My Own Blog: Stranger In A Strange Land

I live in Santa Cruz

however, I am not from here.

I used to visit my Grandmother in San Jose. My Aunt would do regular trips to Santa Cruz, so I played on the beaches as a child.

Sometimes, I would spend a day or two with my father in Santa Cruz from time to time while he partied.

I have memories of bare feet on cold cement on Front St. Hill, with the coastal fog hugged down around me in the early afternoon or watching cable (oooh, cable!) in a trailer on Beach St. while the familiar pot scented cloud floated above me, drifting like vague gray dragon towards the ceiling, morphing over and over again as it disappeared. None of these places exist anymore. The trailer park was torn down for condominiums, and the apartment gave way to restaurants and little shops.

I feel lucky that, while some got the tourist picture of Santa Cruz during there visit, given my economic position, I was able to see Santa Cruz more clearly.

less of this: ___________

*****
more of this

(Wait, what am I talking about! That first picture looks nice. I want to eat at fancy-pants restaurants with rich mofos who wanna spend buttloads of cash on me. Sign me up! I'll bet that bitch gets her hair and nails done, and gets waxed/facials- an all that! That salt-n-pepper yuppie probably paid for it all too. I want to be a paid for doll to the top tier of the power structure.

Just kidding. I mean, a little objectification can be nice from time to time
"oh yeah- ya like that baby? Hmm Hmmm, there's more where that came from"
Ha. But a life built on that, where your partner has no interest in you, you as a person, in who you are, what you think, etc. And when your "parts and pieces" have aged and you can't be propped up with silicone, you get replaced with a younger model. Fuck that. Besides, I'll bet those homeboys in the second picture would be way more interesting to kick it with. Plus, nicer to look at-check out them abs!)

But I digress *clears throat*

When I was nine years old, my mother gave up custody of me, so I went to live with my father in Boulder Creek, (the Santa Cruz mountains).

Oh, my father's house. It had been in a fire a year or so before. What was left was a bedroom (his), living room, and a bathroom. There were pale, thin plywood sheets nailed up against the burnt half of the house.

The bathroom floor was falling down. The corner of the wooden floor across from the toilet gaped open like a hungry mouth. When you sat on the toilet, you leaned forward, toward it, and day by day, watched it grow wider and hungrier. It's sharp wooden splinter teeth became more and more prominent until one day it ate the whole bathroom. My father then put a port-o-pody in a trailer adjacent to the house. It was disgusting. I remember, in all the months of living there, only taking a shower with the camp-shower once- maybe twice. We visited his mom- my grandma- every couple of weeks to a month and I took a bath then. Disgusting indeed. The good news is 1. I now know I can live without plumbing, and 2. I'm an adult so if I ever have to do that again I know what to do and how to do it and will never ever ever ever have to live that way again.

Besides, that wasn't what had the greatest impact on me. It was being immersed in a drug culture I had never had direct experience with before. My mother was an addict when I grew up and I saw the affects of it. Certainly, I saw the affects, I saw it in the mirror in the form of black eyes on a six year old face. But it wasn't towards the end, right before she gave up custody that I actually saw her sniffing things through a rolled up bill.

(Is it just me or do those lines look puny as hell?)

My father mostly did his partying away from home in the beginning.After the bar closed he often brought everyone back to the boarded up house. I slept first on a dirty cot in the living room behind the couch and then on homemade bunk beds he made, also stationed behind the couch.
He was rarely home. I was alone for hours and hours everyday, until the night came. Then I would be sleeping. I was in fourth grade and had to walk a couple miles to the school bus the next day. And in would pour the bar.

Its no wonder I asked to move back with my then sober mother. I remember it being a huge controversial issue at the time. I was about ten or so. The fact that I already had a nice little drug history under my belt meant nothing. Ten-year-olds should not be doing acid. Period. I had smoked pot regularly, drank, and was moving up the drug ladder, and on the verge of dropping out of elementary school. I had watched my father beat his girlfriend until the ambulance came to remove her. I had watched countless times as he destroyed the house in fits of rage. To his credit he never hit me, unlike my mother and stepfather. Things were getting more and more serious in the house in regards to drugs and I would go visit my mother and all I wanted was to go back to my mother's quiet apartment in Sacramento.

Sacramento has always meant home to me, even though my memories are all very painful, it still is my hometown.

Whether it was the crack-apartments off Marconi Ave., the house in the pear orchards down south, or the gray house of Franklin Blvd., it was always centered around this town.

After moving back home, my mother promptly had a complete mental breakdown, and thus I began my illustrious three year career in the local group home.

It was rough. I'm not going to lie. I learned, (the hard way) how to fight back, after years of having every one in my life beat the crap out of me. You get jumped enough times by peers and eventually you start coming back swinging.

I hated, hated living there.
But, now with many years between now and that time, I find myself cherishing the connections I had with the staff and some of the other kids there. There are moments that i will never forget and I find that I have gratitude for this time of my life.

Kayponti didn't have to take a vested interest in me. But she did. Tyrone didn't have to care about my well being. But he did.

I remember Jatiya's M.C. Hammer poster on the wall. She was my first roomate. We didn't always get along, but she was my sister, completely. I would give anything to know how she is doing. I heard Angela was ok. Hanging in there. Rough for awhile but doing better now.

I can not tell you enough how this time, and more importantly- the people who worked there who put their heart into their work- shaped who I am- and the fact that I have survived to type this today.

I sincerely owe my life to these people. Because when I got there I was a wreck, and most certainly headed for a dark and miserable existence.

I thank you.

When I moved back home, my mother was still a wreck. I went to high school, and college and worked all at the same time- and was out of the house most of the time.

I road the bus everywhere.

I did take the high school traffic safety course, but, there was no one in my life to actually teach me how to drive. And the idea of my having a car was so laughable I could almost cry. My mother barely had her car. I didn't end up getting my license until I was almost 25.

That was solely due to the kindness of a stranger/friend. My life has been a series of lessons in learning to cherish friends who have been there for me, keeping me just back from the brink. Again and again.

Everyone in Sacramento skated.

(Sacramento Skater Stefan Janoski)

Back in the mid 90s, though, when I was a teen, only guys were skating. Girls could have the skater-look but they basically stood around and held their boyfriends boards. My friend Teya and I thought "Fuck that". So we both asked for skateboards from our prospective homes.

I knew it was never going to happen. ----I shit you not, for my previous birthday I literally got a packet of pencils- unwrapped. At least she remembered.

Teya picked out a nice Foundation Board.

(they still round??? Hmmmm)

And I, despite telling my mother- NOT to pick it out- that I will put whatever cash she had toward a deck- that I know she doesn't know anything about skateboards- just-whah whah whah....

I got a plastic Toys R Us Nash board. Not even banana boat cool plastic.

If I ever meet that Nash guy, I swear to God, Imma gunna punch him in the mouth.

So I waited. Saved up. In the meantime a random guy hooked me up with his old skateboard.

In fact, I only saw this guy twice, whom I met through some friends. Once when I met him and he hooked me up and later when I gave the board back. It was a righteous set up though. Huge, old, beat up board, monster sized trucks and massive wheels. I road that board all over the ghetto- no problem. Gravel, broken glass,- whatever. That thing was a tank!

Then I got my very first deck. By then the clock was ticking. I was used to (and really liked) the old- old school style of boards. I got a small, more trick-friendly board. Well, I had tried to do ollies on the tank and that never panned out to well.
This board felt wobbly. It was from a short lived brand that had their own store on the mall downtown called "Mountain and Surf" or something. And it was kinda crap.

Still, between the two boards, Teya and I skated all over downtown, acting retarded, wearing crazy clothes, feeling like aliens , drinking coffee and sneering at all the stupid skate scene girls whom we called "pro hos".

Oh- there are a shit ton of pro-hos in SC, for the surf guys (yuck) but no one really calls these chicks out on it. Maybe if I was more involved in that seen I'd be better informed on the topic. I wonder if serious surf chicks have that attitude, or if so hippie-stoner-blissed out- and "yeah, man, don't hate."

So, after all the years, I have ended up in Santa Cruz. It's not a bad town. The beach is nice an' all, when I actually get to see it. Locals who are not rich or in the Marine industry of some sort are usually working way to much to afford the location to have time off to enjoy it.

Right now, I have worked through my general education at the local junior college and am working on my degree at UCSC in film. When that is done I will probably move down to LA.

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