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Mandypants
Austin, Texas USA
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REPORTS:
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I arrived on August, 15th 1983 around 10pm. I was born Mandy, named after my grandmother. I was born in Lubbock, Texas to Jim and Terry. I'm the youngest of four children. We are all half brothers and sisters, but we were not raised to call or think of one another in that way.
I have two brothers, and one sister, the youngest of which is my sister, being 7 years my elder.
We lived in East Texas in a tiny town called Grand Saline. On my 3rd birthday, we moved to an equally small town called Post, in West Texas. This was my home until I reached 2nd grade. My best friend was a Hispanic boy named Jamie. He lived a couple of houses down from me, and we lived across the street from the high school football field. We spend all of our time playing football. As I got older, and by older I mean 5 or 6, I would watch my brothers and sister go to school, and sit out on the porch with my backpack and mock school work. I pretended to get up and go to school every morning, the front porch is as far as I got. Both of my brothers played football, I always sat on my front porch and watched them practice, pretending to play along with them. I was a major tomboy. Post is also where I received my first kiss. His name was Ryan, and me and two of my friends were sitting at a round table at daycare and he walked in circles around the table kissing all three of us. SO ROMANTIC.
When I reached 2nd grade, we moved to Lubbock Texas. My dad started his career at the local newspaper and my mom became a hair dresser. When I got to school, all the kids had already learned cursive, but in Post we hadn't started learning it yet-- to this day my cursive is TERRIBLE.
I started hanging out with more girls in Lubbock, but never felt like I fit in anywhere. This was the case until high school. Junior high was an uncomfortable, awkward blur of puberty and materialism.
High School was a little better. I started hanging out with a girl named Lindsay and we were completely inseparable. We listened to a lot of punk rock, got jobs at the mall. I dated a guy a couple of years older than me that did a lot of emotional damage. He cheated on my a lot, which sort of set the stage for my relationships with guys. I had a difficult time trusting people. Our relationship ended with him forcing himself on me and my entire school hearing all about it, through a "friend" with a love for gossip. I was a terrible brat, and so mean to my poor parents. I still didn't have many friends that were girls, and this just freaked my parents out. With the exception of Lindsay and a few other girls, I always ran around with boys.
I started dating one of my really good friends my junior year. His name was Brandon, he was one of the nicest guys I've ever known. High school was mostly me and Brandon and Lindsay hanging out. We had a little group of friends and we all had lockers together, and we all loved punk music.
We were so lame.
Graduation came, and me and Brandon moved in together. We smoked a lot of pot and drank almost every night. The previous mentioned emotional damage came in to play a lot around this time. I was convinced he was lying to me, and probably cheating on me as well. I developed some pretty bad anger problems. I would just snap.
I moved out. I moved to Abilene with a guy I hardly knew, which was probably the biggest mistake of my life at that point. We fought like crazy and drank all the time. I moved back to Lubbock, and started hanging out with his best friend, Jake.
I moved in to my own apartment and I thought I was pretty happy. I had two cats, and tons of friends. We drank constantly. Me and Jake got closer and closer and closer, but I was still dating his best friend.
After a few years of total bullshit drama, me and Jake were finally free of him and comfortable with our relationship. We moved in together and started our lives together.
I cut way down on the drinking when I saw it wasn't getting me anywhere. I started drawing and painting a lot.
A few years later, we got married. We've been married for almost two years now and I can honestly say it's the best choice I've ever made for myself.
Last month we decided to get out of Lubbock, so we moved to Austin. We both really, really love it here. I'm so much happier than I ever thought I could be. This year I plan to go to school for my degree in graphic design.
This is my life so far.
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