About Me
I was born in November of 1979. I spent my entire childhood and teenage years in Northeast Ohio, and continue to live there to this day. While I have not taken the effort in order to earn a collegiate degree from an educational institution, I am a firm believer in acquiring knowledge and education throughout one’s life and experiences.
After my graduation from high school in 1998, I did try my hand at collegiate-level education. However, I found that I was more interested in girls and partying, and I continued this activity up to and until September 11, 2001. After such time I decided to join the United States Navy, which was quite a diversion from my hitherto accepted and chosen lifestyle. My thrust into the Armed Forces was more education than I was ready for at that time, but its regimen and organization quickly served as an instigator to realizing the potential that I held within me as a human being.
After having graduated first in my class in 2 out of the 4 of my classes at FLEASWTRACENSD, I went to the fleet (USS JPJ/Higgins out of San Diego) and soon earned a reputation from my immediate supervisors as somebody who could get things done. Further, I reached an unheard of benchmark of attaining the rate of Second Class Petty Officer in only 22 months from my initial enlistment (the typical time period is 4-6 years). While in the Navy, I served on two Western Pacific deployments to the Persian Gulf and visited a myriad of foreign nations from Australia to India to Dubai, as well as many others. Most importantly, I grew to know quite a variety of different characters, many of which I still consider my very good and close friends to this very day. My naval division earned quite a reputation for being one of the best anti-submarine forces in the entire United States Naval Fleet, coming in second-place for the ‘Bloodhound Award’ (I was leading Sonar Supervisor), as well as prosecuting many enemy contacts, providing vital tactical intelligence, and furnishing necessary physical security during my tenure.
As an aside, I often like to describe my time in the military as being full of some of the best times in my life, but that I would never ever do it again. One would have had to experienced it in order to understand what I mean by this statement. And, I am sure that there are more than a few veterans that would completely agree.
After receiving my discharge from the USN, I moved to Los Angeles to try my hand in the film industry as a sound engineer. While I did participate and complete production on a number of projects, I felt that the economy was soon to turn sour, and thus moved back to my home state in order to seek solace amongst my family and friends. My instincts were correct, as the ‘Great Recession’ of 2008 hit very soon afterward. However, during the time from 2004 to the present, I have consistently been engaging in the study of economics, foreign policy and constitutional law. While I am not formally trained in such, it is my belief that one can learn any subject if they have the drive and desire. That is an idea that I still live by to this day.
I currently have found employ as an environmental remediation and demolition professional. While this work is quite physical and is devoid of the mental challenges that I encountered in previous years, I have found that it is made up of a close knit of individuals who truly enjoy their work and take great pride in the same. While it is quite a separation from the constructs of the strict and methodical organization that can only be found in a military environment, I have found many similarities. There is a sense of pride, drive, and the feeling of brotherhood that can nary be found in most any other civilian career. Much like the military, everybody knows their place, and when it comes right down to the nitty-gritty, the men that I have surrounded myself with often work like a well-oiled machine. Those that I work with have embraced the idea of working as a team, which is probably the most important attribute that can be bestowed upon any group of otherwise free-thinking individuals who strive at the attainment of common goals. Taken apart, they all come from many backgrounds, yet when they are put together, they form the embodiment of quite the elite team. For that, I am quite grateful.
After having shared my otherwise private thoughts and studies with a select few of my closest friends and family via email, I decided to bring those ideas and thoughts into the public realm. In doing so, I opened this blog as a test case in order to see if such ideas are viable and/or acceptable to the general public. How long this experiment will continue is contingent upon many variables. However, I do hope that it will serve as a contribution to society as a whole, rather than as a detriment. With that said, only time and reception will tell…..
Regards,
Joe
P.S. The photo on my blog header that shows the setting sun over the water was taken in the Southern Persian Gulf (the SAG for all of you squids). I took probably 1000 pictures of sunsets during my deployments in an attempt to capture the illusive “green flash”. However, the picture that I chose for this blog has always been the one that I remember, due to the complete beauty of it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. Unfortunately, I never did capture, nor did I see that “green flash”.
