Life is an aggregate of experiences. These are mine.
Year Month Event
0 [1] Born on the remains of an Indian mound in St. Petersburg, Florida.[2]
1973 First memory: ghostly apparitions rising from the floor of my grandparents’ living room. Perhaps it was a dream. I hope it was a dream.
1974 ♫ discovered Hot Butter Popcorn
1980 October First visit to Kennedy Space Center.
1983 ♫ discovered Planet P Why Me
February Complete Air Force wilderness survival training.
1987 June Graduate high school. Get a job at a surf shop.
1988 April After a gap year in a variety of employments — assembly line worker, warehouse laborer, fish cleaner at the boat docks (I chopped off the heads as they came off the boat), door-to-door salesperson (of fake perfume), telemarketer (of Bahama “vacations”), dishwasher, bus boy — I decide that going to college is not such a bad idea.
1989 ♫ discovered Erich Kunzel Time Warp
September Editor-in-Chief of the TCC student newspaper. Phi Theta Kappa honor society. Buy a Roland U-20 and an 8-track tape mixer.
1990 ♫ discovered Dave Brubeck Time Further Out
January Foundation Scholarship Award, Florida Journalism scholarship, multiple Florida College Press Awards, an award from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association.
September Move to Fort Worth, start work as the creative director of a company called Vitalife.
1991 January Vitalife CEO is a crook — management skips town, and nobody gets paid. My first professional career experience equals not so great.
April Return to Florida. Get a job on a reforestation crew at Pinellas County Park Department; perhaps a job in the woods might be more rewarding.
May Earn my CDL driver’s license. Begin truck hauls between parks. “10-8 to your location, over.”
1992 ♫ discovered John Anderson Seminole Wind
January First archaeology dig with Janus Research. Begin excavations at Moog Midden.[3]
September Take a pause in archaeology assignments to make a road trip out West in the Jeep. Run out of gas in Moscow, Idaho.
1993 March Get work as a seasonal farm laborer. Of the 36 that start, only 14 of us are left uninjured at end of the season. I make it out, and get my pay.
May USFS wildland firefigher Guard School, training as a Smokechaser. Stationed at Powell Ranger Station on the edge of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness.
August Explosion on the fire line. Three months of intensive burn unit rehab.
1994 June Continue college. Transfer to University of South Florida. Work part-time at Janus.
1996 July Internship with U.S. Senator Connie Mack.
December Start work as Legislative Aide (District Liaison) to Florida Senator Charlie Crist.
1997 ♫ discovered Sasha & John Digweed Northern Exposure
December Take ownership of a tiny old hotel from the 1920s with my family. Refurb one of the hotel units as my apartment.
1999 ♫ discovered Kruder & Dorfmeister The K&D Sessions
July Begin coding classes at St. Pete College. Discover my first courses in digital audio workstations.
2001 September Green River expedition. 9/11 happens while we’re on the river — there’s only static-y AM radio reception to find out what’s going on, in the middle of the wilderness, under a sky with no jet trails.
October Open Bayflash, a little web design company, making Flash and Actionscript websites.
2003 ♫ discovered Ten Madison The Dust
2005 May Start taking yoga classes. Begin oil painting. Expand the company client base.
2007 July Tie wrists with Fey at a little church.
2008 December It’s the economic end-of-the-world. Close the business, buy a $1,000 RV, refurbish it with solar panels and satellite internet, then drive off with Fey across America.
2010 ♫ discovered Shpongle Ineffable Mysteries
December Park the RV for one last time in Grangeville, Idaho.[4] Donate it to Goodwill and live for a while in the Rocky Mountains.
2013 January Start a redesign of the website for the Naples Museum of Art and the Naples Philharmonic. Begin an autodidactic education in art and music, using resources from the museum library.[5]
2018 May First art exhibition of my work, Florida Environs at LeMoyne Arts.
2020 ♫ discovered Steve Reich Music for 18 Musicians
April Zombie apocalypse. Buy some audio equipment, catch up on the state of DAWs, and welcome a new Roland into my life, an A-88MKII.
2064 September The future? Not sure. I’d have to consult with the infinite decimal places of an otherwise deterministic universe.