I left afraid from the ties you severed and I thought best friends meant friends forever.
Past (1985 - 2005)
I grew up in south Florida in West Palm Beach. I lived there my entire life. After experiencing a few harsh winters where I am now, it's no wonder why everyone wants to move down there. Winter sucks! My parents got divorced when I was 4 years old so I lived with my Mom pretty my entire childhood. I never had any siblings while growing up, so it was pretty lame some days. I usually spent the summer with my Dad doing work I did not feel like doing but made me a better person for doing it anyway.
I went to Lake Worth Community High School in a town they call "Lake Worthless" due to its extremely ghetto appearance in certain parts. I was a member of the Air Force Junior ROTC unit at the school in addition to Civil Air Patrol. I founded a drill team called the Trojan Force Honor Guard which went on to win a national championship. Several of the members of that team are some of my best friends til this day. I also ran cross country, track, and participated in other activities such as National Honor Society. I had no date for prom.
I spent my high school career working to get into the United States Air Force Academy, and I did. I wanted to be a pilot in the Air Force and make the military my career. Unfortunately, I could not serve my country because it was determined in my last semester of my senior year during a routine sports physical that I have some sort of benign (harmless) kidney condition that's genetic. To say the least, it was pretty devestating to have worked so hard for so long and then end up with nothing, but everything happens for a reason right?
In the end, I am grateful for the experience because you can never truly understand what loss is if you never lose something you care about. It also gave me a unique experience at an early age that I wouldn't trade for anything. Without my experience(s) in high school while in ROTC, I don't think I'd be where I am today. It made me a leader and a strong person. I came into high school uncertain and shy, and left uncertain but determined.
After high school I moved to Cincinnati, Ohio where my Father lives. I "started" school at a local university called Northern Kentucky University. The enrollment is about 16K students, so it's pretty small compared to places most of my friends went. I didn't kno anyone when I moved. I felt lost and confused most days during that first semester of college. I saw an ad in the school paper for a new fraternity that was starting up, Sigma Phi Epsilon. I met with the representative from the headquarters and joined. I was an active member until the fall of 2005 when I moved again. My original idea for what I wanted to major in was computer science, but that changed quickly when I found out how much math (I suck at numbers) is involved in that field.
After a lot of thinking about how to get my fucked up life back on track after the military stuff denied me, I considered going into the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and making it my career. That too changed as I did not want to takwe the risk of working another 4 years only to be denied again by yet another government agency.
It was during this time that I somehow began doing graphic and web design stuff. Working with local bands in south Florida where I went back to visit often, I started designing stuff like t-shirts and websites for them for some money or free CDs. I wasn't really into music until after high school, and somehow I became very attached to it. Music is life. I don't know how I could go a day without listening to a good rock song or an acoustic jam.
Present (2005 - 2006)
It was in the summer of 2005 that I started a company called Chapter Zero with an old friend from high school, John "Ricky" Cornell. To start the company, I went to Connecticut (against my Father's will) where he had been attending school and we got an apartment inside a house in Bloomfield, CT. We bought a big bag of rice and worked pretty much all day every day to get the company going. Soon we had a few more people on the team, and by the end of the summer we had over 300 clients, an investor, and had relocated Ricky to New York City in preperation for opening an office there in 2006.
After the summer ended, I went back to Cincinnati and started school again in the Fall of 2005. I changed my major to business administration with a minor in graphic design. Between the amount of work I was doing for Chapter Zero, my classes, and my requirements at home, I just about died trying to do it all. By the end of the semester, I was worn out. I had little energy or motivation to do anything beyond sleeping and I had some sort of panic attack one day related to stress and the consumption of large amounts of caffeine in a short amount of time.
To my surprise, my Father suggested that I make a decision to put school (or the company) on hold. He agreed that I could no longer go on sleeping 3 hours a night working the way I was. Ironically, he works the same sort of hours, but I guess it helps him understand the anguish it can cause someone after a period of time. After a lot of thinking, that's what I did. When it came time to register for classes for spring 2006, I didn't. I packed up all my stuff into my car and left Cincinnati for Jersey City, NJ (where I live today) with Ricky. Aside from living in Connecticut the previous summer, I had never "lived on my own", so the past few months have been quite an experience in a place they say "only the strong survive" because it's true. New Jersey can be a real bitch!
Today, Chapter Zero consumes my personal and professional life. The company has grown beyond our wildest dreams and continues to expand at a rapid pace. We have taken the music industry by storm with Chapter Zero Entertainment and Chapter Zero Hosting, two of our most popular divisions. We work with some of the biggest bands and record labels in the world, yet we've done no marketing or promotion beyond this site, MySpace. It really is amazing, but I guess hard work pays off even if it takes a couple tries.
Future (2006 - )
Coming soon...
