. I did not have the best parents. I never had a lot of money. My family just scraped by, and there is a lot more sad stuff I did omit from this just to keep it from turning into a pity fest. If there’s anything else anyone would like to know about me feel free to approach me and ask, I won’t bite, and I enjoy talking about stuff like that, it’s a good way to get the pain out.
(Word count: 978/500)
My mom, what can I say? I love her. She was the only parental figure in my life. Yeah, she is not the perfect mother, but she’s given me so many opportunities growing up. Whenever my parents would fight, they were both completely inebriated, and it was scary for me up until I was about ten. When I was ten, I started yelling back when they would fight, and my father never changed. After my objections in these family affairs, and talks with them when I could get them to listen to the only kid in the house, I got my mom to completely give up alcohol for about 3 years. These 3 years were (almost) golden. If my dad wanted to fight, my mom would just shut him up, end of story. My father never changed.
In late 2012, tension in the household was at an all-time high, and my dad put the last straw on my mothers’ back. It does not matter what happened, I know, but what it was, led to a very nasty, brutal, depressing divorce. For the next two years, I saw my dad one Sunday a month. Granted this time was very little and far between, he was still my father, and without my mom in his life, we could get along kind of O.K. (Also- he was not allowed to drink or smoke within 24 hours of picking me up) I had just started to love him again- but he picked up a dangerous hobby he had once held. Motorcycling. This, ultimately, led to his demise, and my father passed away at the start of 9th grade.
Earlier I mentioned I have had many great opportunities thanks to my loving mother. So when I was 4, I told my mom, (me being a huge spongebob fan) I wanted to do karate (along with me already playing soccer.) Well for my fifth birthday, my mom enrolled me in Tae Kwon Do, and that lasted for seven years, and I learned a lot in that time. I got up to my first degree black belt, and then it slowed down, and I stopped learning as much, so I decided I wanted to quit. After this, I was hesitant, but I picked up playing ice hockey on the in house team, and progressed really quickly, moving up to the travel team, Riptide. I am still playing, and still loving it, I can’t see myself stopping soon. When I was nine, my grandmother bought me this thingy. It was an expansion pack for a flight simulator. Without the simulator I could not play with the expansion, so thanks to my grandmother, I wound up with my own flight simulator. Well after I found I was taking it more seriously than a game, I told my mom, I wanted to fly in real life, so she enrolled me in flight lessons at the age of ten. Everyone at the airport was reluctant to take me on as a student, because well, I was 4’5 and ten years old, I could not even see out the front of the plane, but one guy, Joe, took me up, and was amazed at how much I already knew on our first lesson, and we kept flying. Well Joe got a callback to American Airlines as a senior captain after a year of instruction with me, and left forever. What now? That’s when I met Michael, Michael is unarguably one of my best friends, albeit he is in his sixties. I have been flying with him for almost 4 years now, gathering so much experience under my belt, and a lot of good times as well. I have been told I’m ready to solo, and get my license (hell, I have been told that since I was 13, it’s just truth still.) He noticed I take things on quickly, so he moved me up to flying tailwheel aircraft, and I took it up like nothing. It came naturally to me, I guess you could just say I have a knack for doing things well, as I have done for a long time.
So that’s the rollercoaster world I came from. Very uncertain, a lot of sadness, but also a lot of good times. I did not have the best parents. I never had a lot of money. My family just scraped by, and there is a lot more sad stuff I did omit from this just to keep it from turning into a pity fest. If there’s anything else anyone would like to know about me feel free to approach me and ask, I won’t bite, and I enjoy talking about stuff like that, it’s a good way to get the pain out.
(Word count: 978/500)