About Me
“Self-revelation is a cruel process. The real picture, the real “you” never emerges. Looking for it is as bewildering as trying to know how you really look. Ten different mirrors show you ten different faces.” Shashi Deshpande (b. 1938), Indian author. That Long Silence, ch. 1 (1988).
Do I begin like Charles Dickens, or like James Joyce? Birthday or nursery rhyme?
Birthday.
I was born on October 16, 1973, which means as of today I am just turned 31 years old. Tomorrow I will be a day older and a dollar shorter.
I was born in Parkersburg, West Virginia, along the mighty, muddy Ohio River. For eight years, from about age four to age twelve, I lived in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, further south along the Ohio. Point Pleasant’s claim to fame is the mysterious Mothman, of whom Richard Gere made a movie not long ago, The Mothman Prophecies. I don’t think the director actually used the town of Point Pleasant for that film, though the account of the bridge collapsing is true enough. That disaster was part of local lore when I lived there.
In those days, which is to say the very early eighties, I’d come home from school and plop down to watch hours upon hours of sitcom reruns on TBS: The Super Station! I can even remember vaguely what order the shows aired. The Flintstones was first at around four, then either The Munsters or The Addams Family (these shows alternated from season to season), then Gilligan’s Island or sometimes The Brady Bunch, then The Beverly Hillbillies, then by six, it was The Andy Griffith Show, then at six-thirty, Sanford and Son, and finally at seven The Carol Burnett Show. In the evenings, I loved to watch The Dukes of Hazzard and The Incredible Hulk (both were Friday night shows). I also watched Dallas with my parents on Friday nights. Short-lived as they were, I also enjoyed Battlestar Gallactica and Buck Rogers in the 21st Century. My parents and I also watched The Jeffersons, One Day At A Time, The Facts of Life, Diff’rent Strokes, Three’s Company, and (somewhat later) Cheers.
I was the quintessential child of the eighties. I played with Star Wars toys. I had almost every action figure and vehicle. Come to think of it, the only toy I didn’t own was the AT-AT Walker, which was much too expensive for my parents, though they did manage to spring for the Millenium Falcon.
I read comic books, mostly Star Wars and G.I. Joe.
Towards the beginning of my adolescence, after a childhood steeped in pop culture, we moved back to Parkersburg and I began attending a Protestant Fundamentalist church with my Grandmother. I was born again at about age twelve or thirteen, and again at about age 22 when I converted to Roman Catholicism. I figure at this rate, I’ve cut my odds of going to Hell to about a forty/sixty chance. Just as long as those durn Methodists aren’t right.
Diploma from Parkersburg South High School (1991).
MA (1998), BA (1996) in English from West Virginia University. What does that mean? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even to me anymore, though the MA may have had something to do with my landing my current job.
I also have k-12 public education certification in English and Library Science, which have stood me in much better stead in the job market.
Married (one wife). Father (one child, a son). Our son is named after a mythical Irish saint, Saint Brendan, and unlike me he is a born Catholic, duly baptized (by an Irish priest no less) at a small rural parish church called the Shrine of the Sacred Heart. I like to think the auspices of his baptism bode well for him to grow to be a kind and gentle man.
That about sums me up. Actually, it does not sum me up. But that’s all I am willing to reveal right now.
