Adventures in Childhood

In life there are certain things that teachers give us that doesen't really click until about ten years after you graduate from high school. This is one of those things. My high school government/economics teacher, Mr. Doty would always give us this piece of advise, "This is your childhood I I. Soon you'll be eighteen, and this is now your childhood I I". Out of all my years of growing up, that is just something that would always stick. Even now, ten years later.

I have come to realize that I never had much of a childhood growing up. My dad always barked out orders at me. My mom was always there for me, no matter what the circumstances were, but I don't think I have ever connected with them.

I never had a lot of real friendships growing up. My parents thought it would be cool to put me in D.J.A.A. (Downey Junior Athletics Association), and I had a few friends on my team, but nobody I really hung out with. Scratch that. There was Daniel Duke. He always looked out for me. I don't know why, he always seemed to be there for me. Some time in middle school our friendship kind of drifted away. There was also Nick Allen. He wasn't on my team but he was my friend, but in middle school our friendship driffted away.

I wonder why that is. You become best friends with somebody and then the friendship just fades away. I think there's a point in the friendship where either you or the friend becomes cool or something and it just kind of fizzles out. There was only one point in my life where I was the "cool" friend.

There was this group I hung out with in high school for about two and a half years (most of my high school life). The group consisted of a bunch of "A+" students who were really into science and math (you would think some of that rubbed off on me, well it didn't). We got along pretty well, but I never hung out with them outside of school and all we ever did was talk about The Simpsons, Top Gun, Star Wars, The X-Files, and Married with Children. Those conversations just got repetative. Sometimes I wouldn't hang out with them at all and I ended up wandering around campus trying to find some new "friends".

So one day I wandered where all of the cool people were. Then, I had an insane crazy thought in my head. What if I just came by and hung out. Sorry girls, This is where it gets a little graphic. I felt my balls growing and I did something a nobody like me would never do, I kind of just started hanging out with the cool kids. The jocks. A while back this guy, Jeremy Sclitinhart told me jokingly that I should hang out with him and his friends. I don't think either one of us took him seriously. I ended up hanging out over there. Nobody seemed upset. I feel that they were just suprised that I would have the balls to go and hang out with them. They were actually really cool to me and for the first time in a long time I felt accepted.

I got to even hang out a few times with these guys. I went to a few parties with them. We hung out after school. Out of all of this madness, I became really good friends with the infamoous Jeff Barrick. Then, he asked me one day if I wanted to go to church with him and I ended up making more friends. Some of those friends I still have today.

Sorry for the Jason Parks sized blog. I am actually thinking about writting a book. It will be called, "Manchild- The Story of the World's Oldest Child".