Family of 28

Family of 28

Right from the start I will say this straight out. I am not writing this in order to throw my family, relatives, friends or others under the proverbial bus. I am just trying to be transparent, honest and open. Telling the story like a small bit of history, be it good, bad or ugly. Perhaps others will be encouraged to write the story they remember and find peace, instead of letting it all just swirl around in they're soul for the rest of they're lives. DO NOT FEAR!!!

My Grandparents had 11. Mom had 5. Dad had 2. Step dad had 5, Aunts and Uncles had 3. I had 2. Total of 28!!! My mothers mom had 7 of them alone and was dead at 47. These were not children, houses or cars, they were divorces. They do not include the countless number of boy friends, girlfriends, live-ins and one night stands. All of them I had to respect or get smacked.

Before I go any farther, I will mention that as my memory serves me better and I recollect more, I will add it to this publishing, so please look to the bottom after it reads “and further more.” I hope and pray that you find healing in this story. I have no doubt that many of you can relate and could write your own...just endure the pain, because through it all the sword is made sharp by being put into a fire and then beaten and then dunked in water and then it starts all over again. Sometimes the one crafting the sword is very much misunderstood by the sword.

These are the childhood memories I can recall to the best of my knowledge and I am writing this for many reasons, some of them are just to get it all out my mind and also to share with others so that they can hopefully see the utter destruction that comes from this pattern of insanity, carelessness, selfishness, apathy and cruelty between not only the parents but the children as well. This was hard to write and I found myself having to often take breaks because I was either depressed, shaking or trying to remember it.

I will do my best to recall all I can and be honest no matter how much the pain. I am not even going to try to put things into a chronological order, so forgive me if I seem to “be all over the place”. It is also impossible because many of these people are dead or they are unwilling to talk about it all. More of that “sweep it under the rug” philosophy. Casting it to the wind and letting the rain settle it.

I was born in November 1961 in Westminster, California. I was brought up in a culture that included The Irish, Welsh, Finnish, English and Indians. And nobody drank!!! Instead everyone drank!!! They argued, fought, cussed and threw things. Oh happy day.

We or I wound up living in 18 of the 27 cities that existed at the time in Orange County, California before I was 18 years old and some of them 2, 3, 4 times. Stability and security was a total illusion for me.

I have tried to muster a lot of compassion for my mom and the way she treated me. Because between 1942-1959 grandma married and divorced 7 times, so my mother had to endure having 7 fathers by the time she was just 16 years old. Growing up in a household where if you dropped your food, you had to toss it in the trash and then eat it. She wanted to escape that madness by getting married at 16 in 1959. During that short marriage she was tossed down some stairs by her husband, killing the baby she carried. I would have had a brother or sister 2 years older. She divorced and remarried soon and I came along in 1961. That marriage lasted less than 2 years and she married again by 1963. So this is number 3 in 4 years. I guess she was keeping pace with her mother. This 3^rd marriage in 1963 lasted 10 years and they had a son, my brother, a big accomplishment, because the man she married was on his 2^nd and she was on her 3^rd already and they were 23 and 18. For me though, it was a lot of heartache and pain.

I never knew my real father or grandparents until I looked them up in the phone book at age 12 while living in Tustin, CA. (at address number let's say 20) Right after the divorce. My mom was reluctant to let me see them but, I was very determined and knew how to get on a bus and get around Orange County by then, so she agreed to allow my grandparents to pick me up for a day. I kept in touch with them often and had regular visits. They tried to make up for all the years. My dad lived with them after his 2^nd divorce and having 2 sons, he remained there until he died at 58. He did not want anything to do with me and hardly came out of his room when I visited or lived there. I had to knock on the door and converse with him from the doorway. He never once took me anyplace or hugged me or said anything good about me. One day when I was 28, he finally told me that “you were an unwanted child.” I wanted to knock his face in. Because I thought, “what good did that just do accept make him feel proud of himself for saying it and me feel like trash.”

My grandparents were always very kind, loving and giving towards me and I lived with them several times when I was between 16 and 30, always taking me in to they're home no matter what the situation. Once my family and I even lived there when we were between homes. They never gave up on me and showed a lot of compassion to a very troubled young man. They taught me a lot of good things and I will never forget them.

They were married for 60+ years. Lived in the same house in Anaheim CA. for decades. My grandfather was a Millwright Machinist at the same company for 25 years and pretty much could build and or repair anything. He was also a bare knuckle fighter and truck driver for U.P.S. back in the 1920's and 30's and even in his 70's was able to arm wrestle or box with my friends and win with ease. My dear grandmother was a home maker and kept it immaculate. Even in her 70's she still scrubbed the floors on her hands and knees. She was a great cook and loved to work in the yard. She never drove a car. If grandfather was doing something she did not like she would sneak up behind in while he was in his rocking chair and grab him by the ear and twist like a 3^rd grade teacher. It was a great relationship, they loved each other. They both would often go and help others who were shut-ins or poor. Always willing to help anyone weather they asked or not. Grandfather was the kind of man that if he saw a person do something wrong, he'd just walk right up and tell them no matter who, what, when or where. Grandfather came from a family of 12 and grandmother was an orphan. He was Welsh and she was Finnish, both were tenacious.

My mom was a straight A student and became an accountant and worked at the same company for most of my life. She also did ironing on the side for extra money to make ends meet. I learned a lot of good things from her in spite of all the difficult situations. She was a “perfectionist” and always tried to do her best at things and her being very critical was helpful in some things. Precise, direct and straight forward in speech and actions. She carried a lot of emotional problems from her childhood and did not really know how remain calm a lot of the time. She overreacted to a lot of small stuff and I found it hard to just be me, never knowing if I would be second guesed or not or if I did a good enough job. My errors were always pointed out first it seemed and so the complements that rarely came were of little comfort to me or my brother. He was 5 years younger and I did not treat him well at all, especially after the divorce. It was even harder on him because he was younger. We did have a lot of fun together too though, it's just when I started acting like my mom that it was not cool. I regret all those times and have told him so often during our adult years. I tend to feel things very deeply.

My mom was a very, very honest person too, telling a lie had no place in the house and punishment was harsh if you were caught, seems like I always got caught. Afraid to tell the truth because of mom and dad's extreme temper and things getting thrown at me and being slapped or beaten beyond the extent of the offense, mostly by my dad. I call him my dad because he raised me from age 2 until 16. He was tough to please as well. I guess I learned how to do things to utter perfection from them both but, it came with a cost and a lot of painful memories. If any of you have seen the movie “Mommy Dearest”, my mom could have played the role of Joan Crawford and not had to get out of character. I will say this for her though. She has tried very hard to reconcile with me and has gone out of her way to help many, many, many times and we get along good now. My dad and my step dad never made a move in this direction. Oh well!!!

My mom and dad are geniuses and so is my brother, having a measured I.Q. of 185 (140 is genius) and he was doing calculus in the 9^th grade. He had very few friends because he just did not fit in. I recall him stealing my dad's silver dollars and taking them to school and giving them to the other kids so they would be his friends. I have been told many times that I am a genius too but, I really do not care at all about it. My brother went into the army at age 20, after taking the tests they told him “you can do whatever you want man, pick a field, your scores are unreal.” He served for 20 years, then he retired as a Lt. Colonel with a nice pension. He has lived all over the world. He served in both Iraq wars, being in charge of the communication systems and telling people when, where and how things needed to be in order for it all to work right. We get along great now and I am proud of him to the max. He and his wife have 4 children who are really well behaved and very engaging to talk to. They are well accomplished in many things too. He and his wife have been married 22 years and the only one's without a divorce in all the relatives. I miss seeing him though, he lives several states away.

In my childhood I attended 3 elementary schools, 3 junior high schools and 4 high schools, and no, I was not expelled from any of them, my parents just seemed to have nothing better to do than move every 198 days it seemed. All the schools I went to were in Orange County and so was every address, if you can believe that crap. Talk about having a stable home and sense of security!!! I hated it. I mean, if you are going to move, then move, don't just bounce around the county like a box of rocks. (a box of rocks does not bounce and that is the point, it don't go far...hahaha) I was constantly in trouble in school and even though highly intelligent, found it all to be boring. I would rather be playing sports or fighting someone twice my size. I was very good at both of them. Anything I put my hands to I was good at but, did not care about it all, my family would just find some crap that I was doing wrong in the thing I did well.

When it came to sports, I was team mates with Lenny Dykstra (1987 Mets & World Series Champions, later he played for The Philly's) when we were young. We were good friends, we were constantly trying to out do each other. I played 1^st string offense and defense, special teams too. Played any position in baseball, any. Bowling I could shoot over 200 any day. Pinball, I was in the arcade all day on a dollar, winning games and selling them. Tennis, beat adults when I was 13. Cross country, I ran the 2 mile in the 9:00 minute range. And bla, bla, bla...who cares? Yes, your right, nobody did, that's why I quit, no backing from family. Who cares? The answer for me was “let's party”, those people accepted me and that's all I knew. It was a fatal mistake and waste of time.

By the time I was 30 I had lived with every friend, family and parent so many times that I'd had over 100 addresses and 50 jobs as well, because that's what I knew well. Got fired from my first for for saying “shit, I dropped the taco” in front of a customer. My 1st marriage that lasted 6 years, we moved so often we always had stuff in boxes. My 2nd one lasted 18 years and I have been in the same house for 12 years now, I live in a canyon and I love it. Being 6 miles from the nearest light is cool and so is the wildlife that lives here. They come to visit everyday.

Between the 2 marriages, I have been blessed with 3 children whom I love dearly.

I recall one time I stole 12 dollars so I could buy a nice bike. I admitted it when the neighbor lady started crying because it was gone and I gave it back. She still told my babysitter and she thought I showed enough remorse and did not tell my dad when he came to pick me and my brother up. The first thing he said when we got in the Jeep was “so, are you going to tell dad what you did today?” (Thanks bro; I love you too!!!) When we got home I was told to go in my room and take off all my clothes. (for what? A bath?....hahaha...ouch) Nope, afraid not man. My dad comes in a with a leather belt beats me without aim 12 times as I tried to get away jumping, screaming and begging him to stop, each strike cutting into my flesh and bleeding. Then he tells me that “you're getting 12 lashes everyday for 12 days!!!” After he left the room I said to myself “me thinks not” and I ran away to live with my mom. She could not hit that hard, nor would she beat me while I was naked.

That man did teach me a few things though, some good and some not. Like how to fish and hunt. How to do carpentry and paint. How to cook. How to turn the gas back on after they'd turned it off for non payment. How to smoke and drink to excess. How to drive like a maniac. How to b.s. people to get your way. How to chase women. OK, that's enough.

One time we were at my aunt and uncle's house and the children were called downstairs for dinner and my cousin did not come soon enough for my dad so he was met at the bottom of the stairs and promptly back handed so hard that he hit the wall and fell. This is the kind of overreacting we all dealt with. Just bloody crazy man. Communication was often done with yelling, screaming, slapping, cussing or if you were out of reach someone just threw the nearest object at you, so we all had quick reflexes. :-)

Once I was verbally assaulted for not doing the laundry right, I think I forgot to get the clothes out of the dryer and they wrinkled. Then I got tossed out of the house (1973 age 12) and was given $2.00 for food or whatever. Another time I did not do the dishes to the set standard and found myself under a barrage of hot-soapy-water-filled pots and pans being hurled at me from across the kitchen and again got $2.00 while I was told to leave. Again, I went to my favorite place, the bolling alley. Life was fabulous :-)

Also while living there with mom, my dad returned from Louisiana without warning and came to the apartment and attacked my mom right in front of me, so I called the police who arrived in moments and leaped across the bed and tackled him and arrested him and took him away. Just another episode of "as the trash turns."

I recall having a babysitter when I was about 8 or 9 that one time punished me for using motor oil on the cement so I could make my bike slide across it real cool like, I thought it was a fantastic idea and so did my friends. She made me EAT a bar of Ivory soap, YES EAT IT!!!...not just wash my mouth out with soap, but made to eat and swallow it all. The idiot bitch forgot that I had assorted dental work that made the soap get lodged all inside my mouth and nothing could dig it out, so I had to deal with it just slowly dissolving away for hours, When mom got home she fired the mindless idiot stupid bitch right on the spot, I think she slapped her too...she should have gave her some soap or bleach and I would have helped her do it.

Then there was the time when my grandmother (the one with 7 divorces) made me and my brother spaghetti and was drunk (again) and she mistakenly used a cup of salt in the sauce instead of a tablespoon. She cooks and serves it up and we both tell her it's to salty and she went ballistic, felt insulted and told use to eat all of it. We needed a lot of water and I think we gagged it down a bit until she left the room and then I took it away. Nana was living with us at the time and was always drunk, hiding bottles even in my room where she thought my mom would not find them. I did and was happy to drink it. When mom found them they sent her away. I remember visiting her at the state mental hospital. Then she died shortly afterwards of pneumonia.

I recall getting my first beer at age 8, drank it and became the funny little clown in the room and had the adults laughing and I finally had some attention that did not include being criticized, yelled at, objects tossed at me or being slapped. Afterwards I raided the bottles whenever I could.

Once I flew from LA. To Louisiana to visit my aunt and uncle and was told that Coors beer was illegal in that state (not anymore). My uncle loved that beer and I was told to hide it in my suitcases, a wonderful thing to teach a young boy, ya think? Just one more cool thing I learned from my dad.

This is funny. One time my mom was on her way home from school and while crossing a field she walked across an old abandon out house pit and promptly fell in up to her neck in human waist. Then after she climbed out she still had to walk home covered in crap, piss and toilet paper. So upon arriving at home she was met by her mother and was told to “hose herself off on the yard”....thanks for the help mother. That part is not funny.

My dad once had my brother and I over the weekend and took us to the desert with a bunch of his whacked out buddies, some of them cops with an R.V. Just crammed full of weapons, assault rifles, grenades and even a .50 caliber machine gun. All of which I think was taken from criminals and kept. I liked to fire weapons and was always taught respect for them and others while using them and never did any harm with weapons. So over the weekend I got to shoot all kinds of cool guns and ammo, including the .50 cal. And being only 12 years old it pretty much knocked me on my ass!!! At night we set up 5 gallon gas cans and shot tracers over the top, then zeroed in and blew them apart, it was a blast (pun intended). But the one thing that happened was that at night they also set up a screen and projector to watch porno movies and my dad made us watch. Yet another great thing to teach young boys. What a fool !!! This was about 1974.

I recall my dad racing through the desert that weekend and with me and my brother in his Ford F-100 off road, hitting a bolder about 4 feet across and nearly killing us. One of many collisions, rollovers or stupid ass things he did behind the wheel with us inside.

When I was 12, I was given the keys to his Toyota Land Cruiser and told to take my brother with me and figure out how to drive it over in yonder field. Needless to say I think I ruined the clutch, but I learned how to drive real well. Hahahaha.

My whole life I remember crying out to GOD to save me from death. Can ya see why? And I did not even know HIM, it just came pouring out. I have escaped death so many times that it would bore you to tell it all.

Psalm 71: 5-6 "O Lord, you alone are my hope. I've trusted you, O LORD, from childhood. Yes, you have been with me from birth; from my mother's womb you have cared for me. No wonder I am always praising you"

I'll tell you one of them. I was on my way home after the last day of school in 1969 and a friend of mine was walking in my direction and I wanted to hide from him, so I jumped into an ivy plant and fell on an old 7-up bottle (when glass was an 1/8^th”) that was broken and left in a manner that had the bottom facing up with a triangle shaped shard sticking up from it about 2” wide. I landed on it with my right wrist, chopping my artery and nerves in half!!! When I rolled over, blood spewed about 5 feet all over my other friend who was standing in his yard where I just happened to be. He needless to say freaked out, being only 8 and all. So he ran to his front door and did not even bother to open it, he just hit it full force and bashed it open, yelling and screaming for his parents who were asleep at 3:00 in the afternoon (don't know why). So I see this and manage to get up and walk to the doorway and was met by his dad who said “hey man, your getting blood all over my carpet”....now there's a concerned parent ain't he? So I was led to the bathroom and sat on the toilet still spewing blood, by now I had lost plenty and had little time to live. Then suddenly a woman dressed in a bra and panties not only got my 8 year old attention but came to save my life, the angel disguised in the underwear grabbed my arm, put a towel around my wrist and took a belt, wrapped it around my arm to cut off the blood flow. She was a nurse who heard the screaming while she was getting dressed for work and came running across the street in said bra and panties to answer the call. (God bless that woman wherever she may be these days). The fire department came and took over. As I sat on the toilet I asked for a smoke...just kidding. So then my mom showed up from work and admitted later that she was walking up the sidewalk and saw all the pools of blood and thought I was D.O.A.....gee, do ya think? So I was loaded into her car and rushed to the hospital where they did the best they could in 1969 to put all the nerves and the artery back together again. Nothing being color coded or numbered in the wrist, it was all they could do to reconstruct the mess that was hanging out of my wrist.

I wound up spending 9 months in a cast and forever using a big thing attached to my arm with finger tips that had rubber bands attached and everyday squeezing it for physical therapy. I also had to learn how to write left handed and go to school. Wiping my butt was something I learned all over again. I lost 20% of my power in my right wrist and arm forever and have limited feeling and usage as well. I cannot make a real fist, hand is deformed, fingers do not work right and arm does not bend like it should. I have a permanent ball of nerves on my wrist that when touched or hit, is like having your funny bone hit by a hammer. The whole arm goes numb and the pain is unreal.

I went on to play baseball (all positions), football (quarter back / defensive back / kick returns / receiver / kicker), tennis, bowling and drums. Go figure!!!

I remember during one divorce my dad, in the middle of the night after getting into a heated argument with mom, taking whatever he could and packing it into that Toyota Land Cruiser and kid napping us and taking us to Louisiana to live with his brother and wife. I was 12, my brother 7. Along the way he took an offramp to fast in Arizona and ran over some signs and again almost killed us. By now I was getting use to this :-)

It took about 3 days to make the 1,800 mile trip. Arriving in Baton Rouge (Red Stick) We moved into a 2 bedroom apartment with uncle and aunt. They were both students at L.S.U. They were warm and welcoming, especially my aunt and all of her southern hospitality. We lived with them until my dad got a job in his field as a carpenter and saved enough money to get and apartment in Baton Rouge. At that time (1973) a carpenter made $6.00 an hour in the south. The apartment was very small and my dad and brother were total slobs, I however was like my mom and wanted an immaculate place. I cooked, cleaned and washed after school. I even set out everyone's clothes for the next day :-) This at 12 years old...and they say today that you do not want to give to many responsibilities to a 12 year old. When people came to visit, they would exclaim “who cleans your house”...dad would point at me and they would just drop they're jaw in astonishment!!!

Honestly though, I resented it because these slobs took no concern for the place, knowing they had a real nice “chump” to do it all for them because living in a pig pen bothered only me. I think I was trying to keep the place the way mom would have and from 1,800 miles away was still trying to keep her happy :-)

This is getting hard to write and needless to say painful. The memories are crushing. Yet I must keep going, knowing my motive for telling it the way it was.

After dad enrolled us in school my mom found out because they had to contact California for records. She then got on a plane and yanked us out of school at mid-day and flew us back to live with her. I can recall arriving at her apartment with the place smelling like crap because the dog she had gave birth and they had been alone all that time. What a welcome it was!!! Back to yet another address and another school. Mom was seeing yet another man and we were often left alone to fin for ourselves. Many a night eating those wonderful “shit pies, I mean pot pies” or “here is a dollar, now go to McDonald's and get dinner, I'll be home later and take care of your brother”

From frying pan to fire...so went our lives. And one wonders why I cried out to GOD?

This kind of back and forth seem to go on for as long as we can recall it all. We felt like we lived in a circus and the ring leaders were crazy ya know? Sometimes I lived with my aunt and uncle, or friends or grandparents, or whoever would take me in. Life for us was basically “F-u-b-a-r” and we felt tolerated instead of wanted.

I remember when the marriage was still together that my parents got an application to send me to military school, but they never followed through with it. I wish they had because I still at that point could have been molded into something useful from people who knew what structure was and how to make a man out of you.

I was always a 1 woman type of man and had maybe 3 girl friends before getting married at 19. We had 2 girls and moved all the time as I said before. In 6 years we lived in Fountain Valley, Long Beach, Lakewood, San Jose', Thousand Oaks, Louisiana (Baton Rouge, La Place and Reserve) back to Anaheim CA. To my grandparents, then on to Tustin where the marriage finally was over. I think that's 10 addresses not including motels....ho, ho, ho!!!

One time I was so broke that I had no money for gas or food for my family and while driving cried out to GOD for something. Then approaching a red light I noticed a small paper bag in the lane, kind of still as I drove by it I noticed it did not move much. So after stopping I looked in my rear view mirror and back up against traffic whilst people were honking and waving with one finger, then I stopped next to it and opened the door to snatch it up. When I opened it, to my amazement I found $50!!!...all in $1 bills, it was a known drug dealer area and I thought it was due to that. This was long before I ever heard of a televangelist saying these types of things happened. This one happened at the corner of Katella and Haster in Anaheim, down the street from Disneyland. By the way I can recall when Disneyland was free to get in and you only had to spend money if you went on a ride or bought something. Am I old?

After my divorce I lived alone, driving an Ice Cream Truck in Santa Ana for a while before I took a train to Northern Calif. And moved back in with my mom and it worked for about 8 minutes and then she bought me a truck, so I was left with nothing and found myself living in a 1963 ¾ ton pick up truck with a camper shell, no electric, heat a/c or comfort, just the shell with a bed, closet and cabinets in Chino CA. I held down an office job and everyday I washed up at the local Jack-in-the box. About 1988.

One thing I had always wanted to do was “drive a big rig” and after living in Chino for a few moths I moved to Albuquerque N.M. to see friends. While I was there I saw an ad about truck driving school and sent an application. They accepted me even though all the information was bogus below my name and address on the form, guess nobody verified it, they just wanted the student government loans. Good for me!!! So I relocated to Colorado Springs, CO. and went to the school for 8 weeks, 40 hours a week and graduated with a 97% test score average after 17 written and road tests, not bad for a dysfunctional.

I had a job before I got out and had to move to Omaha NE. (address #87 or something) so there I was waiting in a motel for 8 weeks before I was being trained on the road in the dead of winter by 2 different full blown Rednecks from Nebraska. One of them was a nice guy, calm, friendly and a great teacher. The other was the total prick, and mean, nasty, disgusting. Oh goody. Being from So. California winter was maybe 40* to 50* and now it's me in the mid west freezing my 5'10” 140# ass off!!! The wind chill one time sent the temp to -51* in Wichitaw K.S. (that was fun, almost died again, turned purple)

Glenn Campbell sung a great song about “The Wichitaw Lineman”...I have been on the road many times for weeks missing my wife and family just trying to make it home.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9x_1Ri3XxE&feature=related

REM covers it here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QutLsCCY2yw&NR=1

I went on to do this line of work for some 20 years and it made me unrelenting, yet compassionate, tenacious yet merciful, velvet over steel. Facing every single fear I could imagine, being all alone and coming to grips with how fragile my life is, staring death in the eye more times than I can recall. Nobody around to help you very often, learning how to improvise beyond what I thought possible. Broken, tired, sleepless and facing snow, sleet, winds, blinding fog, raining so hard it went sideways, in one day dealing with temperatures ranging from 130 above to 20 below. Dealing with every kind of person on earth, some acting like a jack ass and some who removed all doubt that they were. It gave me a nice case of P.T.S.D.....or at least added to it from my family history. Commercial Truck Driving is among the top 10 most deadliest jobs in the world and 8^th in the U.S, Maybe I thrived in it because of my upbringing? Eventually I was awarded numerous safety citations and became an instructor. I never had a single accident in 20 years either. Some of this is due to training, some of it is due to upbringing and some to the fact that I seem to have been born with my 5 senses being so acute that it at times drives me crazy, really it does. It is real drag being able to be aware of things long before anyone else, I just tend to see everything all at once, then trying to convince others is a nightmare.

“People who work in these “Top 10” professions have the greatest risks of loosing their lives at work. We all make mistakes at work but think of people for whom making mistakes can result in deadly consequences for them and others. We should have more respect for all those who work in these professions.” (quote from the source). I will say this too. MY BEST ADVICE FOR YOU ALL IS TO STAY AWAY FROM THE BIG RIGS, WHEN EMPTY THEY WEIGH ABOUT 34,000#'S AND WHEN LOADED CAN WEIGH OVER 200,000#'S...NO JOKE!!! NO MATTER WHO'S FAULT IT IS EITHER, IF YOU MIX IT UP WITH ONE OF THEM, YOU LOSE EVERY TIME. SO PLEASE, JUST SHOW EXTREME RESPECT FOR THEM, JUST LIKE YOU WOULD A TRAIN CAR, AIR PLANE OR TANK. THE WEIGHT CAN BE THE SAME. Remember this too. Everything you either use, ware, touch, taste, live in, drive or own...was at one time transported by a Big Rig Operator. That is what they are, OPERATORS not drivers. They are Class A :-) Living on the road away from family, friends and fun, the are some of the most dedicated people on the planet, often deprived of sleep, comfort and home. Living in a space measuring 8' x 10'.

Sometimes you sleep from 3am to 7am, or from 1pm to 8pm, or from 11pm to 4am or from who cares to who cares because you are so tired that if someone knocks on the door of your truck, they may go home in a sack...because you freak out at the tremendously overwhelming lack of sleep you have had in the last 39 days. But you can still hall a load if called upon. You may drive 700 miles a day to get to your destination only to be told that they are closed.

During my 2^nd marriage, my wife usually told me how to drive though. I constantly had to tell myself that I was happy to know that even though I could ice skate 100,000#'s of steel across Wyoming or Utah or Washington while pulling 3 trailers in a blinding blizzard, that I needed her help to get the Ford Wind Star across the City in the summer :-) Just some of the reasons why we divorced perhaps? It was like the time I heard an 86 year old mother tell her 63 year old son in a parking lot “it's cold, don't you need a jacket?” He's 63, do ya think he can figure out if he needs a jacket lady?

Again, I hope you found part of my life's story both funny and healing, real and hard to imagine, fact and fact....it's all fact as far as I can recall.

Needless to say, or is it? That I carried many of my “Family of 28” characteristics into the marriage's (2) and family of my own. Something I deeply regret and wrote a song about found here. http://hubpages.com/hub/Forgiveness-Parents

To see my original quotes and get a glimpse into this mind of mine outside of my story please go here. http://hubpages.com/hub/My-original-quotes

I am 47 and write many things, music included.

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