rjf9

I was raised by a pack of wolves until my adolescent years. I say raised, because that was my earliest recollection of my childhood. I have no idea what happened to my parents, though I think they left me at Yellowstone Park on a family vacation when I was a baby. Louisiana was where I finally emerged as a wilderness hardened wolf-man. This theory would both explain the absence of my parents and the matriarchal wolf pack I called my family for the cognizant period of my upbringing.

After emerging from the wilderness with a voracious appetite for elk meat, and a quick adaptation to life as a bipod, I found living among humans manageable. Other than the occasional memory lapse that the sidewalk was not an appropriate place to use the restroom, I adapted quickly.

Through the Louisiana foster care system I was actually placed in a wonderful home in Michigan and eventually adopted by loving human parents. It was a very musical family who encouraged me to play the piano and guitar. I was a quick learner and was soon flawlessly performing Sonatas from memory for anyone who would pause long enough to listen. Though I enjoyed both the Classical and Baroque periods, I far preferred Romantic composers like Brahms, Chopin, Liszt, and Tchaikovsky.

Like any teenager, I had my rebellious phase. Shortly after my 14th birthday I took the dirt bike my adopted parents gave me for Christmas the year before and rode it all the way to Venezuela to help fight in support of a coup that was trying to remove Chavez from power. I financed my trip with the money I made mowing lawns the summer before. Unfortunately, we were unsuccessful, and after some soul searching in the Venezuelan rain forest, I returned home never to leave the straight and narrow again.

Though in the back of my mind I always knew I would return to music, I was led down many paths in high school, trying to find my calling in life. I took a keen interest in computers, and paired with my love for music, I began developing a file sharing site with a high school friend of mine, Shawn. He continued with the idea, but I eventually pulled out because I thought the legal ramifications were too great. Around that time I began mapping the human genome, worked on a team that dated the history of the universe at 13.7 billion years, and invented the easy bake oven.

After giving advice to and heavily investing in a fledgling computer company called Apple, I spent most of the money I made in an effort to eradicate the Flipe-Westerfield Virus. I can't go into the details here, but they are truly horrific. You've probably never heard of this virus, and that would be due to all my hard work.

After graduating high school, I took a year off and was the captain of a crab boat which operated in the waters of the Bering Strait. We had a record breaking year for profits, and one night on the deck of the boat I proclaimed to my crew "This job is the deadliest catch!" It became a rallying cry, and as I made my exit after that winter, my successor was actually in talks with a TV producer who was interested in a documentary type show chronicling the lives of the crew. It was during this time that I became involved with a woman in Alaska. Her name was Sarah. She was beautiful, loved nature as I did, and though I loved my life with her, I informed her that she must choose between me and her passion for public politics. Eventually she chose the latter and sitting at her kitchen table, with the most beautiful view of Russia you've ever seen, we said goodbye. With a broken heart, I knew I had to leave Alaska. I left my ship in the hands of a worthy sailor named Phil Harris who had served under me that winter. I wished them the best and took off on my way, hitch hiking all the way back to Louisiana.

When I returned I learned of the terrible fate of my beloved state. In my absence, Hurricane Katrina had decimated the Louisiana coast. The next year was a rough one for me as I dealt with the guilt. I had served a brief stint at the Army Corp of Engineers and was extremely close to securing the funds needed to strengthen the levee system in New Orleans. It was this grief that drove me back to my first love. Music.

I joined a band that only performed bluegrass tunes in odd time signatures. We toured the country but after a falling out with the Mandolin player Chris, the band broke up. Chris and our guitarist at the time went on to form another successful bluegrass band, and I found myself alone in a one bedroom apartment in Vancouver BC. It was here that I began writing songs. Not just any songs, but songs from deep in my heart. Songs about my wolf mother… songs about Jose, my Venezuelan brother who died in my arms... songs about my only love, Sarah... songs about my winter on the Cornelia Maria and my blood brothers who make up its crew. Yes, it was in that apartment that I was born. It was in that apartment where I found my TRUE love. Writing.

In my 26 years on this earth, I have held many things that have come and gone. My writing will stay. It will by my companion in victory, and my companion in defeat. For that I shall owe it my life. Perhaps one day someone will read the words of the poet Samuel Rogers on my tombstone and find their meaning as well...

"I lived to write, and wrote to live"