For as long as I can remember life’s been full of hardship, my parents were both drug addicts and alcoholics and would abandon me for long periods of time on my own from a very young age. Because of this I fell into trouble fast and never had any real purpose or direction in my life – on the upside I grew into an independent person very quickly.
At a young age I was taken away by child services and put into a lot of different foster homes until at long last I managed to escape and make it on my own in the world. I lived on the street for a few years looking after my little brother until we were both apprehended and taken into the custody of our grand parents. After living with them for a couple of years I stole a comic book from a newsagency because I thought it “looked cool.”
That day changed my life forever. The comic I picked up was a Spider-man comic that would later become Spider-man: The Lost Years #0. In this book I read about a man who would later come to be known as Ben Reilly – who when faced with nothing, even the loss of his own self overcame his anger and bitterness and lived selflessly for others.
I had never been so moved in all my life – I started doing odd jobs to earn money so I didn’t have to steal the comic books anymore and before I knew it I had over ten years worth of comic books.
I still didn’t know what to do with my life though – as soon as the government stopped paying for my support and school my grandparents kicked me out of my home to fend for myself.
I was 16 and things were rough, harder then I remember them being but I managed to fake having a place and keep myself clean enough that I could work and with the help of some old friends I was able to get my affairs in order.
The problem was I had no direction in my life – I didn’t know what to do or where to start so I sort love and my place in the world, I worked hard and got money and travelled the world experiencing my share of heart break until like something out of a movie I found myself penniless and stuck back in my small country town Grafton scraping buy.
After that it was hard again – there was a lot of times I wished I had betrayed my ideals, just given in and gone along with the crowds, because more then anything I hated and feared being alone.
Though through happenstance and miracle things started to fall into place and I took one last adventure, to Jersey of all places!
It was the greatest time of my life, once I set down on American soil I felt like I belonged everything was amazing and it only got better from there. I found love and family - For the first time in my life I was surrounded by people who cared about me. Then comics happened again, old memories and good times came back, I looked at my life and spent hours hunting online so I could find J.M Demattesis and thank him for the life changing story he had written all those years before.
He replied to my e-mail and we started talking and again he filled me with inspiration, he told me that he believed in me and that I could live out my dreams.
Newly Convicted I set about chasing my dream – I hope to one day work for Marvel Comics Spider-man Group and write the kind of stories that helped me break the chains and become the man I am today and I am willing to do whatever it takes to make that dream a reality!