Welcome to The Front Rohe

Where to begin?

I've always been an avid reader. As far back as I can remember it was a passion. As a child I would bury my head in comic books, Tolkien, and other fantasy novels for hours. If I was eating breakfast, I had a book. Lying in bed, I was reading a book. Watching tv? Yep, a book. All of that reading prompted my own desire to write. I was one of those kids that liked the essay part of a test. I can remember smiling when my name was announced over the PA system that I was one of the winners of the school writing contest. It was so much a part of who I was, that I majored in English when I went to college.

I was going to teach high school English, but a bad student teaching experience derailed me in the last year of my education minor. In a weird bit of what I perceived to be unintended reverse sexism, myself and the only other male in the class were sent to student teach at the high school 30 minutes away from our college. All of the female students were placed at the local high school, which was only five minutes away. It was common knowledge that the bigger, out of town school was considered "not as good" of a school. The teacher I was working with all but told me she was only doing it for the free college credits she received to do so. I didn't realize the experience was making me miserable until I yelled at a good friend one day for absolutely no reason. That friend walked in to my room, and said hello. That was it. I snapped at him, he looked at me like I was a crazy person, turned around, and walked back out. I realized right then that I needed to drop the program, and so I did.

I still graduated with my BA in English, but I didn't do much writing for quite a while. I dabbled in writing comic books, but nothing came of it. There's one hardly known comic out there that I had a small hand in, though I wasn't given any credit. After that it was various jobs, mostly retail and sales related, marriage, kids, divorce, and plenty of life lived. I was briefly able to bring some creativity to my job with The Florida Trail Association, though I wouldn't have called it "writing". Eventually, I ended up in car sales, which I still do today. I enjoy the challenge, the interaction with customers, and helping people with the second biggest purchase in a person's life. However, something was missing. Writing.

I've always been a fan of soccer. My dad raised me as a Liverpool fan, though opportunities to watch were limited. I played as a youth, though certainly not well enough to have anything come of it. I bring this up because in 2015, I turned my attention to Major League Soccer (MLS). Almost at the same time, Orlando City Soccer Club was transitioning from the United Soccer League (USL) to MLS. It was perfect timing. I adopted Orlando City as my team and then started scouring the web to learn as much as possible about my new team. I was already familiar with the SBNation family of websites, and found www.themaneland.com. It couldn't have taken very long for me to see the article asking for new contributors to the website, as it is always near the top of the page. I reached out to the editors, submitted some sample writing, and was "hired" on. I put that in quotes, as for the first several years it was something I did purely out of the goodness of my heart, and my love of the beautiful game, since there was no pay involved. Actually, it was something I did because I needed to write again, and it was a chance to write about a topic I was passionate about. I'm now a Senior Columnist and the co-host of the podcast associated with the website. As such, I do get some pay. By some, I mean very little, but it's more than before, and I'm grateful to be a "paid" writer.

Michael Citro is the Mane Land's Managing Editor and the host of the podcast. He has become a friend in our time together, despite being several hours apart geographically. I bring him up, because he recently started his own website, www.michaellikestowrite.com. One of the people who gave me the opportunity to start writing again after so many years, has without intending to do so, inspired me to start a website as well. If it seems like I'm copying him, I am. Of course, I'm only copying him in writing about something other than Orlando City. As much as he and I have in common, I expect you'll see our personal blogs are going to be very, very different. He is an excellent writer, and I thoroughly enjoy reading his stuff. I recommend you give it a read.

Now that I have all of that out of the way, I want to let you know what this blog will be about. Or I should say, what it may be about, as I reserve the right to write about whatever I damn well please. I am a pretty far left on the political scale. I'm an out and proud atheist, who flirts with anti-theism. I am a humanist, and a skeptic. I love comic books, and comic book movies. I love Rock, Irish Punk, and many other genres of music. I'm an environmentalist and a conservationist. I backpack, cycle, and kayak. Some of what I write might piss you off, but hopefully it will also make you think. I will use foul language in some of my writings, as I believe that those words used appropriately are often the perfect words for a given topic. Politics, religion, sex, drugs, and rock 'n roll are all on the table. If any of what I write offends you, feel free to engage me in reasoned responses, but know that evidence is the only way to get me to change my mind. Logical fallacies will be called out immediately and vociferously. What I'm saying is...

If you made it through that last bit, and are still interested in my upcoming blogs, I welcome you wholeheartedly to The Front Rohe.