I write a lot of words so by default that makes me a writer. I used to be optimistic but that paid even less. Sometimes I'll write a sentence that takes me somewhere. Where those thoughts and inspirations come from is anyone's guess. It's not the booze or drugs because I'm still scribbling even after 5/13/92. Sometimes I show my graffiti to my friends and hope that they like it. If they do then maybe so will total strangers. Some of it even rhymes but I would never call myself a poet. I'm just a guy trying to find my voice without plagiarizing my idols. It doesn't always work.

My chequered collegiate experience began before I graduated high school in 1982. I was a victim of Reaganomics. Our not so wonderful President decreed that anyone 17 or older, with a deceased parent who wanted to keep their Social Security benefits had to enroll in college. The absolute best thing that happened was I met this beautiful young woman who was incredibly kind to me. To this day I can't listen to UFO and not think about her as UFO were "her band." The semester before she'd hooked up with this fellow named Steve. Steve came around campus a few times and didn't really dig me. About a year later, you can imagine how thrilled he was when I showed up at his house, dating his younger sister.

The worst thing that happened that first semester was my GPA. That and some guidance counselor recommended rehab instead of college.

After working some dead-end jobs, I eventually went back to college. Not so much because I was into higher education but rather because Steve's sister went away to school in Binghamton and invited me to go live with her. If I was gonna live in some upstate New York college town I might as well go to college, right? And it beat delivering refrigerators. Now I'm not what you'd call a morning person or particularly studious. Getting my kicks has always been more important than worrying about the consequences.

I write a lot of words so by default that makes me a writer. I used to be optimistic but that paid even less. Sometimes I'll write a sentence that takes me somewhere. Where those thoughts and inspirations come from is anyone's guess. It's not the booze or drugs because I'm still scribbling even after 5/13/92. Sometimes I show my graffiti to my friends and hope that they like it. If they do then maybe so will total strangers. Some of it even rhymes but I would never call myself a poet. I'm just a guy trying to find my voice without plagiarizing my idols. It doesn't always work.

My chequered collegiate experience began before I graduated high school in 1982. I was a victim of Reaganomics. Our not so wonderful President decreed that anyone 17 or older, with a deceased parent who wanted to keep their Social Security benefits had to enroll in college. The absolute best thing that happened was I met this beautiful young woman who was incredibly kind to me. To this day I can't listen to UFO and not think about her as UFO were "her band." The semester before she'd hooked up with this fellow named Steve. Steve came around campus a few times and didn't really dig me. About a year later, you can imagine how thrilled he was when I showed up at his house, dating his younger sister.

The worst thing that happened that first semester was my GPA. That and some guidance counselor recommended rehab instead of college.

After working some dead-end jobs, I eventually went back to college. Not so much because I was into higher education but rather because Steve's sister went away to school in Binghamton and invited me to go live with her. If I was gonna live in some upstate New York college town I might as well go to college, right? And it beat delivering refrigerators. Now I'm not what you'd call a morning person or particularly studious. Getting my kicks has always been more important than worrying about the consequences. About the only classes I ever did well in were the ones that revolved around writing like english or journalism or modern literature. The writing courses saved my GPA and come in handy later on.

From my teens through current, I've always written. I've kept sloppy journals, penciled outlines, jotted notes, and hunted and pecked short stories on a genuine typewriter. I struggle with tenses, mutilate spelling, and my grammar is abysmal. I know the ways of wite-out. If someone else happened upon my writings and dug it then fine but the act of writing has always been like a personal exorcism where only I can release whatever it is inside me that needs freeing. Maybe I can't always share or convey my feelings like other people but under the guise of a fictional story, I can vent or express myself or at least try. Thats what happened in 1986 with a short story called "Without You." Along with a pack of wonderful alcoholic degenerates, I was living in a place off Santa Monica Blvd known as "Hell House." I was 22 and bullet proof. During this time I witnessed something that inspired me to write a story about a musician who writes a love song only to be haunted be his own fame. His success becomes a curse that drives him toward suicide. I nervously gave this story to Axl hoping he'd get the message, the warning. He did and since he ever so kindly acknowledged me at the end of the "November Rain" video, that's essentially how I landed my book deal for The Language Of Fear.

I write a lot of words. Sometimes they stick.