i want to get back to when i felt good about being alive. i want my body and mind to be as strong as they once were, and to improve from there continually.

 i am designed to achieve. i am a machine. when i set a task and devote myself to it, it is done. i came to understand this fully 10 years ago. five years ago i let myself begin to decline.

 i am probably manic/depressive. i start off toward achieving goal, then after some degree of success i work against myself.

 i have lived a very slow and sedentary life for the past five years. i have real wants and needs, but disreguard them for what i think to be 'right for the time'.

 i drive a truck over-the-road. i am driving a truck solely for the purpose of paying for it, for one of two scenarios; 1) so that i may earn monies for myself, and finally use this job as the stepping stone which it was origionally intended to be... 2) so my mom's husband will have another source of income if he were to hire a driver once it's paid for, or to serve as a backup if his truck becomes inoperable.

 i have a daughter. her mother does not want my child to know me as her father/daddy. she keeps her from me, and would make me out to be a bad man if i tried to be there. it is a painful distance i maintain.

(time is very much a blur. i'll try to be accurate)

 i was a fat kid all my life. in 1996 dad gave me a guitar. i was a natural, and i excelled. in February 1998 i had a girl tear my heart, and i had a falling-out with my dad. i left the guitar. from then i was sleeping wherever i landed until my family's house burned in July 1998. i spent time with them while they were waiting for their modular home to be ready, and ended up moving in with them again. my mom set me up so i could get my GED.

 in July 1998 at age 16 i weighed 275 lbs. from July til November i smoked weed and stayed in a room and withdrew from drugs. then i was a bum off the family til July 1999. dad said i had to pay rent, so i got a job with a friend, made some money. i made a decision to change. i bought a home gym. with diet and exercise i went from a fat 275lbs. to a lean and strong (skinny) 155lbs.

 June 2000 dad died, we lived off savings. August 2000 i found a job that eventually let me work 20 hrs. a day at flat-rate pay. i gave all my money to my mom, except for fuel costs, a plan i would stick with til mid-2004. November 2000 i got with a girl, got comfortable with her, we were lazy together and ate as recreation. I started playin guitar in a mediocre band. i gained weight til i was 230lbs. got fired in May 2001, worked crap jobs til Nov. 2001 when i started laying carpet.

 in Spring 2003 my boss convinced me to quit eating so much. i started eating healthy again. started playing drumsin a band i enjoyed. started playing guitar in another band i enjoyed. in both bands i was very physical. drums plus guitar plus healthy eating and a hard job turned me into a super-strong 175lb. machine. August 2004 i was severly injured in a car wreck, then i cut my leg open. i ate poorly and couldn't perform as much in my job. through tolerance of the severe pain, i improved marginally.

 February 2005, a former acquaintance, a seventeen-year-old girl with an infant child put her hooks in me. i was deceived greatly. i found she didn't want to care for her baby, so i stayed to make sure the kid made it through. i quit my job and she burned through my savings. she was a wicked girl, but i found some comfort in the abuse. i ended up getting her pregnant as well. she got rid of me when my child had been in her belly 2 months, in November 2005, and i sank further.

 moved back to my mom's house, now with her being re-married. i worked a local appliance delivery job with my mom's husband til May 2006 when it fell through. He had to go back to over-the-road trucking. i went on the road with him. i signed up for a grant for a local trucking class. Sept.-Dec. 2006 attended Truck School during the day and worked evenings.

 December 2006 began my time as a over-the-road truck driver, typically driving 28 days, off 2 days. In the beginning, as a company driver, i was able to give my child's mother large sums of money. By May 2007 my boss offered my mom's husband the opportunity to purchase the truck, effectively terminating my employment, as well as the hefty paycheck.

 The money coming in was far less than before, with all the expenses of owning a truck now falling on us. The money i could give my child's mother also decreased, though she was still receiving a decent sum.

 Spring 2008 allowed me to be in town Every Saturday, and to see my kid on those days. My child's mother started keeping me away from her by Summer, and September 2008 was the last time since that i have seen my daughter. My child's mother set me to take a state enforced DNA/Paternity test. With the positive paternity result, the state determined i would pay a sum to the state, and the state would pay my child's mother. Since then the only contact i have received from my child's mother were a series of malicious text messages in early December 2008, and an equally spiteful Myspace message in November 2009. I continue to drive the truck, while allowing my child to grow up knowing another man to be her daddy. I want to keep my child's best interst at heart, though i am not sure what that would be.

 I Want to get my mind and body healthy.

 I want to establish financial stability for myself and my family.

 I want to feel alive, and free, and that there is something worth living for.

 I want to play and write music, and to have it all mean to me what it once did.

I want my strength to be steadfast, and to allow me to achieve what Is within my reach.

 I want my child to have the opportunity to know and/or to love me, whenever that time is right. And if it is to be otherwise, to accept it.

 I believe i can do anything, and only my will can form my reality.