Meet James...

So I have decided to start writing. I am just going to write whatever comes to my mind and build on it.

My name is James and I am a father of two, grandfather of two and husband of 32 years. I have had an interesting life, at least after the dull years I lived growing up. I was born to mom and dad in 1972, the first of 5 children over the next 10 years. We were a modest family but we were usually ok. I don’t recall ever really wanting for anything. We always had something to eat and clothes on our backs. My childhood is kind of hazy aside from memories of specific moments and regular traditions. I don’t remember being overly loved on nor do I feel I was not loved. We just were. We went to church regularly. Every Sunday, morning and evening as well as Wednesday night services. It was just what we did, it was normal.

I was not one of the popular kids, ever. I was picked on and bullied. For my hair or my clothes or whatever else the other kids liked to pick on people for. I didn’t really get beat up a lot, just a few times if I recall correctly. I remember fearing to go to the bus stop in Detroit since a bigger boy liked to pick on me. I had friends, but I was never really good friends with anyone. I had a few that came and went over the years, but no one I have grand memories of or certainly that I still keep in touch with.

Wow, you know, it is really interesting to think that I have nothing of substance that I want to recall. A few good times. I remember the Friday night fish fry’s that we would go to on occasion at Dad’s workplace. I remember he would sometimes bring us little brown bags of candies he picked up on his way home from work. He would take us to the park. I do remember getting stung by something large and unholy during one adventure to the park. I threw my arm over the top of one of the brown wooden logs at the top of the playground equipment and it crawled over my arm to greet me with a yellow and black face staring into my soul and a sharp nasty jab into my forearm which left me screaming and running back to the car to sit the rest of the voyage out in the back seat. I hate stinging insects; my fear of them is unnatural. I have hit myself so hard in the side of the head a few times that I have knocked my hat and glasses off and ended up gouging my cheek so deep it bled. I must look like a complete idiot when that happens. Flailing around like I am on fire, trying to free myself from what must be the inevitable tortuous stab of a tiny inch long flying creature with a little poker in its butt…

We won’t talk about spiders…

Well, that was an interesting sidebar… Back to the show…

I remember another adventure I went on that sent my mother into a tizzy. We lived in Romulus, Michigan just off of Eureka Road. Me and a friend (we were 5 I believe) decided we needed to go to the store, an IGA I recall. I took the few pennies I had in my drawer and we set out, alone, to buy some candy or something. I don’t remember the journey, but we had to cross a busy 5 or 6 lane road to get where we were going and again to return home. I don’t think the visit to the IGA resulted in any prizes, but I remember the look on my mom’s face when I came walking down the sidewalk. She was scared and I was in trouble… She might even have made me get a branch for my punishment… or I could have imagined that…

I was not a good student. I did not do my homework. I just didn’t want to. I never studied. School was not important to me. I was tested in or around the 5th or 6th grade and scored in the gifted range. I was then exposed to a battery of testing at Ohio State of which I remember very little. I never saw any results from the study although I would be interested in that information. At this point in my life I look back and figure I was just bored and uninterested. I remember applying myself much better in instances where I was interested in the subject matter. Some history, biology in high school, ok, not a lot of examples but there are a few.

Lots of other stuff I could talk or write about from my childhood and beyond. Maybe I will eventually...