MY LIFE SO FAR
I was born in Atlanta Georgia in November of 1960. I grew up in southern Louisiana for the first few years of my life and then lived in southern Mississippi for many years after that. I graduated from high school in Hattiesburg Mississippi. I had not been a good student in high school and was not sure what I wanted to do with my life. Everyone I knew was going to college, so I went to the University of Southern Mississippi (USM) in Hattiesburg.
My first year in college I had a lot of fun and I made a lot of new friends, but I did not study and I did not attend class very regularly. I also learned that my lack of effort in high school was causing me to work a lot harder in college. Many people were finding their first year easy because they had already learned much of the material in high school. At the end of my first year my GPA was 1.0. I decided to leave school and my parents agreed.
I spent one year traveling around the USA with a musical group. This was a positive experience in many ways. I met a lot of different people and saw a lot of different places. However, life on the road can get old fast and I soon wanted to come home. When I returned home, I got a simple job at a service station and settled into this simple lifestyle for a while, but became unsatisfied with this job and wanted to do more with my life. At that time I was studying jazz with a teacher and he was also teaching at Jones County Junior College (JCJC) about 30 miles away. He offered to help me get a scholarship to this school and then I could study music with him full time.
After starting school at JCJC, my music teacher left to go to another school and left me in an unusual situation. I decided to try and make the best of it. During my two years at JCJC, I made a lot of good friends, improved my academic records, and became a better musician. After JCJC I returned to USM to finish my education.
At USM I changed my major from Music Education to English because I wanted to have a job where I could travel and possibly live overseas. Teaching English seemed to me to be the best training for this goal. I enjoyed my undergraduate course and found that languages and literature was something I could understand and enjoy.
After USM, I worked at several simple jobs never really pursuing any particular direction with my life. Eventually I moved to Columbia South Carolina where I intended to study for one year at the Seminary of Columbia Bible College. However, I only completed a few courses and left to work for a medical supply company for about 2 years.
After about 3 years in South Carolina, I entered the MA program in Linguistics at the University of South Carolina (USC). I completed this program and a graduate certification in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). About the time I finished my MA, I got a job offer in Saudi Arabia and I was preparing to go when my mother became very ill. I decided to stay in the USA.
I worked for several years teaching TEFL at USC. During this time I also started my PhD work in Educational Psychology and Research. I also taught courses in Educational Psychology and Physical Education as well as my usual TEFL courses at the English Programs for Internationals (EPI). This was a very busy time in my life, but I enjoyed it very much.
During my graduate-school days, I met my wife, Raquel. We dated in the USA for several months and then she had to return to her country, Brazil. Over the course of 2 years I made several trips there to visit her and we emailed about 2-3 times each day. After two years, we got engaged and we were married in Sao Paulo on March 10, 2000 and in Columbia South Carolina on July 15, 2000.
Within about 3 weeks of our South Carolina ceremony I was offered a job at Zayed University in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). We came to the UAE in August of 2000 for a three-year contract. Three years has gone very fast and we have just signed up for another three years.