My Past.

This may be a long read... This is my life, semi-summed up. I left a lot out, but if you read this, you know me better than most.



I was born into what I suppose could be termed a "middle-class family". I had a dad, I had a mom. My dad worked, my mom was always around. And I was always trying to learn.

4
I don't remember much before I was four... When I was four, I was the kid who was always going around and trying for the girls - somehow I found something attractive about them. I remember one girl in particular - Kaitlyn, I think her name was - she really didn't like me because I kept trying to sit next to her. But chasing after girls wasn't all I did - I learned to read before anyone else my age knew how.

5
Five years old, kindergarten. I was bored - all the other kids were learning their letters, and I could read the teacher's personal instructions on the papers she handed us to trace "A" onto fifteen times. As a result of being bored, I got into trouble, and lots of it. I think I averaged a few trips to the principal's office a week. I don't remember there being a week where I didn't go there.

6
First grade. I still didn't have any friends, and what happened that year didn't help any: my mom had the teacher give me special spelling words, since they didn't have an Apex (advanced) class for kids my age yet. I was spelling "hippopotamus" and "astronaut" while the other kids struggled with "time" and "there". I was also chasing around a particular girl called Ashley and trying to tell her I loved her... When I started, it was in earnest - but after a while I kept doing it just because I liked her reaction to it. I wasn't that good of a kid.

8
Next couple years - few friends. I was widely recognized as the smartest kid around - people came to me when they wanted help, and I tutored them. I became very full of myself rapidly... But then I got thrown into an Apex class a couple grades above mine for one reason or another, and suddenly I wasn't the smartest kid around. I learned a lesson of humility - I never bragged about my intelligence again. I did, however, write a short story called "Super Fork", which got first place in my grade level for the entire school (about 120 kids or so). I think through the entire third grade, I only had two real friends... and one of them died a couple years later... hit by a drunk driver.

9
When I was nine, my mother took me out of school to home school me. She was convinced that I wasn't getting a good enough education. By her definition: if I was getting straight A's, then the work I was doing wasn't challenging enough for me. If we hadn't started going to church right afterwards, I would've never seen another kid my age for a long, long time...

I started feeling like I was getting behind, schoolwise, before long... My mom was a nice mom, but she wasn't a good teacher - and with three kids to teach, she started having problems quickly - and so did I. She bought books - hundreds of books - for us to read as part of our "curriculum". I didn't care a whit for curriculums - in my walk-in closet, I would stay up late, late at night and read for hours and hours, consuming anything and everything I could get my hands on. I wanted to be the best of the best - I wanted to do something special with my life, something that would get me remembered. I had high hopes and big dreams.

As I mentioned before, we started going to church, around when I was 9. I understood the gist of what they were saying - especially about manners. It made sense to me. I didn't really care about the religion they taught, that much, though. Like everything else, I ate it up, learned everything I could. I earned the nickname "The human bible" - I could quote at people which book of the Bible just about every story was in. But I never really got it - I never really let it sink in. Instead, I fell in love.

Her name was Emily - a really sweet girl. I won't post her picture here, no reason to. She was a brunette, with dark eyebrows, a beautiful smile, eyes that could melt you to your soul... the cutest freckles on her cheeks, and a nose that didn't so much "protrude" from her face than make it more beautiful. As if that wasn't enough, her personality was like that of an angel's. At least, that's how I saw her then... I kept my feelings as hidden as I could, but I did nurture a friendship between us - the first friendship I'd ever really done that with. I'd learned my lesson with Ashley and Kaitlyn - I wasn't going to be ridiculous or do something to scare her away. But she liked me - she said so - and that was enough for me. She and I grew closer, sharing long heart-to-heart talks. I loved it - as far as I was concerned, I was already in heaven, and I looked forward to Sundays and Wednesdays - those two days I could see her.

One year, she suddenly moved with little warning. She left to go to Florida - I gave her my address (on a little piece of paper I tore out of my Bible - it was the only paper I had at the time), and she promised she'd write, but I never heard from her. It was a whole year before she showed back up - and in the meantime, I never really got over her. I made friends with a guy named C.J., a guy named A.J., and a number of other people. But only guys - I couldn't really bring myself to look at other girls. Everyone reminded me of her. I fell in with the wrong crowd, and my personality began to change - I became immature and, basically, a jerk.

Meanwhile, at home, my parent's marriage was on the rocks, and my schooling was down the drain. I'd read every book we had - over six five-foot-wide shelves of books - and I had nothing else to learn. I wanted more, but it wasn't available... nor was my mom around to help. My dad was having troubles with his job, and my mom slowly stopped going to church.

This was about when my dad got me interested in programming - he gave me a copy of Visual Basic 3.0 - without any instructions. He told me a few basic things and let me figure out the rest. It was a puzzle - I liked it. But I was only allowed on the computer during the weekends. For the rest of the time, I came up with games (first with legos, then on paper) to play with my brothers. I never stopped making games.

11
When I was 11, and Emily showed back up, I was overjoyed. Her father had gotten relocated again - back to Memphis. But she seemed more distant than before - I slowly realized that she'd changed. She wasn't the same person I'd known before. She didn't care to talk to me - she'd rather hang out with other girls. But I still made the effort, and slowly she became more comfortable with my being around. We'd always gotten teased about liking each other before, by the other kids - I couldn't see why it would matter to her now that she was back. But she didn't hate me - one time I punched a guy (twice my size) who was making fun of her. "Run, Talvieno, Run!" she yelled, and I took off down the hallway, ducking past the teachers - they tried to stop me but couldn't. Nor could the guy I had punched. That cry of hers fueled me, and I got away clean - til I had to come back to the room.

But I wasn't the best guy, either. I laughed on occasion if she (or anyone else) got hurt, only asking a couple minutes later if she was okay. If she looked upset, I might or might not ask what was wrong. I figured she would want space, not somebody to be there for her. I was more of a fair-weather friend. I was a jerk, sometimes, too. Not to mention immature - she hated those jokes.

12-13
As time went on, she grew more distant. The years passed - 12, 13 - and finally she said it was too awkward and she didn't want me to sit next to her anymore. That was a death blow to me, but I kept my hopes up. I was head over heels for her, though I tried not to show it. Every time she walked into the room, it was as if my soul itself shouted out in jubilation as my heart leapt for joy. I wanted to be with her - but she said she was waiting until she was 16. I could respect that - and I waited. Starting around when I was 12 was the last time I really ever saw people my age on a weekly basis.

Back at home, my parents' marriage was worse and worse - they fought constantly. I had barely any time to read - they had adopted two children from Bulgaria for one reason or another - Kimberly and Maria. They were sweet (well, Kimmy was), but they had a tendency to purposefully pee on the carpeted floor in their room instead of the toilet - that was to become my problem to deal with later on, though I didn't know it.

In the meantime, my sisters stopped going to church, then my dad. I wasn't allowed to go to Sunday school anymore. My mom didn't want me hearing about marijuana and crack - they were discussing the evils of them there, and I'd never been exposed to it. I didn't know what it was. I embarrassed myself pretty badly at one point by not knowing what pornography was. Instead of Sunday school, I volunteered with the three and four year olds - I helped watch them and teach them. It slowly instilled into me a desire to have a daughter of my own. But I still wanted Emily. I also started singing in the choir - it had turned out that I had a really, really good voice (according to people there), and I was a bit proud of it. I sat first with the tenors - and then later with the basses.

14
Fourteen years old. My brothers had dropped out of church - I was the only one still going, and though I wouldn't admit it, it was mainly because of her. I didn't "get" church - like I said, the message they taught never quite sank in. I'd been "born again", I was a Christian. But I didn't "get it".

It was one day at "Music Camp" - a week-long thing that the church had thrown together for the youth - that I finally got the courage to go up to her and tell her I liked her. She and I were both volunteering - we were too old to be in music camp, but we could help. A lot of my other friends were helping out, too.

As I was readying myself to tell her, I heard people talking about her and A.J. - hinting. "Why don't you just kiss her and make up?" one person joked. Those words, though not meant for me, pierced like arrows. I figured they couldn't possibly be serious. But things like that kept coming, and I finally got up the courage not to tell her that I liked her, but to ask her if she liked A.J.. I doubt I'll ever forget her reply:

"Yes... we like each other... I thought the whole church knew that by now."

She might as well have rammed a sword through my heart. "I guess I'm not part of the church, then," I mumbled, and left. It was the last time I ever really talked to her - not that she minded. I wasn't anything to her anymore, and I finally saw it.

I went home and cried. I've only cried like that once since. It finally hit me that I'd lost her - I hated AJ for it. I thought it was his fault, not mine. As I saw it, he stole her from me. She could've been mine. My perspective was a bit skewed, I'll admit, but that's how I saw it then. It was only a few weeks later I stopped going to church altogether.

Things at home weren't much better. I was locked up in the nursery with my adopted sisters, day after day - watching them to make sure they didn't pee on the floor. I invented a great deal of games then, wrote most of a book (it was bad), came up with ideas... I didn't have a bed, so I slept on the floor on an outstretched sleeping bag. I almost never left the nursery for six months. It stank in there, too...

Then, finally, my mom exploded on my dad - he left the house. I won't talk about the circumstances, but they weren't good... They were getting a divorce, the next thing I knew. I was numb - I couldn't think - couldn't feel a thing. My life was falling to pieces... and suddenly I had to watch my brothers as well as my sisters. My mom wouldn't watch them. I was more or less thrust into adulthood at the age of 14.

15 - 16
My dad was gone - living up north somewhere, though he came back a couple times a month to visit. My mom was trying to help a friend start a business - she was away all day, every day. I had to get up early to get my sister Kimberly on the bus. She has an IQ of about 40 - she had to ride the "short bus". But she loved school - she adored everything about it. Everything was magical to her. As for Maria, she was only home on the weekends - my mom started her going to a state school for the blind (Maria is blind). I couldn't drive, and so my mom took her to and from the bus stop. But on the weekdays... My brothers had the house to ourselves.

What did we do with our new-found freedom? We ate pizza on the sofa while watching movies, tore the house up, and guzzled sodas like there was no tomorrow. We set things on fire - we pretty much became pyromaniacs. I'm pretty sure we wasted at least two gallons of gasoline blowing things up in our backyard. We dug little "rivers" in our backyard and filled them with water from the hose, and dug out a bathtub-sized pit for no real reason at all. We cut the fingers off latex gloves, filled them with water, took them outside, and watched them squid around. We poked holes in the hose (at first on accident) until it ceased to function. We got our bikes and we rode up and down the hills in our neighborhood - riding until there were blisters on our hands and we could hardly move from being sore. After hills in the neighborhood started to seem too tame, we took our bikes and rode in the backyard, making a rough dirt-bike track (with ramps) out of landscaping timbers. After it rained, it became a mud-bike track, and we continued our daredevilish leaps and turns until our bikes gave out and fell apart. Then we had dirt clod wars after everything dried.

My brothers thought it was fun. I just wanted to forget.

One unfortunate night, my mom broke her ankle, while over at her friend's house. She wouldn't let my dad come take care of it - and I became doctor/nurse. My granddad came - my mom's father - and tried to help. Unfortunately, he got very, very sick while he was here... and then he misplaced his insulin. I searched hours on end to find it - and I finally did. He never forgot it - after that (up until December of last year), his new wife (my stepgrandmother) always sent me $20, once every month, for how I'd taken care of both him and my mom. After he left, I met the man who was to become my stepdad - and I thought he was a really, really good guy. I liked him from the start.

17
My brushing habits finally had the logical effect of giving me cavities - a huge one over my front teeth, from where my braces had been. I looked at it in the mirror, shocked by how it looked. I felt sure that any chance I'd ever had at getting a job was gone - who would want someone with a hole in their teeth? I became terribly depressed - I spent hours doing nothing but sleeping. I think I wasted several months that way. Depression really hurts when it gets to you. But finally I decided that while my life might be ruined, was wasting time. So, I got up, went to the living room, and set up our computer. Before then, my mom always got mad when she saw us on it (a couple years before), but now, I didn't care. Emboldened by my depressed feel that things couldn't get any worse, I didn't care what she said. Interestingly, she didn't care. It was for the best, I figured - plus, I didn't want to be seen outside the house anymore, with the cavities in my teeth. Later on they got fixed - but then, they were always on my mind. For half my 17th year, we raised the same hell we had before - but inside. The house was a wreck. I still didn't have a bed - I was sleeping on the sofa in the livingroom.

September of 2007. Late one night (around 4 in the morning - I couldn't sleep - insomnia and such), I was watching a movie (I never learned the name), and what was happening to the guy so closely matched what had happened between myself and Emily that the dam finally broke, and I cried. I haven't cried so hard since. As I cried, I wrote down in notepad what I was feeling, in strangled verses of poetry, trying to capture those emotions forever, though through the blurring of my tears I could hardly see the screen.

It was then that I realized that it was my fault I had lost Emily - not AJ's at all. I fully forgave him, in my mind - it was my own fault. I had been a jerk to her. I'd been acting like a moron the past few years, too, I saw - I swore I'd change. I swore I'd make myself into the kind of man a woman would want to be with - someone who would love and protect, listen and understand. I wanted to learn to play the guitar - somehow I thought that would help (I was new to it all). I went and I read my mom's books on love - books I'd never read because I deemed them "girly" - and finally began to understand the opposite sex. They don't want help - they want someone to listen. to understand. I'd never realized it before. I began to model myself after what, in my mind, I termed "an English gentleman". I wanted to be the best I could be for whoever I ended up with.

And there was still almost no adult supervision. But I was trying to help reform my brothers as I reformed myself.



The next years are more recent...

18/19 - We moved from our old house. Our movers were horrible - though they praised me often for outdoing them - especially the football player they brought onto the team to help the job go faster. They also stole $400 from me (which I later got back). I didn't care so much about outdoing them - I just wanted to be the best I could be. Plus, I figured that if I nearly killed myself with heavy lifting, it would do something good for the size of the muscles in my arms and legs.

We lived in our next house for almost a year, while my mom and stepdad-to-be worked out plans for expanding my stepdad's house, so we could live there. My brothers and I were still alone most of the time - but we had a new computer. We didn't have internet access, but we were happy. Our house was huge, and had the ultimate view - it sat halfway up a mountain, and we could see everything below and all around for miles. I didn't think it could get any better than it was.

Late, late in my 19th year, around November, I finally got my laptop. I immediately uploaded some of my programs, and started working around on the Internet. This is all a bit too recent to discuss much farther...



I still hadn't seen anyone my age since I was 14, and I still haven't gotten to hold a serious conversation face to face with someone outside my family since I was 12. I don't know how to drive, I never officially finished high school, I've never gotten a job. I don't have a driver's license or any form of ID. I've never held a woman's hand in mine, I've never looked into her eyes as she looked into mine.




Well... Perhaps now you understand me a bit better... Or at least, you think you do. You can never actually "know" someone. That's only an illusion you give to yourself.
Either way... I feel a little better from talking. odd how that works - especially when you're not actually talking to anyone in particular.