I am of course a work in process, but here are some highlights of my life that may help you to connect the dots.

I was born in 1953 and grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I wrote my first poem in the 9th grade at about the same time my idyllic childhood perspective started to show some cracks in it.

By the time I was 18, it was clearly time to head off to college to use some of the potential that all of my teachers had been saying I had in ample supply. I was just about to do just that when the financial umbilical cord was abruptly severed and I found myself drifting around like an untethered astronaut. At the same time there was something called The Modern Volunteer Army that paid for a lot of education for a few years of service, so in 1972 I enlisted in the US Army to be a Medic. This was not a real swift move since the Vietnam War was still a daily headline, but through some bureaucratic screw-up, I became an Army Food Inspector and that’s probably why I’m still here.

Upon discharge, I attended Penn State University. I loved every minute of that school. Great teachers and a great group of peers enabled me to tap into some of that potential that I’d heard so much about. I was first in my class for three consecutive years. To complete a lifelong dream of becoming a small animal veterinarian, I moved to Davis, California. (Insight: The interviewers at the University of Penn Vet School were very condescending, and besides, the weather’s better out West.) I worked in construction and pumped gas while I established residency and continued my undergraduate work. I graduated from the University of California Veterinary School in 1982.
Visit Jim's VetHouseCalls.net website.

After many years of being tested for long-term compatibility and failing, I met a gal who I guess thought it was easier to marry me than to get a restraining order. Anyway, it’s been a bunch of years and we have a beautiful fifteen-year-old daughter to show for it. Happily, she is exercising her potential at a much earlier age than I did.

So that’s me in a nutshell. Now go buy Heart Quake… It’s a lot more interesting.

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