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Lived To Tell The Tale
I found this site while lookin' around to see what folks that have been where I have been are doing. People I know now think I should write a book about where I've been. I try to tell them it's not an unusual life. There's lot's of folks been there, I just got lucky to live long enough to get out.

I grew up innercity, it doesn't matter which one, it's all the same. I saw my first friend killed in a drive-by when I was six, I didn't stop seein' that shit until I got all the way out at 24.

I grew up in the projects...just another crazy half-breed in a violent drunks house. I started hangin' on the streets when I was 7 with my friends. We all came from fucked up homes and nobody gave a shit if we came home or not. Got locked up in every juvenile detention center and camp out there until I really screwed up and got time in the Youth Authority. Got out when I was 13 even more messed up than I was goin' in. Now I really didn't care if I lived or died. Did any drugs I could get my hands on, stole whatever I wanted, fightin' anybody looked at me sideways.

By 15 I quit going home at all, I took the last beating I'd ever take from my old man. I'd been shot at, stabbed, beat and left for dead. I was tired and felt 100 years old. I'd been livin' on anger for so long I didn't know anything else but it was time for a change. I couldn't keep playin' the game. By then I'd been with 11 friends when they died on the streets, shot, stabbed, beat, od'd, run over, jumped seen it all. I'd done the same to others. Same ol' story...maybe just happened a decade or two before some of you.

I finally decided to get it together or there was no way I'd see 16. I started going to school lived out of my car (a piece of shit...but I bought it)and even graduated. That was 20 years ago now. Now I'm a college grad and work as far from a city as I can get.

The nightmares of the early years are still there, I don't suppose they'll ever go away. I try to help other folks from the 'hood where I can. Good to see others trying to change their lives...it's worth it...trust me. Myself and one other are the only one's left alive from our old crew. Glad to know this site's out there. I'll be passin' the word.

Thanks! Lito