Phase Two - Jump off the Roof

Early 2000's to Late 2000's

During this period, I'd start to dabble with computers. Previously we just never had them, only consoles. Which wasn't an issue to me, when my father got his house he let me have his Playstation 1 and some games he had. I Remember playing the beginning level of 'Tomb Raider' over and over again on different occasions. We had some Demo Disc that had a bunch of games on it. One of which being 'Silent Hill'. I Never got far in it at all, i'm pretty sure I tried playing for a minute or two before switching games. I wasn't ready for it at all. I Remember liking 'Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage' , 'Crash Team Racing' , 'MediEvil'. I never got far in it but remember trying to play 'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' a couple of times.

Back to Computers though. When my Mother re-married and moved us up to a different town with my then stepfather, he had some and one was allowed for us kids. I Remember downloading limewire and infecting the computer in order to get and find music. I enjoyed going on the website 'Newgrounds'. My Stepfather got 'Medal of Honor: Allied Assault' and I'd play that on his computer sometimes. I Remember my Oldest Sister getting yelled at by my father for having a Myspace. She soon showed me how to set one up. Randomly found a band that would have a huge impact on my young self. When I discovered the finnish band 'HIM' , it was like a mini explosion for me. I hadn't really seen or heard anything like them. These Romantic songs filled with the air of death and tragedy. I was hooked, it felt natural for some reason. I fell in love with the 'Razorblade Romance' album, I thought every song on it was perfect. The Heartagram then became a normal everyday shape for me, I was soon drawing it everywhere.

Sometimes my sisters and I would go up to my Mothers Parents house. They lived like an hour or so away. They had this secluded house that was down a long gravel driveway off of the highway. I Really like that house, very private. Various random animals at different times. Raccoons, foxes, cats, skunks, random stuff would show up. Those grandparents were great, they'd let us ride four wheelers and dirt bikes around their property. We'd watch Attitude Era WWF tapes my grandmother had, and she'd give me some of her Stone Cold Steven Austin merch. Like a Zippo! which was eventually taken away from me by my then stepfather. I'd get a little bummed out that the internet up there sucked, dialup. So we wouldn't bother trying to connect online there, but it was still always a blast hanging out there and getting away from everything. I really enjoyed it there. I Remember one time my Mother had just gotten me new shoes, and we went up to her parents house. She got upset with me because my Oldest sister and I were riding around on a four wheeler, and we get stuck in mud. we can't get it out, so I hop off and run down the gravel driveway to inform them. Mother sees my shoes when i get there and is just like "why? why would you do this??" I Remember one time I was riding a four wheeler by myself, and I was driving it around this abandoned house near the start of the gravel driveway. I'm riding around and I see this Raccoon, and i just started watching it but I didn't stop the four wheeler. I end up driving it into this like giant mound of sticks and trees and one of the sticks pushes right into my stomach, not piercing but it knocked the wind out of me. I get off the four wheeler and walk down the gravel driveway, I remember not being able to breathe and gasping for air, being scared but i wasn't seriously hurt or anything. I get to my grandparents and get some water and it's all okay. the four wheeler was fine too so everything was okay.

My Sisters and I Also ended up with a Stepmother and two stepsisters when my father re-married. On his weekends, sometimes we'd drive to the state above us to visit her parents. They had a Big piece of land with a lake and horses. very country. My stepmothers father was a hunter and a pastor of some sort. He once dyed his goatee like a rainbow, in reference to that one bible story and Josephs Coat of many Colors, he called it a beard of many colors. I Remember seeing a gutted deer hanging upside down in his barn, he'd make jerky a lot. We'd often ride four wheelers up there too, feed horses, and go fishing. Then we'd clean and cook the catfish we caught. I was shown the whole process, gutting it, peeling the skin off all that stuff. I remember feeling uneasy about it. I remember this like white ball on their inside that'd inflate when the fish would breathe, and i remember them puncturing one of those. After they got the meat that they'd cook off of it, they'd throw the carcasses in the backyard ditch for Coyotes and whatever else. I did enjoy the nights when we'd have bonfires, or go on hayrides though. I loved hayrides. The Silver lining to the weekends when we'd do this, is i'd usually get dropped off at my grandmothers instead of my fathers to spend the night there since he picks her up for church anyway. We went to church every sunday we were with him, as well as every wednesday is school. I remember getting bummed out one day when we were fishing up at my stepmothers parents house. My father caught this big snapping turtle out of the lake, brought it in to land, and then shot it in the head with a shotgun. I think my father was worried i was being a 'sissy' about it all or something, because not long after at my grandmothers he had bought and made us eat cow tongue for lunch. yes you could see the taste buds. That wasn't a weird thing to my father or mother at the time, when they were younger they liked brain sandwiches.

The Catholic School we went to had a Church down the sidewalk, we'd all walk over there every wednesday for mass. Sometimes on other ocassions too, but i forget all the days. Sometimes we'd walk and pray the rosary along the way, slowly saying a prayer on each bead, before ending up in this little garden at the church looking up at a statue of the Virgin Mary. One time there was a small fire and we had to walk to the church in the rain, and pray that it wasn't serious. i remember thinking i'd "pray to not go back to school". I wasn't really into it all. I remember always zoning out and staring at this big stained glass window in the church, the altars background, anytime i'd be in there, analyzing random details on it. The school had this big statue of Jesus Crucified, all bloody with the Crown of Thorns and gash in his side and what not in the lobby. It looked wild. I remember them smearing a cross on all of our foreheads with ashes for ash wednesday. I Remember when Pope John Paul II died, I had a little scrapbook i'd put random newspaper clippings I found interesting in, and I remember cutting stories about him out and putting them in there.

My Sisters and I had different ways of bonding. Often we'd all just be outside with a couple of other similar age kids. similar-ish. My oldest sister was born, two years later my younger older sister was born, and then two years later i emerge, so there was some merging of age groups for friends and acquaintances early on. It was always a lot of fun running around outside with everyone though. from jumping on a trampoline, to playing hide and seek, it was great. Soon it was no Content, we loved being at our Mothers. We didn't really hangout with kids at my fathers house, besides our step sisters. we weren't in town nearly as much as we were up with our mother so it just didn't really happen. But when we weren't outside and it was just my sisters and I inside, we'd kill time by watching movies or playing playstation 2. We played stuff like 'Jak and Daxter' , 'Grand Theft Auto 3' and 'Vice City' , 'Ratchet and Clank' and 'The Urbz: Sims in the City' and other random stuff. I liked playing 'Tony Hawks Underground 2' and 'Tony Hawks American Wasteland', 'Dark Cloud' and 'Final Fantasy X' and 'Final Fantasy X2'. My younger older sister and I would often bond with TV shows and Music. We enjoyed watching 'That 70's Show' , 'Jackass' , 'Viva la Bam' was a big one for us. I became a really big fan of Bam and all the 'CKY' stuff. They were hilarious to a young me, and bam was amazing at skateboarding which was cool to me. On top of it all, he was also obsessed with the band 'HIM' ! now i'm wanting to skateboard and jump off roofs too. We watched 'Viva la Bam' from Season 1 up until it ended, i think 2003 to 05/06? But then we'd watched the spin-offs when they'd happen later on. It sort of had a bad influence on us, I remember one night my oldest sister and I setting off a firecracker inside the house.

One of the Dudes in the Neighborhood we'd hang out with had us over at his house and was showing us this computer game called 'Runescape'. It was insane. you could make your own character and walk around this giant fantasy world filled with other people, and you could interact with them and talk to them because they were being controlled by other people! it was amazing to us. we all started playing around late 2005, though my oldest sister wouldn't stick with it long. my younger older sister and I thought it was fantastic and it hooked us. The dude was also into skateboarding and all that stuff, he knew i was into 'Viva la Bam' , so he gave me this rad Bam Element shirt he had. With a heartagram on the back of course. I still have the Shirt luckily, for the memories.

My younger older sister got really into 'My Chemical Romance' , and by extension got me into them. we'd listen to stuff like 'Panic! at the Disco' , 'The Used' , 'AFI' , 'Paramore' , all that stuff. My oldest sister was always largely into rap, I heard a lot of random cool stuff because of her. I Remember one time my older younger sister got in trouble at the catholic school we went to because her band pins were 'scaring' other students apparently.

One interesting day at my mothers house, a kid I was friends with that lived on the same street as me had their window open. My mother and I are looking over at their house, and there's this big giant snake on the outside wall right under the window. It freaked us out, we never saw a snake that big just out and about. Little garden snakes sure, but this thing was big. She quickly runs into the house to call over to their house to tell them to close the fucking window, which they do and eventually animal control shows up and takes it. I've never seen a snake that big just out in the wild since.

One time my neighbor and I got really sad that we couldn't stay the night with each other, neither at eithers house for some reason. We got really bummed out and decided we'd run away to show my then stepfather and his mother. We packed a backpack with a couple of knives, bottles of water and a couple of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. We headed out as the adults were drinking and we went down the road, one street over, got bored and decided to walk back home and play pokemon on our gameboys.

There isn't much to talk about it feels like, it's just largely kid stuff. My neighbor and I would often pretend to play 'Real Life Runescape' in the woods behind our houses, we were nerds. Finding glorious sticks to claim as our own Godswords. We'd get bark and pretend to make shields and armor, try to make bows, wear towel capes and run around pretending to kill different monsters, dueling each other, and pretending to train various skills. On two separate occcasions while playing I lost my thumb nail. The first time being when a stick bashed my thumb really really hard after my neighbor hit too low on accident, it immediately started bleeding and swelling up. a few days later, pop it fell off. The second time being, and it still confuses me to this day, is we were playing around, and he kicks my hand very very lightly, no pain at all, it connects with my finger and the nail pops off. We'd often pretend to fish in this nasty mosquito water, which was just reaching in and pulling leaves out. either with your hand or a stick. Cooking was laying the leaves out and pretending to prepare them.

I don't have many moments like that at my fathers, purely because we mainly lived with my mother. we only stayed the nights at my fathers house every other weekend. down there, I had friends when I still went to that catholic school, everyone kind of knew each other and there really wasn't any bullying that was apparent. kids were chill there. but we never really hung out or talked outside of school. I had my first "girlfriend" in 5th grade. we "dated" for a whopping couple of days before breaking up. There really wasn't much talk like that in my grade at the time I don't remember how it came about. I Remember staying at one kids house for their birthday. their house was so cool to me. they had this kickass basement where all of us would gather and play playstation 2. I remember we played 'Simpsons Hit and Run'. I remember being jealous of the birthday boys badass boba fett action figure he had. I don't remember much of that night, I guess we all just ran around and played until we fell asleep. I remember having donuts in the morning and being sad it was over.

My Mother and then Stepfather would sometimes take us kids on little vacations. A couple of times we went to this mall in Tennessee and we got to feed and pet stingrays. You'd put this shrimp between your fingers, and dangle it in the water for them. they'd swim up and suck it out of your hand, it kind of freaked me out. I loved going to the mall though. we'd all be given a $20 dollar bill to buy something. One time my sisters and I pulled our money together to get a painting for our mother.

I got into skateboarding, my cousin was also into it so when we were down at my fathers, we could hang out at grandmothers house and skate on the sidewalk. He stayed the night there with me a couple of times and we'd usually spend the day skating and drawing, and then end the day by still drawing and watching movies. We watched 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' , we liked that. We watched 'Friday the 13th' , we liked that too. We watched this really dumb movie we liked called 'Grind' . It was a bad skateboarding movie. Bam was in it and he did this obnoxious hand gesture thing in someone's face before walking off, and i thought it was ridiculous and hilarious. I started doing that and my oldest sister would get annoyed at me. My Cousin made my Grandmother really mad one day. He climbed up in the tree they had in the front yard, and she started to yell at him to get down out of the tree. He kept saying he couldn't and that he was stuck. She got even more mad but was determined to help him get down safely. She stomped into the backyard and grabbed a ladder, marched back into the front yard and started to lean it against the tree. He jumped down and ran off. She yelled in his direction in anger and disbelief and I covered my face to hide my laugh.

My Grandmother put up with a lot. I don't remember it, but I was told that one time she was washing my clothes and found a bunch of soil and earthworms in my shorts pocket?? no idea why I had them in my pocket, I think it might've been the day my cousin and my oldest sister rolled in boxes down a little slope in the backyard filled with worms, pretending to play 'Fear Factor' and those were left overs? One of my uncles would start staying over there after my grandfather passed away. He showed me a lot of cool stuff. We watched stuff like 'Clerks' , 'Mallrats' , 'Dogma' , 'Cannibal! The Musical' , 'Spaceballs' , early 'Robot Chicken' , random stuff. We'd also play 'Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance'. I remember I'd follow him outside when he'd go to smoke a cigarette, and he'd blow smoke rings. One time he showed me how to make a corn cob pipe. I Remember asking my Grandmother about her family one night, and she told me she actually had 3 brothers, but that they were all killed during World War 2.

We would soon transition into Phase 3, Loser.