PHILOSOPHY

     The interesting thing about reality is that it's different for everyone.  You've heard the question about a tree falling in the woods.  Well, if I'm not here to see you, do you exist?  Are you nothing more than  biochemical electrical impulses surging among my synapses?  Without me, are you real?  Reality is not a physical existence, but merely a personal perception.  I think, therefore you are.  Welcome to the mindset of a megalomaniac.

     With this in mind, the standards of normalism are mine to define.  I am the writer of the grandest story as it unfolds at my very hands.  Reality could be a lucid dream--don't take it too seriously.  Enjoy yourself, dabble and interfere as you like, and voyeur as you please.  I'm directing the show, and you're here for my entertainment.  If nothing else, be amusing.  I'll return the favor.  Your friends keep you around for a reason, know those reasons and value those aspects of yourself.  Value also what keeps certain others away.  I believe the sum of one's character can be found in those who love him.

     In today's society, we much place emphasis in determining an individual's worth on currency, on social status, political clout, career, education, and other aspects irrelevant to our individuality.  These learned qualities and earned traits root in our cultural normalism.  Why do we accept it so willingly?  Dare we not rage out in defiance?  Is the norm already defined?
   Our greatest capacity for impacting the lives of strangers is to share who we are, our experiences, our happiness, our sad stories, our smiles.  So many people hide behind the shroud of societal roles, designer labels, expensive cars, and titles they have chosen for themselves.  Be real, and be more than what you do and what you have.  Does society hold the hope of returning individualism to the masses?

BACKGROUND

     I  was born in Ashland, Kentucky, in June of 1977.  After 72 hours of maternal labor, I am.  I spent my early years in a trailer park in Summit, Kentucky with my mom and dad.  My mom, a nurse by trade; my father, a welder.
     My memories of childhood are vivid.  From sleeping in my crib and learning to climb out of it, to days of macaroni and cheese and afternoon naps I keep pretty strong hold on my experiences: sights, sounds, smells.  I remember the burning sun in my eyes as I threw rocks at the neighbor girl from my swing set turned fortification.  Did you ever mix peas in your macaroni?
     While in kindergarten, my dad moved out for a while to the farm on which he grew up to look after things as his grandfather ailed and ultimately passed.  One day, we turned the kitchen table over to its top, took the knickknacks off the shelves, and moved the homestead out to Carter City.
     Carter City, a small town in the hills of Eastern Kentucky, is populated by about a hundred people.  There's a post office, a reaturant-poolhall-gas station, and a furniture store that sells sausage.  A friend once observed, "country folk are efficient.  They consolidate everything.  Where else can you go pick up a dozen eggs and four cheeseburgers, get a fill-up, and shoot a game of pool while your new couch is loaded onto the pickup?"  Where else indeed?  Small-town normalism.
     At any rate, life in the country was a bit of a change, but at 5 years old, adjustments aren't difficult.  The adjustment was obviously difficult for my mother, and I feel our relocation put quite a strain on my parents' relationship.  During the summer between second and third grade, my mom and I moved back to Ashland and lived with her mom, Nana.
     Nana's health was poor during our stay with her.  My parents divorced, though their love remained evident.
     I spent several weeks with my dad during the summer between third and fourth grade.  It was at my father's house, the trailer I grew up in, I learned of my mother's death--heart failure.  The trials of that time of my life have remained unparalleled.
     As Nana's health remained questionable, I moved back to the country with my dad.  While my father never remarried, he did meet a woman--who was 18 at the time--with whom to share his life, our life.  A mere ten years my senior, we managed to grow with one and another and I've never known a moment without love.
    Small-town living never satisfied my appetite.  Upon graduating high school I moved to Louisville for school under scholarship.
     After majoring in English and Biology at U of L, I found my first "big-boy" job at United Parcel Service doing some data entry and, ultimately, telephone customer service.  I am surprised that two years passed before I realized my distaste for the corporate suffocation of individuality.  My work experience is diverse, and for that I am fortunate.  Before moving from my hometown, I did some computer systems work for the city government and only recently removed the mayor from my list of references.  Perhaps His Honor will again join my name-dropping repertoire once I've turned focused toward my political ambitions of taking over the world.  I cooked at PoFolk's family restaurant--the country-fried steak:  hockey pucks.  I was an insurance agent for a while selling those damned HMOs to Medicare recipients.  I've roamed around the country, professionally of course, collecting wages from kind strangers between concert venues, amusement parks, and Fidel Castro's secret bungalow.
     I lived in Los Angeles for three years, returning to Louisville in October 2005.  I sold doorknobs in the City of Angels, lunched among celebrities, tried my balance at surfing, and never missed an opportunity to learn a lesson.
     Contemporary times are pretty interesting indeed.  To pay the bills, I'm a freelance technology consultant.  The job suits my Gemini skills:  I'm not an attorney;  I just play one at work.  I could go on and on describing my average, anything-but-average days, but I'll sum it up by saying that my job description equates "find a way to do whatever needs to be done," and I do.  I don't remember running into Al Gore while building the internet.
   I lead a pretty charmed life:  I know good friends, drink fine wine, eat gourmet food, listen to moving music, and know much love.  I've surrounded myself with a self-constructed playground.  To think is to live, and I live the life.  The merry-go-round accepts all passengers.