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-a dark place
	When i was younger i used to terrified of the unknown, under my bed, a dark coset in the hallway, maybe a monster my mind created. Those were the days honestly, my fears were real to me but not realistic.If i could i would go back to those days where i was safe and of sound mind and all of my "fears" were just mental constructs i think things ould be better, but as of late the things i'm afraid of are becoming and are very real.Sometimes I ask myself if I've become one of the monsters i was afraid of? How do the monsters I've surrounded myself with affect the man that i've become?
	If the boogey man was real he wouldn't be half as terryfying as the everyday people that i come into contact with. In my honest opinion the boogey man is just a personification of the soul or man's true nature. Mans primal attributes have never really left, our eveloution has kept many outdated assets such as; the appendix, adrenaline, and fight or flight.I personally haven't had a need for for any of them but unless I forced myself too. In mixed martial arts you find yourself in a cage next to naked with only the skills you have learned and an opponent who is equally deadly as you.This type of fighting plays on mans savage side there is no flight only fight or die. Death is a very real possiblity if you leave yourself unprotected you could easily leave the ring in a cast, or worse in a body bag. I have found myself in this cage 8 seperate occasions and won each time with a knockout, and sometimes i left with scars, bruises, and broken bones, yet each time i rendered my opponent unresponsive. The fact that i trained myself for years for this moment to hurt another being willingly is enough to be labeled a modern monster, but in this age it takes a monster to make one.
	When i was in middle school i experienced bullying, but not of the normal teasing and being called names every day my life was threatened. Sometimes i "asked" for it by trying to be like everyone else, other days it was completely unwarrented. One time a kid was dared to knock me out as i was coming out of a doorway and up the stairs from lunch literally just joking with my friends as i came out of the door I was given a full powered jab to the jaw that left me in a disorientated stammer. Sure this kid was suspended for 10 days but no further reprecautions were taken. I found myself perpetually in fight after fight and i had never been taught how to defend myself either physically or verbally, honestly i don't know how i got through it.But i made it out of there with little to no permanent physical harm but my psyche was severely damaged and summer of 8th grade year one of my fellow classmates was drowned brutally in a river and it was at this time that i knew i needed to defend myself.
	Freshman and sophomre year at I.C. norcom highschool was of a different experience i suddenly found myself surrounded by some great people, and some true monsters. I think that the first time i ever found myself in the presence of a killer was one of my friends there by the name of antony. antony had come up from louisiana due to some family problems his cousin got murdered for guns,drugs,gangs, whatever the non urban youth imagines inner city African-Americans do. Antony's street name was "killa" and this was something he had earned. antony and i shared a few things in common, we were both from inner cities, intelligent, liked music, smoked on ocasion, and lastly we were both thought of as highly dangerous. One day he took me into a neighborhood called swanson homes, swanson is a degenerate den of standard scum in villany. Everyone their is either on drugs or sells drugs, however theese people were his family he felt safe here it was his second home. The neighbor hood only has one entrance by car lined with several speedbumps and ally ways not accessible by car and it was because of this that portsmouth pd never entures to far into there alone. I stood on the outside of whatever buissiness transactions were being made because i was still young only 15 or 16 and had no interest in money or the corruption it brings. literally everyone and their mother in this neighborhood owned a gun and everyone knew exactly who was in their neighborhood at all times.This place made me feel oddly comfortable like home. Being around people who have killed for money, food, drugs, and survival made me feel more at home than being in my own neighborhood which was on the safer side of town. From a young age i was told that you are the comapany you keep.
	In junor year i came to Western Branch and experienced an entirely new type of monster. in my first week i experienced maybe my second truly racist event. i was sitting in the lunch room around some people i had befriended due to playing magic the gathering with over the summer at the local cardshop borderless games and comics, along with a few students i was unfamiliar with.
one day i came into the lunch room from a line and saw that there was only one seat left and i instinctively took it. A few seconds later i hear, "hey thats my seat". to which i calmly reply " oh sorry it didn't have your name on it" then he asks me "why'd you steal my chair nigger?" and i appaulingly ask him if he kisses his mother with that mouth, to which he tells me his mother taught him such words. with my blackbelts and training in self defense and offense i was less than scared however i was stunned anddid not know how to react. I suddenly found myself in a situation that i did not know how to react too i was brand new to the school so i didnt know if i should fight or report him or if the staff would even do anything. i just got up and removed myself from the situation.Apparently racism was hereditarary and this experience proved to me that monsters can be bred.
	Almost daily i find myself contemplating what kind of person i am and if i am happy with that person. If I could change anything about my past what would it be and would that make me happy? The answer is no. I have zero regrets in life and the person that I am today was born of the events that i experienced. Monsters are fears created by the imagination then personified into a physical form or representation. But in my life monsters are real they are normal everyday people the only difference is if they choose to let it show. sometimes the scariest monsters are the ones who are around you and you never see them coming.To me the most terrifying monster is the one that lies within myself.The day that I become that monster is the day that i start having regrets and develop self hate.My worst fear however, is that i become a monster and don't realize it.Sometimes i think that if everyone took five minutes to contemplate the role they played in others live a viscious cycle coud be stopped.