Once A Hockey Whore....

So from the looks of it, you wanted to know more!

How did I become a hockey-whore? Well, it was a wintery night in 1998, when I discovered the glorious sport of hockey and haven't been the same since. My best friends, Aimee and Mike, and I, who were all very much into hockey, coined the nickname "hockey whore" for each other. So here I am at your service - Sasha the hockey whore.

I know the Internet needs another website filled with self-absorbed drivel like it needs another porn site but hey, I paid for the place, I might as well get my money's worth. It's kinda nice having your own little site - filled with crap about you ... and now I have a real one - done with good old HTML and everything. (I'm learning the other crap ... it'll eventually be added.)

Sooo... welcome to my website! You won't find anything grand here - basically random crap about me, meanderings about silly stuff and babblings about my day to day life. I promise, your IQ won't go up or down while visiting here. Well, it might go down a little.

So what about me besides hockey? I live in the California Bay Area and have been living here since 1989 without any plans of moving at the moment. Not quite sure I'll be a Bay Arean for life but the area definitely has it's perks. Living here for such a long time is quite a change from when I was a kid and we moved all the time. I was born in Pensacola, Florida on a good ol' military base but was shortly moved to the Northwest (Idaho/Washington area) and grew up in that general region. In my early teens, we moved to Vermont, which is a BEAUTIFUL area. I loved the old covered bridges and the changing of the leaves in the fall but attitudes on the East Coast are way different from the West Coast. It's funny how people can be so different but live in the same country. But here I am now, quite by accident in the California Bay Area.

Most of the pictures here are of me ... and they haven't been drastically changes with Photoshop, so you'll get just another average girl. As soon as I figure out how to make myself look like a Playboy model, I'll post more. But yea... that's me below - when I was sweet and innocent. A lot has happened since then because I'm definitely not sweet and innocent anymore.

Ever look at your baby pictures and think how little and cute you were back then? And then you look in the mirror and wonder what the hell happened? Well ... I do!

Time certainly does fly and here I am ... all growed up. Or I'm supposed to be. Who really wants to grow up? I know I sure don't!!

Most of these pictures of me were taken at my grandparent's house in Malden, WA. Although I don't remember a lot of my childhood, I do remember that bathroom! It was painted this seventies pink and absolutely huge. It might be that I remember it being huge because I was little... but who knows. Don't really care that much to travel to the middle of nowhere to find out.

What memories I do have of growing up, they weren't exactly fond ones. In fact, one thing I *do* remember about being a kid, is I definitely wanted to be a grown up. It's amusing to hear how people's childhoods vary so much. Some people remember it fondly, almost as if they long to be a kid again. But others, like myself, hated being a kid and couldn't wait to grow up.

There was so much wrong with my childhood, so that when I witnessed what my friends' lives were like, I figured out my parents weren't exactly normal. I realize that no one's life is perfect but being a kid was as close to hell as I think I'll experience. But then again, my life isn't quite over so there is a possibility of it getting worse ... give me a second, I need some wood to knock on.

This site isn't a pity party, I swear... I'm just rambling a little bit about my childhood. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all bad growing up... it's just nothing I long to relive. And my childhood makes me seriously wonder if I want to have kids ever. At the moment, I'm leaning towards no and have been for quite a while. It's not that I think I'd repeat my parent's faults, the truth is I would probably would be a fantastic mom! But all in all, I don't have a lot of faith in the stupid people who are going to be running the world in 50 or 100 years and I really don't want to leave anyone behind to suffer it. That and there is sooo much I want to do with my life. But ... if kids are in my future, planned or accidentally, I definitely know how a parent **shouldn't** be.

So yea, my life story is a little bit of a drama. At times I look at it and think I'm a character right out of a day time soap or something. I haven't been buried alive though ...

Basically, it started out with my biological mother, Mary, deciding she didn't want to be a mother and bailed on my brother and I, at the age of 11 months. I'm sure there is a lot more to it than that but that is the story my grandparents and aunt gave us. I'm fairly certain that my biological father, Alan, was a big part of the equation because he was a raging alcoholic with a temper and a love of violence. More than likely, he beat her up a few times. But my family, being in the constant state of denial said she just bailed.

My father was still in the Navy, so he couldn't take care of us and we ended up in the care of my paternal grandparents. That wasn't a bad thing but my grandparents did use my brother and me in their game of "fuck you" to one another. My grandfather spoiled me rotten, my grandmother spoiled my brother rotten. I guess overall, my entire family has no idea how to treat the people they love very well. With any luck, I'm going to be the first to break the habit.

So for a few years, my grandmother used my brother as her pawn and my grandfather used me in their little game basically turning us both into little shits. I was spoiled rotten and got away with murder while my brother was punished for the most minor of things by my grandfather. I would be willing to bet that's where our sibling rivalry started. Sadly, at the age of 5, my beloved grandpa died of an embolism, leaving me with the enemy he had used me against. Let's just say my grandmother never forgot and always viewed me as the demon spawn - even until the day she died.

After Grandpa's death, there was this huge question of what to do with us. My Aunt Candy (my father's sister) and Uncle Bob stepped up and took us in. Believe me, I know how lucky my brother and I weren't turned over to the State and grew up in foster homes but there is always a trade off.

I don't remember much because I was only 5 but my aunt and uncle owned a wheat farm in Washington. It was pretty interesting to grow up there as a kid. What I do remember is we used to have a ton of barn cats ... and a skunk too (that story later) but the most memorable is harvest time. We had a CB radio to contact the combines and trucks during harvest and I remember I was "Little Gopher" on the CB. My job was to sit and play near the CB while my mom did mom stuff, just in case my uncle (Big Green Giant) called in. It is an amusing memory...

Basically though, as the story of my life progressed, my aunt really shouldn't have been allowed to have kids. Although she never beat me up like my biological father did later in life, she did verbally abuse me my entire childhood. The most interesting thing about coming from a fucked up childhood is that when you are exposed to something that is "normal", the aftermath can go either way. You can either be in huge denial and only feel right in the fucked up environment or realize how bad of a situation you are in. After I spent the summer with my best friend and her family, things got pretty ugly when I went home before school started. I came to the realization that I was tired of being treated like crap.

When I went to some friends' parents for help, they took me in but the law stepped in as well. Since I was never legally adopted by my aunt and uncle, I was to be returned to my biological dad who magically appeared during this time. He basically heard through the family that I was a horrible kid and stepped in to "set things right". At that point, I didn't want to go back to my aunt and uncle at any cost, so I eagerly went to my biological dad. When you think things suck, don't worry... they can always get worse!

And that's what happened with him... he was an alchoholic, pot head and basic sicko. After he beat me up a couple times, molested me on a couple occasions and constantly threatened me with turning me over to foster care. After all of this, I pretty much figured I'd do better off on my own out in the world of stangers. And low and behold... I was! So at the young age of 15, I ran away from home.

In the picture to the right, my uncle, my brother and me are standing on the dock at our lake cabin after one of our many fishing trips. We used to have a lake cabin in Idaho that we would go visit on vacations and during the summer. It was so much fun up there. I loved going fishing with my uncle, it was one of the two things that we ever did together. Fishing and helping him in his carpentry shop or at the building sites were two of the things we bonded at. He was an excellent carpenter... probably still is but I don't really know because I basically stopped all contact about eightsix years ago with any of my family.

I still like fishing though. And I still have a love for architecture, home building and renovating thanks to my uncle. In all honesty, I think that even though he was pretty reclusive and withdrawn from the "family", he was probably the only sane one.

As for fishing, I tried deep sea fishing a couple years ago... and it was awesome!! I have wanted to go for quite a while and finally got tired of trying to find someone to go with me. I went Rock Cod fishing and caught over 40 lbs of fish. It was a lot of fun... I'll definitely have to try to go again. I keep saying that I'll go over the summer but summer comes and goes ... and still no fishing. WTF?

Speaking of fishing... and just the quirky way life is ... my old roommate Rich fishes all the time. What's the big deal about that? Well, he won't eat fish! He hates sushi! And he's Japanese! So he spends all this time fishing... only to give it away to his mom. Irony ... gotta love it.