Dirty Little Secrets

Hmmm..The thought of telling total strangers, and some who know me some of my darkest secrets is a bit scary...and I don't scare easily, so I am going to tell a little story. It may be fact. It may be fiction.
I grew up a little different than most of you. My family and me lived overseas for the first half of my life, we moved about every 2-4yrs.As soon as I met and made new friends, it was time to move again. We were most of the time driven around with guards and always had security around us if we were in public. After about 10-15 yrs traveling, we moved back to the States. I guess you could say that is why I don't get too attached or feel the pain when someone leaves you.
I/we moved to Florida and it seems like this is where I developed into the person I am today. My first day of school I was jumped by three people because I didn't want to play basketball with them. I had always grew up that fights were one on one, but not here...everything goes! And not to mention one is now a world famous UFC fighter now.
I almost got everything I wanted. If I wanted a jet ski, I got it. When tired of that, I got a boat. When I wanted a motorcycle, I got two. One for me, and the other for my friends. And I was the "new guy" in town so I had a few ladies after me as well. I had a cool car, the loudest music in the parking lot, and everything going for me. I then heard that I was getting my parents house for a graduation present. Wooohoo, I was on top of the world! Until the day of Aug 24...Hurricane Andrew. My father was overseas working while my mom and I were home alone. The Cat.5 hurricane hit and destroyed more than just our home. The next day a phone call was made telling my father "You weren't here when I needed you most, I want a divorce!" WOW!! Total shocker! My graduation present of the waterfront home was thrown away with that call. From that point on my mother and me were not too close. A year later she threw me out of the house to move her thirty year old boyfriend in full time. The business I started with her was now all mine, except for the fact she cleaned out the bank account and canceled the license. I was on my own! I found a place to rent (a storm damaged home a friend had) and continued to try to keep my head up. I was struggling just to get by, eating bologna sandwiches, staying home, and getting-.25-cent burgers just to try to get back to normal. But after talking to a friend, we were going to make a change! This was the life I had never known...And never want to feel again. They say you need to hit rock bottom before you want to change.... well this changed me forever!
Change was necessary...and boy did I change! My best friend and me were just talking one day when we started thinking...What do you think that guy does? He never works, has all the cool toys, and all the beautiful women. We made our move. We knew his good friend and started asking a few questions. We got our answer, and now it was time to see if we too could have everything he had. We became friends with him and slowly he began to trust us and tell us how the business was run. This was Miami and if you wanted anything nice and didn’t want to work hard, but take major risks, this was your job. Here, you either did drugs, or sold them. Well, not everyone...but just about everyone I knew smoked pot, so my new lifestyle began.
In little less than a year, we were making double the amount the guy who taught us made. We bought each other gifts like Rolex’s, remote controlled boats, and the biggest gold chains we could find. Yeah, I know STUPID!! But hey, we were making $200-$500 a day and all that while just riding our 4 wheelers and playing. Times were different back then, there was trust! Now there are more snitches than cops. The cops don’t even have to leave their office before another snitch comes and tells them what's going on. But needless to say, I wasn't eating bologna sandwiches anymore!
A few years passed and our original plan exploded into an enterprise, we had people working for us and we making numbers that would take 5-7 years of schooling. But as we were getting bigger, the greed was also coming out. Our friends began to use us, the women knew we were "big timers", and we started to look over our shoulders. By 25, I had 4 cars, 2 trucks, numerous amounts of race boats, 4 wheelers, lived in two different houses, and couldn't even bring my toys home, all the neighbors would have wondered what a 25yr old was doing with all that. So the mystery began. No more fancy clothes, no showing off (unless far away), and my dating life was all secretive. I wasn't allowed to say what I was doing; therefore keeping a constant girlfriend was out of the question! For years I would date multiple people so no one could get too close. Therefore I bring me to how I am today. Or so I think. As the years passed, we were on top of the world, we were envied by most, and hated by the jealous one's who were too scared to take the risk. Was I crazy? Hell yea! But who can say they had $200,000 in their closet, always at least $1,000 in my front pocket, and another $2,000 in my wallet. I knew my days were numbered so I stepped away from that circle of friends...One thing I’ve learned "if you're not with em' , you're against em' " or so they thought. I learned quickly that when you're not on top.... you’re just an average working Joe...No more free VIP tables, free bar tabs, massages two times a week, and hundreds of friends who wanted to hang. Those days were over...I walked away with my stash, a home, business, and I was to become a normal member of society. Hahahhaaa!!! Life sucked! I missed the excitement and rush. It wasn't even about the money, it became almost an addiction and I was in withdrawals! So the adventure continues...
-----To be continued---- (maybe)
The Man