Sure, why not. Also, I am apparently an old man, so this is going to be in larger blocks than you fools. 0 – 6: Lived with mom and dad. Moved around a lot (Florida, New Orleans, Costa Rica, Hawaii, Florida) because they were young, hippies, and that is what they wanted to do. Lived through a hurricane in Hawaii, losing my cat Friday who decided to run after it. I still remember calling for him to come back after the storm and looking for him. 7-12: Mom and dad divorced, in part because he is crazy. Moved to live with my grandmother in South Florida while my mom got back on her feet. Eventually got a house near where I was going to school with my cousin. I was not one of the popular kids. Got into fantasy novels through my uncle. 13-18: My mom got involved in a long-term relationship with a dude and he ended up moving in. There was a lot of conflict between him and her and my brother and me. I ran away once. I was almost always grounded but mostly ignored it when I thought I could get away with it, which mostly defined how I got along with authority figures. I did well in school, but did not develop much socially because I was mostly focused on my power struggle with the parental figures. At various points got into CCGs and RPGs Eventually my brother ended up moving to Georgia to live with my aunt and uncle (dad’s side.) 19 – 21: Went to community college while off-and-on living at home. Made new post-high school friends and decided I would want to make a new start once I went to university. Still had never dated or been romantically involved with anyone, but still made short, stuttering progress in that direction. Father went to prison for killing someone. 22-25: Moved to Orlando to attend University. Got into romantic relationships and such and slowly became less awkward. Made good friends some of which I am still friends with to this day. Started getting to know Orlando and deepen my interest in music, film, and the sort of local establishments that define the character of a city. Got into Collectible Miniatures Games, specifically Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures. Was a big fish in a small pond and made it to the Championship every year. Got Top 8 the first year, which was nice. 25- 28: Got a job working for a defense contractor through my aunt (yay connections!). Commuting was hell, but I stayed in Orlando. More dating, but I did not really meet anyone who it quite worked with. Made more long-term friends. Got into Dreamblade and spent a year flying around the country on vacation time winning money. Used the money to take a vacation to London for the first time. It was pretty awesome. 29 – 33 (August 2012): Met Minerva on a dating site and ended up falling in love and shacking up with her. She got a job at the same place I worked (yay connections!) and we ended up working down the hall from each other. Adopted a stray cat in our apartment complex. Got a domestic partnership. Eventually certain incompatibilities between the two of us became too much and we broke up. She moves to New York but I keep the cat because he likes me better even though she feeds him. Also get into board games. Start going to board game conventions and eventually write reviews on board game web sites. Become popular enough that publishers send me product. Complain about how cozy “board game journalists” are with the companies producing product. Cause lots of angst for a year. After break up decide my heart really isn’t in it anymore (also because I got tired of being big fish in small pond and the lower number of people who like the more complicated games I am into) so I stop playing. Still have some board games but mostly play them casually at movie nights and such. August 2012 – December 2013 (33 into 34): Decided I need to turn my life around. Start cycling regularly and eating better. Lost 35 pounds. Realize I hate my job and should go back to graduate school. Get laid off, but decide it is for the best and dedicated myself to going to graduate full time. Make friends. Get back into dating and find myself way, way more successful than I was previously for reasons that are unknown to me but are probably directly related to being more experienced and actually learning how to build an effective on-line dating profile. Meet some interesting ladies, but nobody who is quite right. 2014 (mostly 35): Continue with graduate school, cycling, and dating, though dating is a little bit more difficult now that I am unemployed. Internships! Go to tons of art shows because they are fun times. Decide I need to finally get the hell out of Florida. Near the end of the year decide that dating is mostly pointless now because I want to get the hell out of Florida and the last two women I dated eventually reached the “What are we going to do about you wanting to leave?” conversation and I would rather not have that hanging over things. Started playing Pox Nora. 2015 (mostly 36): Got a well-paying job offer from a friend in one of the cities I wanted to move to, which took off a huge amounts of stress (yay connections!) Continued to play Pox Nora. Will hopefully be Limited League soon on one of my alts! Got in contact with some half-siblings I had never spoken to before and are much, much younger than me. Will probably meet them in the next year or so. Generally looking forward to starting the next stage of my life.
I'd tell people my life story but after the ones that have been shared thus far I think people would be depressed. I have never been out of work longer than a week and in hindsight I have been exceedingly blessed/lucky from the day I was born. Heck, just a week ago my wife and I recieved a bill for almost $4000 in medical expenses from our babies birth that we did not know was coming. We had no way to pay for it but an hour later we recieved a "random" phone call from Medicade (Which we had been declined almost a month prior because my wife and I made too much) telling us that their decision had been reversed and they would cover any outstanding expenses. Normally the point would have been moot because we had paid off all the other medical bills but who am I to say no when we just got hit with a $4000 bill. They covered the whole thing and that was that. I truely have no idea how I would have responded to some of the situations you guys have faced. Its inspiring how you guys have pressed on and I would encourage you to keep going. If there is one thing I have learned it is that there is always a way.
Its good to have but for most people not reasonably affordable. The ACA (Obamacare) stuff supposably makes it affordable but if you accept the govenment subsidies it comes out of your tax returns at the end of the year and many of the people that would be taking the subsidies rely on getting that money back. Its great for people below the poverty line but for the working and lower-middle classes that are not part of huge corporations (and even most of them), Health insurance for a single person can be 3-400 dollars a month and a family can be 6-700 per month. Luckily for my wife and I we are both covered by our parents for another year or so (until we turn 26) and they paid for the vast majority of the maternity expenses. The bill we got hit with was for a 4-5 day stay in a specialist hospital for medical complications with the baby which we had been told was covered by my wifes insurance but turned out not to be the case because the insurance company decided that after the baby was born it would require its own insurance policy and failed to communicate that to us. Luckily the people I work for are wonderful and have already offered to cover 75% of the monthly insurance cost once it is time for my wife and I to hunt for our own policies.
It is the UnACA for the majority of Americans. But don't worry, the answer to abusive government is even more government. Reality always wins, eventually. Buckle up peeps.
In Belgium going to the doctor costs around 25 euro of which you get the biggest part refunded. I mean it is common practice in Belgium to "legally" skip highschool by going to the doctor as it is that cheap. By traveling around I have really noticed how "for granted" I took healthcare and howmuch more I should appreciate it. Than again, Belgium is one of the highest tax paying countries. We get a lot for it in return, but still a whole lot of money is being wasted and badly put to use.
except decent roads, or a way to not be the "dumb nationality" in Dutch jokes. I need to learn not to buy stuff when I am nearly broke... I blame PSC, they just finnished their 1/72 38(t) and marders Marderrrrrssssssss
"...and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed." As a group, we humans prefer to take it and take it and take it and take it. But hey, at least some of our blood, sweat, and tears is returned to us in the form of free goodies. SMH.
I know what you mean But its so damn hard to show off your human face puppets without some ******* calling the cops
I wear my heart on my sleeve; so I really appreciate the support guys. Really means a lot. @DMrBadguy I applied for EI (Employment Insurance) which takes a few weeks to process; so hopefully by mid march my life will be on track. Sometimes the manic depression kinda kicks into over-drive and really drains me of all positive thinking, but lately it's gotten worse. But I'm starting to realize that as much as life can Firk you in the ass (no reach around style) things always get better. It's statistically impossible not to win. =) I'll just stay positive, that's all I got at this point. @DarkJello I'll see you in game my Jellatin brethren! Much love. @BurnPyro Ilyu2bbydoll <3 @Baskitkase Thanks man, one of the nicest things I've heard in a while!
I have to agree. What of the police want to see them? Would you keep them from that? What if their life ambition is to find a complete human face puppet collection and you are keeping them from that dream?
Just got notice that I passed the personality test leading up to the police-inspector training. Which is the most frustrating and difficult one of all the tests, so I'm glad that's done. LAW ENFORCEMENT HYPE (sorry boozha)
Karma and I have shared some pretty wicked stories, and have lived a lot of good times together. Karma in reality is a virtual brother and I will cherish his friendship and try to be as best as a father figure to him as I can, but even then the ball drops short, for my own life isn't so peachy key either. I am the oldest male in a family of 2. I have a younger sister who is 6 years younger than I, who was spoiled, where to I was suppose to be a "man" and live with what I got. I was neither my father nor my mother nor anyone in my families favorite no matter how hard I tried or pushed myself. I craved affection, which lead to my first sexual encounter at the age of 15 with my first real gf. She was beautiful, I still remember how she was like it was yesterday. The love making, actual love making. Not mealiness sex, which at the time I had no idea what that was. I felt as if I finally found the piece that had been missing from my life, which mind you wasn't bad at all. My family treated me well, but they tried to give love through gifts or money but not actual love, just fake love. My first girlfriend, Danielle, died at the age of 17 our junior year in highschool. She died from a car accident which in a winter storm. After that loss I heavily turned to alcohol and drugs. I spent my first 2 years of college playing MoTG and numbing myself while playing "school" which so many of us have done before. Firking playing school. What a Firking joke. My father came to me my senior year and told me I had a choice to make. I can join the military like he had done, or be excommunicated by my family for being a disgrace. I needed someone(mind you through college I had 4 sexual partners who ****ed me and truly loved me, but the feeling wasn't the same. I wasn't even human. I showed no emotion besides laughter which was just a plastic mask to hide my suicidal thoughts which had acted 3 times my sophomore year at college, to which my 2nd girl fling whatever saved my life.) So I wanted something in this world, and with my sister just being a junior in highschool I said Firk it and joined the damn army. I was just a Firking grunt. Nothing to big. Deployed to Iraq saw a little combat nothing special. Over time, I became something I am not proud of at all. I enjoyed killing more than I did living, it gave me a certain fetish to know that I was snuffing out life. I lived this way for 3 years before joining a unit that was assigned missions that were clean up. We would go in and "clean up" sticky situations for people. The term Mercenary or Covert Ops isn't what we were. My phrase for it would be butchers. This went on until 2006 when I met a women who changed my life. God if you gentlemen ever find a women who truly gives you the raw emotion of love. Firk it's the greatest human emotion ever. It's not like the sappy poets write or the gay films depict. To me it's being so happy that you are numb from any other emotion, and you can live every day as if it were the best god damn day ever when that person is around. It wasn't instant love either. A buddy hooked us up at a MoTG convention (omg she is a cow ugly fat no nerd is hot) she wasn't a nerd though. She was an artist studying the card art for a college assignment. She was young, funny, pretty, and she somehow understood my pain. She was able to do one thing no one in my life ever had done before, and that was disarm me and make me feel comfortable(besides Danielle) We dated for 5 years and married in 2011. She is and always will be the reason I live and function today. Without her I would be nothing. In 2012 my parents were driving back from Christmas at my sisters house and what the report said drove off the road due to probably an animal or a car and both were killed. It was a blow to me that I did not expect and did not want this early in my life(I was only 30 at the time) Even though they weren't the best parents, it's still your Firking parents that have been there forever. You don't want to see them go until you are in your damn 60's or never. I had been sober almost 6 years(since I met Jennifer or Jen) and after the death I turned back to the bottle. I had stopped smoking weed and taking pills, cause I knew they wouldn't help as much as the devils brew would. In 2013 I was almost officially retired from my "clean up" job. In a training exercise, I was injured in the field of combat, to which my left testicle was completely blown off my body, and the severe trauma of the impact had exploded my right. To keep a story short, I forgave the man for what he did, and we made peace for what had happen. I now have to get a shot of testosterone and other chemicals to keep my young body working properly. A depression fell after those months, due to the idea of me never having children. I can never have anything in this world that would carry my legacy or my own blood into the future. In words it sounds weak but for fathers out there you know your children are everything and the blow was indeed low for me, who has always wanted a little me or little Jen running around causing chaos in the house. I am now a student teacher at a college, in which I teach college english literature and also do study groups for troubled highschool kids. I am living life and have been sober and drug free for almost a year and 5 months now. Jen and I are living happily and I can say life ins't so bad now, but a few weeks ago an old friend called up a favor and I did it. I will not go into details for it will bring tears to my eyes but I want the younger members of Pox to read my words and read them good. Your past will never go away, it will never fade nor fall out of existence. It will haunt you day in night. I suffer now from severe insomnia due to night terrors and I find myself crying hysterically at random times. Even if you think you are a machine, a rock, a cold hearted *******, your emotions will find you at one point and will leave you a wreck. Even happily married, I still get depressed for the sins I have committed and for the way I was in the past. I never got to say "I love you and appreciate what you have done for me Dad" or give my mom a hug for at the time of their death we had been in a no talking relationship for almost 2 years. I don't want this to change how you see me as a player, nor give you the right to use this as ammunition to hurt me. Thank you all for sharing and I appreciate all of you as a human being even if we get a little trash talk going. I love you all and thank you for being you, I hope you all have a great future and if you need to talk about anything, please please please come to me. As tears swell up in my eyes I enjoy all of the younger players and love it when I can act like a father, that in real life, will never be. Sincerely Yours, Papa Ross P.S. Stay awesome guys, it does get better at some point. P.S.S Sorry for spelling/grammar errors and words that aren't used properly or confusing parts. It was a hard thing talking about this and at points made me get emotional.
