Leviticus

I was born in Ypsilanti, Michigan, graduated high school in Lagrange, Georgia, but grew up in Chicago, Illinois. For each city, I am grateful beyond what anyone can imagine, for what I took and what was given me. It is worth noting that my interest in stories is due to my parents having ordered mail order books that would arrive every other week or so. In my solitude, these books would sufficiently occupy me, however, as the small tastes of adventure outside of my home that my parents would allow became ravenous gorges, often unbeknownst to them, my appetite for semi-dark entertainment grew in large leaps. When the books stopped, the call to more aggressive exploration became more strident and seductive, I was too naive not to follow. The more distance I placed between home and somewhere else, it seemed, the more fascinated I became with escapade and perceived good times, not all the shit I was doing was fun, but when carpe diem is your Svengali, in retrospect, the bad stuff was relative. Visits to my grandparents in Georgia was the apex of many summers. The last time I visited for the summer, I was motivated to stay due to a new set of friends who were quite distinct from those up north and had great ambition; a new school, and beautiful southern females, this town was my deliverance, as I sensed my life, up north, was headed off the rails. Though I was never a scholar, educating myself became more of a focus, incognizant that I was laying the foundation necessary for higher learning, in fact the folks I hung out with were a couple of years ahead of me and already high school graduates, it was their gravitas about going to college and elevating themselves beyond the town they had grossly outgrown where my own motivation to attend college after graduation started taking shape. After graduating from high school, I returned to Michigan, and found work with one of the big three automobile manufacturers where I worked for three years before being laid off for a second time. Albeit the pay was good and benefits great, my mind had been imbued with the idea of a different vocational direction than my parents. A buddy of mine from Georgia, had moved to Chicago and was all in, and after a few conversations, my move to Chicago's southside was relatively rapid. I thank God because this is where I grew up. While working for a major bank, I attended and graduated from DePaul University with a degree in Marketing and minored in Management and found selling to be the vocation best fitted for my sanity through the years. What I relish most about Chicago is, it's not just a city it can be thought of as a whole other planet distinct from the other cities by virtue of the unique orbit of its character, it is colder in the summer than the winter, metaphorically speaking, it has wise but uniquely impetuous children who channel elders at 13, a regal skyline majestic from any angle, and an incandescent commonwealth whose decades of felled tears equate the water that laps its shores, and like the water that never stops the tears never dry. Although I have since moved to another city with an impressive attitudinal orbit, I am still owned by this windy city in the north.