Re: So what have YOU done?
hmmmmm<br /><br />the usual childhood things, we had a mulberry tree ... I tried selling mulberries but no one would part with a nickle for a bag of berries ... so I added a few cents of flour and sugar, and sold mulberry tarts for a quarter<br /><br />didnt make enough moolah, so I started a lawn cutting service, I made a little trailer for the back of my ten speed banana seat bike (the five speed Orange Krate kids were BENT over that ... kept an eye on the trash and started dragging home busted lawn mowers, started fixing them, bolted three mowers together in a gang and only had to make ONE sweep where ordinarilY I had to make two, done more than twice as fast cause the lead mower hacked half the stuff for the two back mowers (chain driven power mowing, not bad for a ten year old, lol)<br /><br />Painting with my dad (yeah, house painting, woo fkin hoo, right Ralph? how bout those kilz parties in unvented rooms?lol, and zinzer ...<br /><br />high school, valet parking at the night club around the corner, the time in my life that I actually worked for the Mafia (fearless 15 year old riding around in cars, I loved it, private property, rules is rules! ( I was working out constantly, could give most of the bouncers a good run for the money arm wrestling ... skinny guy came in,maybe sixty uears old, death pale blue eyes, huge scar from ear to ear ... completely unnerved me (remember, Im going muscle to muscle with these six and a half foot slabs of beef, I didnt fear much then!)<br /><br />oh yeah, hes an enforcer, killled a ton of guys<br /><br />oh chit! I stood guard over that car ...<br /><br />then I tackled commercial painting on my own (had truck by now), but after helping out some mechanics at various garages, decided to go to pennco tech<br /><br />worked in a few garages, didnt like how the oweners ripped off the customers, went into my own business with Moble Tune Ups, tune ups right at the house, thought it was brilliant ... til I found out customers typically deserve a slam now and then<br /><br />still had the wrecker, did some recovery work<br /><br />by now I was over six feet, did some bouncing, then bartending bouncing<br /><br />wow, Im writing too much, sold the wrecker, used the money to go to truck driving school, then got a job in the reefer div<br /><br />load of tuna shifted and dammn near killed me, <br />two vertebrae and massive soft tissue damage<br /><br />my weight ballooned to 850 pounds<br /><br />(more later too tired to keep going)<br /><br />In 91, sleep apnea nearly killed me, (and in all honesty, ive had it since at least 1980, wondered why I was constantly tired, didnt slow me down any tho!) I was hospitalized for over a month, I was going into congestive heart failure, thank god my doc is a progressive, nosy sorta guy and was researching apnea, had them check me for that and bingo, I was pulling "events" of 300 seconds, blood oxygen levels in the high 20 percents, doc said there is no way someone should be alive with that, no WAY in hell, I wondered in moments of lucidity if it was because my body was shutting down like a drowning persons body does, shutting down peripheral circulation into the extremities ... (it was a pulse ox sensor, yanno, the fingertip thing)<br /><br />but whatever, I didnt die, I was finally, for the first time in probably 15 years, actually SLEEPING, so my strenght came back, and I began walking, 20 feet, 50 feet, high fiber, low fat diet, began hitting the weights again <br /><br />by 97 I had dropped 450 pounds, and started college, <br />studying psychology with focus on nutrition, my goal is to become a pediatric obesity specialist, turn off the fat when they are young, so they can have a life, so they can climb trees and run and play on monkey bars, and later on, date and go to dances and ... and just be young, you only get one chance at it<br /><br />Hey, if I can save one kid from the hell I went thru ... JUST ONE ... then all this torture will have been worth it ... <br /><br />and oh yea, last night when I was rattling off the various jobs, there was also stints at Sunoco, BP, running a bait and beer beer shop out on cape may harbor in my 14 footer with the 4.5 gamefisher block of ice and a few liters of gas, good to go all day, lol)(I errr, almost went to jail over that, it stopped, lol, but what a great idea, grrrrrr) there is a nasty ramp in stone harbor that was forever having people get stuck on, I would throw crab traps in and wait for someone to get stuck, and yank em out my "tips" ranged from 5 to 30 dollars, not bad for a few minutes hooking up the J hook and 10 seconds of 5.13 rear hauling them out, couldnt miss the big red Super Hook<br /><br />I am doin ok Ralph, some days the back really hurts bad, but percocet knocks it down to manageable, thank God I have an insanely strong "life drive" I never ever ever give up, much to the amazement and frank disbelief of those around me, hey, that which does not kill us DOES make us stronger ... LOL, if Atlas gets tired, ive got some big shoulders, Ill hold the world for a while!<br /><br />My mom has a shirt which I love, shes had it for about 25 years, its a picture of a heron, and dangling from the herons mouth are the legs of a frog, and arms reaching down to strangle the heron ... and the words, Never, EVER give up!!!!<br /><br />When things get bad, I think of that, and laugh<br /><br />and go onward<br /><br />
