its a new decade? Part 2

I started a decade in review but quickly realized it was going to be way to long.

I left off with the graduation of high school.  I should pick up a  few months later with the beginning of college.

I started college in the fall of 2002. I planned to live at home and commute to save money but after the first few days of driving from Eustis to Kissimmee (About an 1hr and 15mins) I realized I should just suck it up and move on campus.  On the first day of class I met some amazing people and quickly became friends with many of them.  That first week I was a mere 17yr old scared to death hoping life was about to get better.

And it did.  I was soon surrounded by other people my age, all of whom seemed just as scare as I was, and all of whom were going into ministry.  On the first day I met a girl from California, this intrigued me since I was obsessed with the show The OC at the time and it seemed like such a far away place.  the other place i wanted to go was England which seemed to be filled with educated cool sounding folks.  I had secretly dreamed of maybe one day moving to California to run away from all the negative that Florida held for me, California seemed to be one of the only states that was at least as cool as Florida.  Warm weather, beaches, theme parks, and lots of new people, none of whom I imagined to be as cruel or dumb as the rednecks in my hometown.  not just cruel to me but to the animals who for the last few years seemed to be my only friends, these rednecks would kill these friends of mine and mount their heads on their walls in some caveman like competition.  To this day I don't understand this but I now know that these types of people are everywhere, even in California and England.

One of the worst days was an afternoon were I particularly feeling isolated from people.  I had just gotten back to campus after going shopping with some friends and decided to head home.  I got on the turnpike to head back to Eustis.  There was an accident on the southbound side and the lanes were blocked.  People were standing in the median watching the helicopter land.  I was in the northbound lanes and the flow of traffic was still pretty strong.  I looked ahead of me and saw a semi slamming on the brakes.  I came up beside the semi and saw why.  The semi had hit a person, the driver was completely white, people were jumping out of their cars to go help.  The body was lying there, three tears across the stomach with parts thrown about the road.  The smell is something I will never forget, the rare smell of blood.  I couldn't stop, I had seen enough to be forever changed.  I drove to the next exit, got off, pulled into a convenient store, and immediately began gagging.  I called my friends back at the college and my parents.

I was in no state to drive.  My friends quickly came to pick me up.  I sat in the passenger seat sobbing until they arrived, i wasn't even able to sit in the drivers seat.

That day two things changed, one was of course the gruesome carnage I had witnessed, the other though was something even more powerful, the proof that when needed there were true friends for me.  That when i needed someone to call i knew who would answer the phone.  For most of high school I had a recurring nightmare when I was at my own funeral, sitting up in the choir loft overlooking the auditorium and stage, all of it empty.  Everyone had forgotten that my funeral was going on, the only proof was a lone closed casket on the stage.  but now the friends I had suspected would be there for me truly were.  I was not alone. 

Driving back to my hometown each day seemed to create two worlds, one of school and one of the previous self that I still had to put up with at home.  On Sundays I would sit in the Sunday school class, keeping to myself, contemplating the many activities the others in the room had done in the past week all of which i missed since i was always in Kissimmee.  I soon was seeing how the lifestyle of those back home was, well country, compared to my new friends. 

Instead of spending my time in the woods getting drunk I was spending time at CityWalk and Old Town. (two local entertainment complexes in the Orlando/Kissimmee area).  I soon met a small group of friends at my college who I was spending all my time with.  They seemed to accept me for who I was.  All of them could understand me even with my speech impediment, in fact for the first time in my life I was being told it sounded cool and British like. 

The next two years were filled with amazing fun, the best times I had ever had.  trips to the new Tampa Hard Rock Casino, trips to CityWak, the beach, I was always going, always with friends, always having fun.  

It didn't take long for me to stop going to the church in my hometown and instead start going to one in Kissimmee.  This was a small church that met in a school on the weekends and in the pastors house on Wednesdays.  I was finally able to really be a leader in a youth program, though the program was about 5 kids and we sat on a rug in the garage but still i was a leader and it felt so natural. 

The second semester I moved onto campus and was put into a dorm with two seniors and a cool guy who was also a freshman.  I filled my days exploring all that the tourist district of 192 in Kissimmee had to offer.  I had finally escaped the negative times of high school and the boring times found in a small town and was now eating meals at places like Wolfgang Pucks and Planet Hollywood.  I was always going somewhere, soaking up all that this strange new place had to offer.

I was still very depressed on the inside even as I was around so many new people. My new roommates both supported me, helping me and staying up late at night just to chat.  For the first time it seemed I had real friends who were concerned about me and smart enough to know that life had more to offer than a job at the local feed-store and looking forward to the weekend.

These people were from small towns and big cities, private public boarding and home schools, and surprisingly a large number or so it seemed were foreign.  South America, the West Indies, and Africa.  I loved the diversity and the friendliness.    

The classes weren't helping as much though.  Even as I was feeling welcomed in class it was as though I was being told I was going to hell.  See this college believed that I had been baptized for all the wrong reasons I was now going to hell because of it, this obliviously upset me and the constant reminder of this helped push me further and further from the academics the school offered.

I soon found a local mega-church where I quickly got involved with the youth program as a small group leader.  The church was growing like none I had ever seen and I was there for many firsts at the church.  I finally was a part of the highly professional production focused church style that so many churches I used to attend dreamed of becoming.  

I loved this semester of  college! That summer I moved home but tried to stay down in Kissimmee as much as possible.  The following year of school was much more intense.   I had a few friends that felt the same as I did about the whole baptism = salvation thing and we would pool together whenever the issue arose.

This was the time I first kissed a girl, and did other things of which I don't feel the need to provide details on, what was important about this though was this was my first time doing anything with a girl.  I had not been attracted to many girls but as soon I as began having fun with them I knew I was straight, before even I had questioned me sexuality due to my lack of interest in any sexual activities.

The very first time I did anything I came back to my dorm and called my friend hysterical because I finally knew what I was, I was normal, I was straight, I was just a teenager who finally was breaking out of my shell of insecurity. 

That summer I moved home but tried to stay down in Kissimmee as much as possible.  This was the semester I began blogging, that one action that I think has had the most impact upon me. The following year of school was much more intense.

The following year I became more and more distant from the actual teachings of the school and this in turn caused me to become more distant with many of the students.  The spring semester I was placed in a room with 3 very unique roommates.  By the end of the year one of them and I all but fought each other.  One night him and I got into it about a dumpster found fan and without warning a fist was thrown and I soon had a knot on my chin.  I ran out of the room and straight to my friends dorm, the one from California.

By this point there were few things that I could say or do to surprise her.  We had gone on numerous adventures exploring every square inch of the tourist district.  One day I called her out to my car convincing her I was upset, when she got to the car I began crying and then showed her my vampire teeth.  She didn't think it was nearly as funny as I did.  (I think the fake blood in my mouth may have been too much).

She was the closest thing I ever had to a sister and she and I did everything together.

By the spring of 04 I realized I didn't want to stay at the small college and was looking to go somewhere new.  I had known a few people who went to a college in Lakeland, Fl and seemed to like it so I decided to check it out.  I drove to the new college to check it out, the palm lined walking paths and the many students (2,000 seems like a ton when you go to a school of 200) immediately sold me.  

The distance to the casino in Tampa was also a great selling point! 

One weekend I knew that I needed to change schools but it had been awhile since I had done any type of charismatic praying but for some reason at this time I felt like my current prayer life wouldn't be sufficient so to jump-start my new life I made a road trip to Brownsville (with my roommate who later punched me, lol).  It was one of those weird wake up the morning and know what you need to do moments.  So Friday rolled around and we headed to Pensacola to go to a random church service.  I don't know how meaningful the service was but it did show me how free I know was with my life.

The summer of 04 was filled with hanging out with friends from my first college as I awaited embarking upon the adventures that the new college held.  This was the summer I discovered nude beaches, beer, and porn shops.  it was quite a summer.  

In august right before I left Central Florida for my new life in Lakeland a hurricane hit and demolished parts of Kissimmee.  What I had been discovering for the last two years was now all gone, the bright signs of 192 all dark, the Student Union building were I would hang out know flooded.

I picked up a friend who was stuck in the dorms without electricity and we went to Ybor City in Tampa to get away from the insanity of Orlando.  This was really one of my first times that I spent any time in my own hotel room, in a city which I didn't really know.  Most of Tampa was still closed due to the fact that they had thought the hurricane was going to hit there but a few things were open and we took it all in.  Tampa seemed cool.

The following week and another hurricane later I started at my new college.   The world as I knew it was about to all change.  Just as school was about to begin the most unexpected emergency was about to hit. 

All that will have to wait till Part 3, sorry this is becoming such a huge crazy blog entry! 

 This is actually very enjoyable to write though.  Looking back has become