chris' homeostatic condition is maintained by numerous sensors that allow for the body to function optimally, even when averse conditions exist.
the first house chris lived in in somerset was a small victorian home, that was a 'fixer upper'. the house was located in the town, but there were large fields full of cows surrounding the area. chris and step-brother jessee james enjoyed trying to ride the cows, especially the smaller ones. chris' first memory of killing something is around this time, when he killed a small bird with multiple shots from a bb gun. in fact, he remembers shooting it numerous times, even after it was dead, just to make sure. chris hasn't killed anything recently, and is currently an 'anti-gun nut'.
another malevolent memory of chris' occured in the cellar beneath the house. the cellar was old, dusty, and unused and the children played in it. chris' mom was a school teacher and had her halloween decorations stored in the basement. chris found fake blood and drenched himself in it, and set up some of the decorations to make it look like they killed him, then yelled for help and played dead. april, a step-sister, found him and began screaming loudly, until she heard chris' giggles, then became rather angry with chris.
when chris was in 4th grade, his mother remarried a man named john, and they moved to the east side of somerset, just outside of town. the house was surrounded by many acres of texas scrubland savannah, with few trees and tall grasses and weeds. the house was a bit odd, as it had been given several not so well thought out additions at different times, probably during the late '70's to mid '80's, and probably by a backwoods contractor. it was indeed a grotto of many corners and mysteries.
the house was struck by lightning once, while the family slept. there was a tall cedar tree at the southeast corner of the house which attracted lightning, and brought it down into chris' mom's room, making a large hole in her wall above her head. the lightning came into the house parallel to the ground, but came down the tree perpindicular to the ground. it fried many of the electrical outlets and wires in the house, but everything still worked.
chris attended stevenson middle school in northwest san antonio in the 8th grade and moved to john marshall high school, where he eventually graduated in 1994. the 8th grade was perhaps the most awkward experience of chris' life, as he had begun attendence at a new school at perhaps the most awkward stage of anyone's life. he played with the football boys and desired to be "down" with the "popular" kids, who enjoyed making fun of chris. chris' creators soon found out about the making fun of thing and implanted devices in those that made fun of chris that would never allow them to leave san antonio. many would be cursed with the homeward boundedness that keeps them there to this very day.
ok, so back to the history. the college years. in 1994, a few months after graduation and serving duties at a local go-kart track, chris headed northeast for sunny san marcos, tx, and southwest texas state university. chris entered as an eager beaver biology major, and soon discovered (in part due to a crass old teacher) that biology was not a favorable mode of study. chris had a romantic recollection of reading all those fun national geographic at mimi and papa's house, took a geography course and declared his new found love quickly.
j.a. was a lecturer at SWT at the time and taught chris' first world geography class. a lovely young cajun looking lass was the first person to get chris to go to class everyday so he could check here out. she talked about the geography of music and knew more about public enemy and bongwater than chris, giving him instant erections everytime she spoke. chris would return to his dorm room immediately after class and dream of her teaching him about the geography of sex. soon she and chris would begin to explore the world of sex together and would turn chris into an experienced man. that dream never came true and chris began hounding the girls of falls hall instead and soliciting them for sexual experiments, to no avail. i can't think of how many hours chris spent in 1994-5 in the cafeteria mentally undressing and imagining love affairs on deserted islands with most of the women that walked by. oh, that gives me chills just thinking about it....
the first two years at swt were pretty confusing for chris. chris' first thoughts about a world outside of his mind began to develop, and chris began to get curious about music, drugs, and, well, music and drugs. the christmas break of freshman year was chris' first time of heavy experimentation with THC, as a friend of his was endowed with quite a quantity of the "purple plutonic bubonic chronic" and a certain 4 foot tall apparatus. chris' first experiences were with Humboldt County's finest products, getting him spoiled early in his career. most of the break was spent staring at wall's at his friend's apartment and eating mass quantities of products from Lansing's own Mr. Taco. chris returned to Texas with a different outlook on life.
times changed the 2nd semester. after living with self-absorbed asshole for the fall, chris luckily broke ties and moved away. the first month was spent on the floor in the neighbor's room with two fellows from a small town on the texas coast that fancied a drink. chris and his new friends soon began frequenting the local convenience store to try to get a couple of 20 packs of lone star and hole up in the room and experiment with alcohol tolerances. the room soon grew too small for the three men and their habits and chris moved along, drinking 20 packs of lone star alone. by chris' third semester, he had a 3'x3' lone star sticker plastered to his door to alert any passersby of his love for the product.
indeed, the ladies of Falls Hall found out where the sugar was at, realizing it was not behind a door with a 3'x3' lone star sticker plastered to it. chris became distraught, confused, and soon enough, happy with being distraught and confused. the summer after freshman year, chris made a trek to the mighty New York City, and soon realized his love for large, dense, urban environments, of which chris has yet to live in. nonetheless, this urban love influenced chris to learn what academic geographers had to say about large urban areas, a learning process which continues to this very moment, as chris waits for arcview GIS census tract files to unzip themselves (quite a time consuming process).
the second year of college found chris taking even more geography classes. it was also during this year in particular that chris began to realize there was a wide world open outside of the small box he had kept himself in for so long. his first revelation came with the realization that there was such a thing called commercial music that kept the drolling masses appeased, as the latest young pop star to come from aberdeen, washington or tucson, arizona or grand rapids, michigan was played incessantly on the commericial format radio. it was at this crucial time that chris discovered non-commercial format radio and the rest was dowhill. chris chastized his dorm-mates for listening to "commercial music" while they hummed away at the latest tune.
chris soon found his way across the street to the local independent record shop, amazed by the number of vinyl records hanging from the ceiling and began exploring the alternatives to alternatives. soon the music collection began to grow and grow and grow, only to take on a life of its own. chris soon began to extrapolate his knowledge of non-commercial forms of music to other aspects of his life, realizing that he lived in a big fucking corporate owned and driven marketplace ruled by a cabal of rich white men. soon chris realized those public enemy lyrics he sung along to so many times actually had meaning, and a very powerful meaning at that. everything about the world began to bother chris and he soon fell off the face of the earth.
when chris returned, it was the end of spring semester and grandma gert passed away in michigan and chris was summoned to be a pall bearer. chris always toyed with the idea of moving to michigan, and found just the right opportunity to spend some time there when he bought a variable return ticket. it was at this very time, in the summer of 1996, that everything would change. chris decided to stay for the summer and even thought about enrolling at one of the local state universities, western michigan university, where his sister abby attended school. the deal was sealed soon after chris fell in love with kari, who was also a proud bronco at the time.
during this time on forest street, chris continued to date kari. many hours were spent on forest street and stanwood street eating anything with raspberries and playing endless games of dr mario with kelly. kari showed chris more of the world than he had ever seen. from the pristine beauty of the house in munising on lake superior to the golden gate, kari and chris made the best of these great states and once even ran into chelsea clinton at a dave matthews band concert in the bay area.
kari was a sharp one and a keeper at that, only kari was light years ahead of chris in maturity and chris still had some wild oats to sow. now that the bad times are past, chris wishes kari the best as she continues her new life with darren and a degree in genetic counseling.
kari introduced chris to a wild bunch of people, some of which he still keeps in regular touch with. chris was shy at first around these new friends and took quite some time to adjust to them and learn to love them. after living on forest street for a semester, chris moved to elmwood street, located in kalamazoo's most beautiful neighborhood. it was there that chris taped 11 vhs cassettes of the simpsons. chris and steve spent many hours dissecting the meaning of life vis-a-vis the simpsons.