Personal Info

Where I'm From

I was a bright, mostly normal, little kid, loved by his parents and spoiled (I was the youngest of five, the only boy). A middle-class kid who had a passion for comic books, building model cars, anything related to the USA’s budding space program, and watching horror films on the family’s black and white TV. Growing up in the sixties wasn’t as challenging as being a kid in this century. There were the Beatles, Captain America, and the Apollo program. But I guess the media shaped me pretty well, too. One of the first things I remember was the assassination of JFK. My mom, who often took me to see the newest Disney release, also took me along when she went to see Gone With The Wind, Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte, and Night of the Living Dead (she had no idea what she was in for). It’s no wonder that as I grew older, my fascination with Dracula, Frankenstein and the Wolfman would give way to Alice Cooper and heavy metal.

When I was fourteen, my father died of colon cancer. We had moved from Southern California to rural West Georgia, and I had just begun to build my adolescent identity. Not having the money or ability to survive in Georgia (she could not drive), my mom moved us back to L.A. – at least for a while. Over the course of my high school years, I relocated between Georgia and California several times, and finally graduated from high school in 1977. I had, I guess an otherwise normal life during my teen years, and eventually wound up moving back to California, where I got my first real job, and married my first wife, Debi. We had a son together, and named him Christopher.

Although Debi and I had been best friends in high school, we found ourselves growing apart as the marriage progressed, I began to feel trapped. One of the things we did as a pastime was play Dungeons & Dragons, and we had a pretty interesting group of friends. Of those friends, Cameron and Michele were fairly close, at least to me. They were also having problems, and Cameron left Michele shortly before I left Debi. The story of how I fell in love with Michele is more complex than the subject of a website, but fall in love I did. Hard. We lived together for a few years, then married, and moved back to Georgia after visiting there for a reunion.

Michele and I were great together and were married for ten years. Being married to her was one of the best things I've done with my life, and I loved her very much. I wish it could have turned out better, but we had a bad breakup, and divorced. Casting about for direction for many years afterward, I became something I wasn’t very proud of. It was almost impossible for me to live without the person I had loved so much for so long. But I survived. I co-wrote another game with my former friend Liam Hale, and came close to publishing an anthology called Twisted Bedtime Stories™ – but that’s a different story. One filled with alternate lifestyle stuff not appropriate here.

And just when I began to like myself again, I found Christi. Although at the time it seemed it was quite by accident, I'm pretty sure the Universe knew that it was time. I remember reading her profile online, while surfing through pages of desperate women who were searching for love and gratification. I had found the site by mistake, and read through the ads with growing amusement. Until I found the one labeled “Beatrice seeks Benedict” – a reference to Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. I e-mailed her, I found her phone number, I called, and I won her. I knew from the beginning (don’t ask how) that she was the one. And now, we are married with two kids. For over 25 years and counting.

In 2004, I got a job at NASA as a web developer and server/database admin, and we moved to Huntsville, AL. It probably was the best job I've ever had. But eventually, I became disillusioned with the contract company I was working for, the non-existent career path,, as well as the racism and bigotry in the South. Life thrives on chaos and change I guess. In 2013, I took a job in Denver and I've been here since.

Where I Am Now

I'm a web developer. That's just what I do to pay the bills. I love music, running and playing in roleplaying games. Though I like to build stuff and fix things, sometimes I feel like fucking something up. Destructive behavior is not typically healthy or normal, so most people have an outlet for dealing with their frustrations. My outlet is writing, and that satisfies those urges - in my books, I got to cause Armageddon and misery on a cosmic scale. The next book will have far less destruction; I'll limit it to a more personal scale.

Along the way, Christi and I discovered we are polyamorous. Not swingers, just open to others as partners. It's sometimes complicated, and it's definitely not something that you can discuss outside certain circles. But it's worked for us for years, despite the occasional speed bumps. It's been hard for me recently, after losing someone I truly cherished - someone I thought was going to be a long-term partner. It really broke me, like only losing a loved one can.

I have a pretty awesome family, with a loving wife and two daughters I am intensely proud of. I live in a nice house with a passel of animals and a home office/studio most people would be very pleased to come home to. It's expensive here in the Denver area, but who doesn't fret about bills? I need more friends, and really would love to have someone close, to hang out with on the regular. Overall, my hard work has paid off, and I look forward to getting up every morning. I have a few regrets, but not so many that I can't look in the mirror. Sometimes I get philosophical, but I try to share a positive outlook with people. Listen to EarthZero Radio sometime - I don't have commercials, but I do have little recorded messages that I think provide humor and light to anyone out there listening in the ether. The music's good, too.

Where I'm Going

If I've learned anything over the years, it's this: Life goes on, like it or not; your choice is to stagnate, or find a new direction. So music is what I chose as my salvation. And I’m back to writing and designing games again, so there’s that. What's next? The word "retirement" keeps coming up, but I have lots of questions. And I'm not ready to stop working, either. So, I keep busy with things I love, because if you can't enjoy your life, there is no point in it. I'll keep writing, playing music, and making web pages. Among other things. I keep trying to scale Maslow's pyramid, but I never quite reach self-actualization before life kicks my feet out from under me.

But I ain't done climbing.