The Biography of a USMER Pt. 4 -- *Mike*

Pt. 4

So I moved with my parents out to rural Menifee, CA. It was October 1989, and my parents were terribly poor. Having just quit drugs, they were trying to get on to their feet and establish a new life for them, for me, and for my sister. We moved into an old house on my grandmother's acre property (my father's mother), this house is still there to this day, fixed up nice with all the original architecture, orignal doors, windows, skeleton key locks, and everything, I often stay the night there with my uncle, I like the place now:). But back then it was condemned. Dating back to the 1920s, the small house had no heat or air conditioning, it was terribly hot in the summer, when the temperature often hit 110, and terribly cold in the winter, when the temperature often dipped below 30. The only way to heat the house was an old woodburning stove. There was no plumbing, poor electricity that only worked sometimes, an old clawfoot tub in the bathroom, and an ancient toilet and equally ancient bathroom sink in the bathroom. And, you guessed it, neither worked. The kitchen was empty (no oven, fridge, or microwave) nothing except empty cupboards and an old table right in the center stocked with canned goods, our only food at the time. Our lives were probably quite similar to those of the first people who lived in the house back in the twenties! Luckily my grandmother who lived next door had all those things, and she helped us out. If it wasn't for her, we probably would have went without food, lord knows she helped my parents get foodstamps.

I didn't like it that much there, I was terrified of the old house, and liked living in an old rundown house in the boondocks even less after watching Pet Sematary and Evil Dead (which would later become favorites of mine) at my grandmother's house next door! As far as I was concerned it was haunted and infested with all sorts of foul demons and monsters. There were no streetlights, and it got black as coal at night. The huge, old eucalyptus towering over grandma's property didn't help matters either. I wanted to go back to the city, but that wasn't going to happen. Eventually I got used to it. In early 1990 I was enrolled in school again.

Eventually we left the old house and moved 20 miles west into a room in a junky, rundown motel in Lake Elsinore. It wasn't nice, but it was better than the previous conditions. We lived there for a few months and then dad found work again, in his area of expertise, the Machinist industry. We moved 20 miles south into a nice apartment in Murrieta, CA. It was much better than the previous conditions, and at the time, definately the best place I had ever lived with my parents. We lived here until late 1990 and then moved about 15 miles north into apartments in Sun City, Ca, convienently located only a few miles north of my Grandmother's house, whose property we first lived on coming into the area. Around this time I switched to a better school, and my grades were excellent, always mostly A's. I still had problems, I still was quite unusual, but I was much better now, and even started to make friends at school. Life was good, dad was bring in the money, and both my parents had matured and grown up finally. I was getting along well with my younger sister, who was 3 1/2 at the time. At the time I was 8 going on 9.

To Be Continued...

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