1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10

Someone asked me to write 10 ore things about me that nobody knows so here we go.

1# In 1996 there was a huge storm that came through the town I lived. We had something like 16 inches of rain in a 24-hour period and I scrambled to get things out of the basement as the storm water rushed into it. As it started I, figured just getting things off the floor would be fine but had to hurry to get the T.V. and stereo out before they were ruined. I ended up having almost 4 feet of water in my basement and had to throw away over 700 books that I had collected over the years. Anyway, FEMA came to the house, did some measuring, and gave me a check for $1500 to repair the damages. They didn’t give me money to fix the furnace because the water had to be at least 4 feet before it was considered no good. I contacted FEMA and asked them to re-evaluate my house after I had repaired the drywall and when they asked how high the water was I said just over 4 feet. I got another check to cover the furnace. I only fudged by a couple of inches.

2# I once got in trouble for take a bottle of vodka on a band trip. We stayed over night in a hotel some place and I thought it would be cool to have a few drinks. I was a sophomore and didn’t really have any clue how to drink. Anyway, one of the people I roomed with told someone that I had a bottle and they told the band director. He came in and asked about it and we/I eventually gave in and gave the booze to him. He promised to keep it between us and that would be that. The next week I am called into the principles office and he asks about the incident. I explain what happened and why and his next statement was the key. He asks, “Was the bottle opened?” I answered honestly that the bottle was not open when I gave it to the band director. That was the end of the incident. He didn’t ask if we drank any of it…just if the bottle was open…and it was closed when I turned it in.

3# When I was in junior high, my neighbor and I would climb onto the roof of his barn and watch the girl next door and her friends swim in their swimming pool. She was 3 years older then I and always wore a bikini…and so did her friends.

4# The summer before my junior year I took my moms car for a ride because I wanted a frozen pizza. I didn’t have my license at the time and drove 5 miles out of my way just because I could. I almost put the car in the ditch when I was driving 70 mph down a gravel road but avoided danger with my great driving skills. I’ve never told her that story.

5# When I was in college my mom found a storage container full of seeds in my room. Most of the time the container was used for storing my D&D dice but after cleaning a bag full of weed, I had to put the seeds somewhere. I came home one day and my mom asks me what was in the container and I told her pot seeds. She asked me where I got them and I said they were for a couple of my friends and I and that we didn’t know what to do with them. She asked that I never bring that stuff back into the house and I never did. Later on she asked me about my marijuana use and I told her the truth. I have done it a few times but it is no big deal. I think it floored her put I also think my honesty somehow made it better. Since that day I’ve probably smoked pot no more than 10 times and it had been 15 years since my last toke.

#6 I’m becoming a surly jerk as I get older. I find that I am less tolerant of many things that really don’t matter. I fight with this every day and maybe I will come to the realization that I am to uptight.

#7 I looked into finding out who my biological parents are a few year back. A layer friend of mine said it wouldn’t be that hard and told me all the step I needed to follow in order to release their information. I have done nothing more on that because I’m not really concerned about someone who gave up on me because I have a family that won’t.

8# I drove a car through the front yard of someone I didn’t know. Back in 1990 there was a tornado in Plainfield, Illinois and I went there shortly after the twister hit. A friend lives there and he asked me to run down and check out his house and make sure his wife was ok because he couldn’t get through on the phone. The 20 minute drive took almost 2 hours and I had to go through the front yard in order to get to where I was heading. As I came around the corner I saw what was left of a grove of trees and the remnants of a subdivision that no longer was there. In all, 29 people died from the storm but luckily my friends house was spared. But the photographs from strangers scrapbooks covered the ground and the incident shook me up. A tornado is nothing I ever want to witness in person again.

#9 and #10 In high school I went out with this one girl. We got along great and we were about as serious as juniors in high school can be. Then one day she breaks it off and never gave me any indication of why we could date no longer. Later that year she moved to another town about 15 miles away and I figured that was the end. During the summer that followed she came back in town on many occasions and her and one of my classmates, we’ll call her TC, would stop by and say hi. After a while she started to stop by on her own and we started seeing each other again in some sense. Then she dropped a bomb. The reason she had broken up is because TC had tried to commit suicide because she liked me but I was going out with someone else. This floored me and we talked about how we could continue to see each other if it was going to cause potential harm to one of our friends. This is when I did the most logical thing and asked the school councilor how we should proceed. The councilor knew the situation and said that it was important not to hide it and let her know how we felt about each other. Obvious good advise and we did just that. TC was glad that we told her and everything ended up just fine. I still can’t believe I talked to a school councilor about a problem. The second part of this story only has one thing. TC is now a lesbian and thus I have turned a woman away from men.