I was born on April 16th, 1976.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnyUFg9k88Z
That much I know for sure.
The rest? The early years? That’s mostly secondhand. Stories passed down from family who lived it while I was still too young to understand. What I do know is this: when I was three years old, everything changed.
That was the year my parents found out I was visually impaired.
My mother—bless her—struggled with that. She didn’t think she had what it took to raise a blind child. Maybe it scared her. Maybe it overwhelmed her. I don’t hold it against her.
She and my father split up not long after. And from then on, I lived with my dad.
It’s strange to think about it now—how the course of a person’s life can bend before they even know how to spell their name. But even then, even in that moment I don’t remember... God was already writing my story.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡR0ruth0M9c
98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfciwy5Aitu
My dad was a Marine.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhmJWMlNfqs
And that meant he was gone a lot—months at a time. Long stretches where I wouldn’t see him at all.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5wjme0rPRn
Duty first. Country first. Me... somewhere down the list.
Later that same year, he got arrested.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIQeRqioG90
Selling cocaine while in the service.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5TZoIjPeas
Yeah. That happened.
He tried to use me as his get-out-of-jail-free card—told the courts he couldn’t go to prison because he had a blind son to take care of.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡH3Qtl84xwH
As if he had been doing that in the first place.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWCj8sdIrCG
It didn’t work.
While all that was happening, I was stuck. Literally.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKZnY8TKzQy
Stuck in a playpen, day after day. The people he left me with weren’t real caregivers. Not nannies. Not relatives. Just folks meant to watch me while he was gone.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNt5AXP58Nx
But they didn’t raise me. They parked me.
I didn’t even walk until I was four.
That’s not the kind of thing most people admit out loud. But I’m not writing this to impress anyone. I’m writing this because it’s true.98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ784B3LFUtR
And the truth is: from the very start, life was uphill.
But God...98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNWSInsp5Do
He was already climbing it with me.
98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzWOaFRDzUZ
