Adversity + Resilience & Determination = Opportunity

Being in track and cross country was great for me. It taught me a lot about perseverance and dedication. For me cross country was definitely a unique experience for me. The biggest race for me was running around the biggest lake in Lakeland. Lake Hollingsworth is massive. It is a 3.2-mile wide lake. Just try to imagine running around this lake three times. That is close to 10 miles. Just going around one time all most took me an hour to run.

Going through summer school was for me was easy. All I had to do was to take my math and PE classes and all I had to do was pass my summer school and in my senior year, I could work the entire year and graduate from school with all 24 credits. So it is now August of 1990, and school was about to start and all I had to do was go work at McDonald’s for the rest of the school year and graduate !! And that was exactly what I did. I worked at McDonald’s full time as a crew trainer by this time. I was working mornings just to be sure that every semester I was able to at least go to school one day in the semester to show that I was indeed at school. But the school never asked me to do that. So in May of 1991, I was going to be a graduate from Roosevelt Vo-Tech with a 3.5 GPA.

Wow !! So soon after graduation, I took the $3,000 in savings bonds that I had saved up for many years and moved into my first apartment, close not only to my parents but also to McDonald’s as well !! So I was riding my bike to and from work every day. Flash forward six months later and my mom asked me if my sister Marissa could live with me. And I said that she could. For about six more months I had my sister living with me. Then my little niece Cayleigh was born. Then my sister had to move back to my mother’s house to raise her daughter. And then I come to find out at McDonald’s I was being let go due to lack of business and with new management coming into the store. Thankfully, an opportunity came about for me at Outback Steakhouse to open their very first Lakeland location I was on the opening crew. The store manager at the time was Ed Talman. I worked as a dishwasher, prep, working the truck, and busser in my almost 2 years there.

On the homefront, I was really up to my neck in bills. I had been trying to get a solid roommate to help me out in paying the bills and that turned out to be a true life lesson for me. Come to find out that the roommate that I had a warrant out for his arrest and he was stealing from me and was dealing in drugs. So my landlord found out about him and he told me that he needed to go. I did call the sheriff and he was evicted from the apartment. At that point in my life, I was going to lose my apartment. So what Ed Talman did for me was I could live with him and his family to get back on my feet.

While I was living with Ed, my mother reached out to a family member to see about me getting into U.S. Army reserves. In that year, the ASVAB scores were lowered to get more people into the reserves. I even took the trip Macdill Air Force Base in Tampa to start my training, But the Sargent said to me my ASVAB scores were too low for me to get in. So I had to get back on the bus headed back to Lakeland. At this point, Ed and his wife were expanding their family and they needed me to find another place to live. And I was no longer working at Outback. So I went to work at Chilis in Lakeland. And this is where I met my best friend Mike Temple !! He was a busboy like me.

And I by this time I was living from place to place and at one point I was homeless. I was working at the YMCA as a youth basketball and soccer coach and I was a janitor as well. So at this point, I was living with a person who also was working at the YMCA. So I was working at the south side Chili’s and the north side location as well. So the store manager at the South Chili’s restaurant was being replaced because he was retiring, so that meant that all the employees were going either stay or be let go. So I was thankful that I had the opportunity to open up the first Golden Corral in Lakeland later that year.

In fall 1995 I got married to my 1st wife, Melissa, and had only one daughter with her. The only things that Melissa wanted from me at the time was a wedding, to have her named changed, and to have a baby. The way that we met was very unusual. She at the time was already engaged to be married in October of that year. But broke it off when she met me. She was (come to find out later in the relationship) playing her current Fiance for the very same things with him that she would do to me. And he was paying on a car that he never owned. She couldn’t get pregnant from him. So I was so blinded by love that I thought that Melissa was truly in love with me. I was wrong, she was not. Even her best friends told me how badly she treated him.

I went to work for a great leader in David Carpenter who was the store manager. I was working 16 hours days for the first few weeks. I was at Golden Corral for 10 months. I and my best friend Mike Temple was keeping in touch after he left Chili’s and he had moved back to Lakeland after a stint in Tampa for an electronics company. Things were looking great. Mike and I were getting closer as friends. Then he and I went to Terror On Church Street in Orlando. And that is where Mike and I met two great women, Tracy and Susan. Tracy went on to marry Mike. This is where I moved to Orlando to be with Susan. Susan and I only dated for a few months and then separated. So after I separated from Susan I moved once again to a town north of Orlando called Orange City Florida. Mike had an apartment that was in his family so I was able to help him renovate the apartment and live there for free. Then I was there for about 5 months then the apartment was being put for sale and Mike was moving to Orlando to continue his work at CSX railroad. By this time he had put in 10 years with CSX. So I moved to a hotel in Orange City to start living and work at my new job at Chilis and Applebees. And I was working both for a little while.

I soon found a better job a local car wash in Orange City and left Applebees. I was working at Chili’s and the car wash a total of 5 days a week. So when Chili’s had to cut some labor one month I had gotten more hours at the car wash. Then the money was really flowing and I soon left Chilis. So the car wash was great. Until they were under new management and had to lay off some employees. I was one of them. So I went to apply at a restaurant called Beef O’ Brady’s to work for them and that didn’t pan out well. They were only going to work for me two days a week. So I had to turn them down and call my mother and ask her if I can come back home.

So by this time in my life, it was December of 1998 and I was living back at home with my parents and had to go back to work. So I went back to Golden Corral for about six months until I found out that K-Mart was hiring. So I went to work at K-Mart in the garden center and in receiving. This is where I was going to meet my future wife Melinda. Melinda was a pharmacy technician and she was downright special. She did take a liking to me as well and was interested in dating me. So I asked out one day and took her to the movies and that as they say was history! I told my parents that I was going to move and find a new place to live.

During that time with Melinda, these are the businesses that I had the opportunity to work for; McDonald’s, Walmart, Sears, Dillards, Target (North and South Lakeland), Publix warehouse, Petco Pet Supermarket, Lowes, AMC Theater, Mister Car Wash, Regal Auto, A mobile video company call center, Verizon call center, Florida Southern College, Southeastern University, Universal Studios, Outback Steakhouse, Amazon, Solar Homes, Wag, Rover, Fuzzy’s Taco Shop, And my business Bringing Humanity Together.

The first place that we moved into together was Autumnwood apartments in the summer of 1999. We were there for one year and six months. And then we move to a different apartment in south Lakeland. By this time it was early 2001. I was working as an off-campus lawn maintenance worker at Florida Southern College by this time and I loved it! I could be to myself and work. I worked Monday to Friday. I saw some beautiful buildings while I was working there. This college was built by the famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright. He even has a home here in Lakeland that was designed by him too.

September 11, 2001, was a day I will remember forever. I remember in the very place on the campus I was at when the school announced that the school had closed and sent all employees home. It was very surreal, I had to call my wife to come to pick me up and she was sent home early herself. I couldn’t believe what happened that day. Seeing the towers fall and seeing people jumping to their deaths has forever changed me.