I profess to being a self-made geek. I started the college route, but never quite got done. Currently I'm a Principal Epic® Certified Trainer. Lots of capitalized words that didn't add much by the way of $$ when I got 'em. Ah well, it's definite job security for me.

Even though this is surprisingly plain, let it be known right away that I am a gay male. As I write this, I'm less than a week shy of my 39th birthday on June 12th. I am a '69 child. (I enjoy the fact that I have a "rightful claim" to using the number 69 in any of my screen names / logins / etc.) I came out in 1990, shortly after my 21st birthday, and one week after a good friend of mine committed suicide. The suicide was tragic of course, but it forced me to re-evaluate me, and thus the closet was no longer an option.

Religion, that's something that I consider to be a personal relationship between you and your chosen god(s)(ess). I consider myself philosophical and spiritual, but not in the least bit religious. I've been on the receiving end of "my God hates you and everyone like you" more than enough times. If "Don't ask, don't tell" should apply to anything, it should be religion...

Personal hobbies: MMORPGs are a weakness of mine, I'll admit it. When not parked at a PC, I enjoy photography, and I'm slowly trying to increase my skills at it. I also enjoy just being out and about. Dancing has always been a weakness for me, and of course, there is Mollie, my ever-loving schnauzer of 13 years (now blind). Music, arts, theatre, travel... yeah, love it all!

Relationships? I've got handful of extremely close friends, several "acquaintances," and one partner. My partner, Frank, has been with me for over ten years. He deserves some kind of award for patience. Because of him, I now have two step-daughters and two step-grandkids. (Instant family: just add divorce.) He also has his own personal schnauzer, Toby.

I'm a classic liberal when it comes to politics. I've been involved in more than one activist organization in my life, enjoyed it, but I'm taking a break from the activist role and I just enjoy being a supporter for now. That will change...

Where have I lived and what do I remember most about each...

1969 - 1987 Dysart, IA: Small-town Iowa... with all its trappings.

It started out rough, I have to admit it. From the age of about 6 to the age of 17 I lived on edge constantly... to the point of having a bleeding ulcer and other stress related ailments before I was 15. It was rough not having a "safe zone" for so many years. School was pure torture. The level of cruelty that kids can achieve is absolutely unbelievable, especially from the receiving end. One or two would have been manageable, but the whole mob mentality of it was overwhelming. I was called "faggot" long before I even knew that I was gay.

At home, there was Dad. He was only one, but the amount of damage "one" can inflict as a parent is mind-numbing. I learned at an early age how to disappear very quickly and not leave a trace, purely for my emotional survival.

The oddest thing about all of that abuse, I would have preferred physical abuse over what I got. At least with physical, the scars are visible... (refer to THIS page for my thoughts on abuse)

This all changed my sophomore year in high school. It was the homecoming dance in fall of 1984. About halfway into the dance, something happened. I lost myself in the music, specifically in the song "Billie Jean." Remember the Motown 25 performance by Michael Jackson where he did the moonwalk on TV for the first time? I did that whole dance... all of it. I remember the first beats, and I remember losing myself completely to it. I next remember coming back into myself and seeing the the whole floor was clear except for me and the cheers were overwhelming. I don't remember anything else that evening. On the following Monday back at school, I was still "faggot," but now I was "faggot who could dance." The attacks from most were less, but a few saw it as more reason to torment. The change was complete by my senior year and made it bearable at best. My MJ performances at school dances became the norm. "Beat It," "Thriller," "Wanna be Startin' Something," and others... all of them would have the floor cleared and me in the middle. Senior year prom was the culmination with "Thriller" and the whole dance that entails.

I graduated in May of 1987, and went off to college at the University of Iowa...

1987 - 1994 Iowa City, IA: Here I go again, on my own...

I entered college guarded and shell-shocked. I started as a Theatre Arts major, and in the first semester I met some of the people who would be my best friends for the rest of my life. College was an incredible experience for me. No one knew me when I got there, the reputation didn't proceed me. I was liked before they knew I could dance. It was ME they liked. What a concept! I went thru a few different majors... Dance and then Computer Science when my knee blew out one last time.

I took a break after my freshman year, then returned a year later. The summer after my sophomore year (1990) a good friend of mine, Gary, committed suicide by hanging himself in a stairwell of one of the buildings on campus. They found him two days later. That week was a whirlwind of emotion and self-evaluation. Like I said on the first page, this is when I came out, first to only myself and the guy I was dating. For 3 months, my roommates thought I was dating a girl named Lisa. In reality, it was a guy named Dana. When I came out, it was very uneventful for the vast majority. Most reacted with a "Ok, and your point is?"

There was one other thing I discovered my freshman year that would affect me for the rest of my life. I had already discovered a love for computers long before hitting college, but my freshman year, I discovered how to correspond with people all over the world over a neat (relatively new for the public) thing called the internet. It started on IRC and PARTI, long before the WWW. Everything was text based. ASCII art was the closest thing you could get to online porn. This evolved into bigger things later on. I was in ISCA before ISCA was well known. I even had a single digit user number on there.

Also, in November of 1993, I made my first trip to Alaska, and instantly fell in love with it. The seeds were planted for my future.

1994 - 1995 Peoria, IL: Oh... my... WTF?!? THIS was hell on earth.

This was my last year with Dana. He moved us to Peoria while I was on the road for my job, and it was to be nearer to where his Mother was. I hated Peoria completely and totally. Words can't describe it. I needed out, and I knew where I needed to be. In October of 1995 my last grandparent died, and the day after her funeral I boarded a plane with a one way ticket to Anchorage. I knew one person there, my friend Diane, that was it.

1995 - 2003 Anchorage, AK: There’s no place like home...

A synopsis: I arrived in October of 1995, thought I fell in love the following February (sorely mistaken), met some of the most incredible and fascinating people ever, I was a Prince, and a performer. I did activism, I raised big money, and I traveled for Mama Jose's organization. I found my soulmate there, and I got Mollie. I was introduced to my first MMORPG, Asheron's Call, by Diane, and this slowly evolved into Anarchy Online then Everquest, where I met another group of friends that wanted to fall into that "for life" bunch, but somehow I dropped the ball on that one, and it’s something I miss. My Mom got diagnosed with emphysema, and her health deterioration and 15 months of unemployment prompted me to move back to Iowa in the summer of 2003.

2003 - present Back in Iowa City, IA: The needs of the many...

Shortly after returning to Iowa, I buried myself in being non-existant. I was quickly able to secure employment at the University of Iowa, and I enjoyed my life of anonymity. My best friend Cheryl was there for the first couple years until she transferred to a job in Milwaukee. Career-wise, my life is very much on track, and even further along than I had thought it would be by this point. Frank came with me from Alaska, and we acquired Toby our first winter in Iowa.
On August 13, 2010, my Mother passed away. I miss her every day.