RUBBERCHILD-And The Shit Storm Begins CH 1

  I’ve decided to write my life experiences down on paper. I guess I have to start somewhere so here it goes. I just turned 32 and the events of my life have been like a novel. Maybe a shitty one, but a novel nonetheless. I’m now a multi platinum music producer singer/songwriter living in Los Angeles. The industry is dying and my whole life is once again falling apart. Out of all the things that my doctors said to me over the years, only one was consistent: "write it down!" Like many people trying to deal with depression, or as I call it, (The total insanity of realizing we are all completely out of control floating on a rock in the middle of nowhere)... I didn’t listen- at least not until now. I titled the book "Rubber Child". I know, laugh it off! We all know what a rubber child is. But for me, the term has two distinct definitions, and the latter is the fantastic fun bag emotions that comes along with feeling unwanted. And so the story begins.

  I was born on March 24th, 1977 in Binghamton, New York. If you don't know, that's upstate New York. I use to pretend it was near New York City just to try to find some kind of identity but it was just good old Binghamton. My mom was a housewife who grew up in the South. She had a hard upbringing due to her father being a real bastard. Maybe he wasn't literally a bastard but he was an asshole. You get the idea. Her mother was an unemotional woman who-well let’s just say it. Her mother was completely nuts, both her mom and dad were! And it spread to the kiddies. Lucky for me one of these dysfunctional seedlings became my mother. My dad was brought up in Bainbridge, New York, which is basically like living on the moon, every small town is. All the kids talk about is " I'm getting out! I'm breaking free!" It’s almost like a goddamn prison. Everyone knows everything about everyone.

My father was known for shooting his brother in the head with a bow and arrow (His brother did not die, by the way), kicking everyone’s ass at school, and hooking up with all the ladies. Basically he thought he was James Dean. Didn’t James Dean die at like 18? Yeah. Well, this crazy attitude eventually got my old man strong-armed into the Citadel (One floor from hell). My mother and father met on a military base in Goldsboro, North Carolina. How they ended up hooking up is beyond any sick, celestial, Murphy’s Law that’s ever existed but it happened anyway. Damn pheromones. Were talking about two individuals with the most fucked up gene pools in the entire human race. It should have been a natural chemical combustion. It should have been an illegal clinical trial, but instead it was my sister, my brother, and me. Ahhhhh! MOTHER NATURE! I guess I have to give you some type of background on my parent’s roots so the chapters ahead make sense so here we go. My last name is DeClue, which spelled in its original form is DuCloux. Our family name comes from the word nail, or claw. My dad’s grandfather came to NYC from France. And they say that our ancestry comes from cobblers and blacksmiths. Basically poor sea floaters. Anyway, my great grandfather came to New York City as an immigrant. He vowed that none of his kids- better yet, no Declue would ever work a blue collar trade again, because having no money sucks. We would all be bankers, lawyers, doctors, etc. (Damn, getting a little commie on us.) So this is how the saga begins on my father’s side. No free thought, hence the Citadel from the stories I’ve heard was and is PURE HELL. I know I said there was one more floor, but I lied. One fave Citadel story that my dad told me was literally on hell night. Now, in 2008, that is very public due to the fact that the first two women who tried to enter the Citadel just to get worked over, never to return again. Awesome! A balanced institution that brings out the finer qualities of non-biased gender relations between the opposite sex. Whoo hoo. Sign me up, motherfucker! Unfortunately my dad was a spawn of this curriculum and still has a “save the males” sticker on his bumper. Anyway, my dad said that one night of his freshman year the upper classmen woke him out of a dead sleep, which is terrifying in itself. They added to this by screaming in his face and pouring hot tar on his balls. Now getting kicked in the balls is unreal. Getting kicked in the gonads as you get dumped is even worse. But TAR ON THE BALLS! COME ON!! Imagine that shit drying as it squeezes your kid juice into extinction. Imagine chipping away the black chunks in the morning as you muffle cry on the toilet before running 80 miles for no reason.. unthinkable! I asked my dad if he carried out the same brutal actions as those upper classmen. He replied, quite astonishingly that yes he did attend and enjoy hell night as a senior. Human evolution is incredible…it never seizes to amaze me. So this strict regiment of becoming what was said to become of him was part of my dads daily life. He was hard core and meant business. Although I do remember when I was young sharing some tender moments with the him. Their was definitely another side to him. It’s just that when we got older he didn’t know how to exactly show his feelings. Now, my mother was a whole different story. Her family blood line goes back to Lebanon. Her maiden name is Samaha. When she was a child the other kids would tease her and call her "SAMA HA HA HA HA!", cackling all the way back to the classroom. As I said before, her father was a real charmer. I only met him on a few occasions. When I did have the pleasure of meeting this fine fellow he made my brother and I pick out switches, thin green branches from the trees, and proceeded to hit us with them.

Madre was not very popular in school. Her parents pretty much abandoned her when she was young. Just a totally loveless, suckass childhood if you ask me. She still visits her mother on Salter Path Island in N.C. I really haven’t figured out why, except for the fact that obviously she spawned her so no contact could be painful. I don’t know how or when in our society we began to feel the need to reward parents with kindness when they showed no love to us at all. This strange but normal behavior is shared by most dumbass earthlings and I just don’t get it. Some call it forgiveness, some call it unconditional love… I call it, "your parents are pieces of shit and you don’t have the gonads to do anything about it. I know very few people other than myself who tell it like it is. Even if the truth hurts they make believe everything is okay because the illusion is pretty cool. So that’s basically my mother’s side. A distant mother, an obsolete father. A couple of siblings. These two humans, my father raised Catholic with a strong Republican iron fist, and my mother, awkward, quite unpopular, and spoke only when spoken to, fell in love. I can finally see how the two were attracted to each other. Both harbored loneliness, a bitterness if you will for the parents of the tough love generation. Brainwashed by the fifties Norman Rockwell way of life. Believe it or not, I never realized the resemblance until now. But hey that’s why the doctors said, "write it down!" I never asked how they fell in love. Funny enough, I just have a faint vision of watching old home movies. The two of them running around on a sandy beach with a black lab. My mom was beautiful, and her smile made me realize life didn’t suck just yet. My dad looked like your average army brat brought up in the ranks of a military family. But you could see behind his exterior that he had a gentleness that rarely was shown because of emotional shyness. Something he carried around for years. Because remember, in those days men did not cry. Instead they bottled it all up until they exploded in rage, died or both. I’m not going to go on too much about the history of my parents because it will bore the shit out of you.

So they get married, and have three kids. My sister Laura is the oldest. My brother Brian is the middle child. And I'm the youngest. My brother and I are two years apart. My sister is 6 years older than me. I had a brother that was born before me but he died at birth. His gravestone is somewhere in NY. Maybe that’s why they used the rubber. I think I’ve been there but it was too long ago. For some reason I was not supposed to be born. The complications of my dead brother’s birth made the doctors uneasy about Madre having another tot. But my mom went for it anyway. Three kids and three C-sections (Sounds Fun!) We seemed to be a normal family. Taking trips like National Lampoons Vacation. Visiting my grandfather on my dad’s side. Camping and fishing. Everything a family does when they are functioning normally. Weirdly enough, I remember these times quite well and enjoyed myself. We lived in Endicott New York and all was good. We had family and friends down the street. My brother and sister would walk to school. Halloween was fun, and Christmas was even better. Remember when you actually believed in Santa? Granted at first a fat dude sliding down the chimney in a bright red suit chanting turret’s syndrome like slogans and eating my food scared the shit out of me. But after I got the presents it was all gravy. Let’s just say that I definitely got a taste of a real family, a pack, a bond. Strong rooted and amazing. As I grow older, I sometimes wish that I didn’t have any of these experiences because they made my future look bleak, But in the end I’m really glad I experienced the fake holidays. My brother and sister attended a public school called J.F.K. They called it “jail for kids”, and I spent the days at home wondering what the hell school even was. I was alone most of the time, and really had no one to tell me what to do. So I spent my days climbing a tree in the front yard. Basically, I was a wacko. Most people had an imaginary friend, or a stuffed animal, and unbalanced Kevo had this tree. I would speak to it as if it was listening as I jungle jammed around its enormous trunk. I literally did this every day and no I wasn’t smoking pot at 6. Actually, I must have been five because I went to school briefly before we moved. The only thing I remember from this fine institution was the teacher grabbing my hair and shaking me. I’m serious, and I was born in 1977, not the dark ages. I don’t know what a five year old could have done to deserve a good ass kicking, but surely I deserved it because we all know adults don’t make mistakes. Anyway, everything was quite normal until my first real main event. I don’t know what else to call these little pieces of my life. Main events, sagas, bad luck, God hating me, who the hell knows! But this was the beginning of many things that made me who I am today. I still remember the first incident like it was yesterday. My mom, and dad, had been constantly nagging at us kids to be careful when walking around town. There had been a lot of kidnappings, and everyone was a little freaked out. Back in the day your parents could still leave you in the car when they went shopping. I remember them always telling us to blow the horn if someone came after us.

 “Hey kids, we're gonna to go into the grocery store and do some shopping. Were not bringing you little bastards because you're loud and don’t listen to shit. You always make us buy useless crap or cry if we don’t, so were going to leave you in the car. Now kiddies, there’s been a sicko in a van driving around kidnapping kids just like you, so we want you to keep on the alert. If a child murderer forcefully enters the car and violently tries to rip you from your seat just beep this little horn right here until we come out.”

This tends to scare the crap out of a little kid, so we were very aware of the dangers of the outside world. Whether it was checking candy, not talking to strangers, or not wearing jerseys that had your name on the back we knew it all. Anyway, there was this teenage boy that lived up the street from us, I think his name was Ray. Ray sounds like a fucked up dudes name….. No Travis! His name must have been Travis! I’ve never met a normal Travis. I didn’t know the boy, or man is what he looked like to me, I only saw him around a few times when I gave his mother vegetables from our garden. One day I was hanging out with my tree like any normal young lad when this bastard ran up on me like a bat out of hell. Of course I was scared and ran as fast as I could to the front porch. I tried to open the door but it was locked so I just stood there. The man/boy RayTrav started explaining to me that it was only a joke; he was just messing with me. I felt pretty confident that the man/boy was ok so I let down my guard. Suddenly RayTrav grabbed me, threw me on his shoulder and I was kidnapped. The fear was insane, to this day I think I still have a little bit floating in my spinal fluid slowly releasing panic attacks every so often into my brain. Or maybe that’s just the strong weed. I also couldn’t believe I had been so stupid and was pissed at myself. RayTrav took me way out into the woods and I thought for sure I was a goner. I heard all the stories in my head and bid farewell. After about a half hour of hiking we got to a clearing with a fort, and other teenagers standing around. I could see someone else tied to a wooden post and realized that it was my older brother Brian. Now I was really scared and started crying because my brother was tough as hell, I couldn’t believe they had got him. I remember RayTrav taking matches, lighting them, and holding the flame up to my chin. You could hear the sizzle as the flame started burning the soft skin under my jaw. My brother would blow the flame out and every time he did this they would punch him in the stomach. Between catching his breath he would tell them to eat shit before getting thumped again. I don’t know if it was because I passed out or what but I don’t remember how we got away. Oh yeah that’s because it was 22 years ago, assholes. I do know the boys were caught but I don’t think anything happened to them legally. I just spoke to my brother about this and he was amazed that I remembered. We laughed our asses off when we talked about him blowing out the matches and getting punched in the stomach. After this exciting diabolical, my father got a job in Florida at Chemical Bank. He drove his old brown shitvette all the way down to Rockledge Florida to get ready for us to follow. I was seven and really excited for a change. The only thing I was going to miss was my tree and Mrs. Maestro, the sweet old lady that watched me from time to time. She passed in 2008 and it brought back some of these old memories. Soon my dad was back and it was good to see him. I was looking for an adventure, and I knew we were about to get one. In no time we were all crammed into the Shitvette, and on our way to Florida. The temporary place we lived in while my dad was looking for a house was called Bougen Villa. Like the flower which I recently learned, but this was no flower, this was a shithole and I knew it at seven. Either way we were all together, and that’s all that mattered. I learned to ride a bike for the first time in the parking lot, and my sister got her first of many stitches on the bottom of her foot from stepping on a piece of glass. Around this same time the next major thing happened to me that was pretty amazing in a horrible kind of way. For some stupid reason I got in the habit of defecating outside. I don’t know if it was because I didn’t want to lose momentum in a game or because I was just plain lazy, but I began to do it. I must have been wiping with crazy Florida jungle leaves, because after a few days my ass was itching like crazy, and I was scared as hell. Not for health reasons, but because my mom would turn into a raging southern silverback gorilla from hell if she found out. Soon the itch became unbearable and the worst thing that could happened…happened. Mother noticed me scratching the brown eye. I was doing this little dance hoping that my but cheeks would rub together and take away the itch. This was when I first noticed her stink eye was upon me. I tried to keep up the ass dance but its hotter then hell in Florida and I eventually ran out of steam. Rapidly the itch cam back and I knew that soon I would have to do the dig. It only took a second for Madre to put it all together with her motherly intuition. She started screaming in a high pitched voice, “You’re an animal! A filthy animal!" and then, “WORMS! WORMS have climbed up my babies’ ass!" Ringworm that is, not tape worm, and it was no fun. I was rushed to the doctor and they gave me some massive booster shot right in the buttocks. When my parents took me home they noticed that I was losing color in my face. Soon I was losing consciousness and I actually remember slipping away, coming back and forth from death. It was hazy like in the movies with a shadowy exterior looking over me which I assume was my mother. When I awoke I was paralyzed from the waist down. The doctors said that I was deathly allergic to the medicine they gave me and that they honestly had no idea what was going to happen to me next. Thanks a lot doc, you fucking idiot. I guess he/she wasn’t done with me yet, cause I didn’t die. I was just all fucked up. My legs didn’t work for a few months so I stayed on this brown couch with scratchy fabric watching Sesame Street, and drinking orange juice. I had feared death, my fellow humans, and walked across its line. Now soon after this, I don’t remember why, but my brother and I started going to a babysitter. It didn’t take long before I put myself into a bad situation once again. I was playing in the back yard with my brother when I noticed this little puppy lying down next to the tree. He looked scared, and I felt sorry for the little guy so I decided to get a closer look. My brother had always been scared of dogs but I was pretty cool, and this was just a little puppy what could go wrong? I remember reaching out my hand and this crazy dog jumped up and bit me in the waist. It took a nice chunk out of my right hip and it hurt like hell! I remember my brother running into the house screaming "Kevin got bit by a dog!" But the babysitter didn’t have a dog and neither did the neighbors. When it all came to a head, it turned out the little beast was a woodchuck. But not any old woodchuck, a sick one. That’s why he was sitting so still like a little puppy. Of course, right away my mom freaked out thinking I had rabies and called animal control. They tried to catch the varmint for nearly two hours but had no luck. Legend has it, my mother ran around with a cardboard box and in twenty minutes had the little bastard. Picturing my mom running around, sweating, and swearing, only two months after my worm episode was priceless. Once again I was dragged off to the hospital so they could run tests on me and the dead woodchuck. Lucky enough, the woodchuck didn’t have rabies but I still got some fantastic boosters. And this time they actually made sure I wasn’t allergic to the medicine before injecting it into my body, what a concept! So I’m still alive, my brother and sister think I’m annoying, My mom is fed up, and my dad is tired. A perfect time to say goodbye to Bougen Villa and move into our new house in Rockledge, Florida. I’ll always remember moving into that house because before we moved in, we watched this movie called “The Hand”; I think it was Steven King. The premise was that this guy loses his hand because he was dangling it out the window when a truck passed by and ripped it off. The hand somehow stays alive and starts crawling around killing people. When we bought the house the owner had a hook instead of a hand and it made us all go crazy. Florida was fun for me, I didn’t mind the heat and I was great soccer player. Fishing was also a favorite of mine. My dad use to take us out all the time. On one fine occasion we were out on Bob Horby’s boat, a friend of my dads, and we got lost at sea. We were caught up in a really bad storm and I was shitting my pants. I remember the adults telling us to go downstairs and take cover. We floated in the middle of the darkness in the Atlantic Ocean for hours before the coast guard found us and towed us back in to shore and I was once again happy to be alive. Finally it was time for first grade, and I was about to find out what an institution really was. My school was called Saint Mary’s, it was Catholic, strict, and had a suck ass uniform. My dad liked the uniforms, blue pressed starchy pants, and a white dress shirt tucked in to match, he liked the orderly discipline. I was brought up through the bible stories so sin was part of my daily life. Redemption, confession, the whole thing. Even in the eighties private schools were allowed to hit the kids and I remember on one occasion being slapped right across the face by my teacher. I must have been eight. One of the greatest stories during St Mary’s is my gym class story. They called it P.E and we had it outside on the soccer field unless it rained. Our P.E teacher was crazy, and I mean crazy. This had to be before the screenings because they would never have let him the union today. Anyway he didn’t want to be called by his first name…. oh my god his name was Travis. I swear the crazy bastard's name was Travis. Instead he wanted to be called Coach Barnes and everybody knew it. Nobody messed with him, they knew he was a loose cannon. So we all walked around on eggshells and called him Coach Barnes. Soon Coach B started messing with my brother, giving him shit here and there about push-ups, making him run faster and all of that bullshit. My brother for some reason didn’t give a shit, he never did. Ya know that scrawny kid that ate tons of food stayed wiry and looked like the girl from the Ring? Well that was my brother all 90 pounds of him. So one day Bri-man just looked up at Coach Barnes and says, “Hey Randy, why don’t you kiss my ass?” I’m not kidding. Coach Barnes got all red in the face like Archie and started beating the crap out of my brother. It was a real ass kicking in front of the whole class (Remember my brother was like 10 maybe 11) and coach was areal psycho puppy. But my brother took it. He knew he couldn’t beat Ray up, he knew he had no chance. But he wasn’t about to take his crap any longer. So he set him up. Soon after Travis was gone…. Victory! That’s two Travis's so keep count. After that episode, things were pretty smooth for a while. I got my first best friend Ryan Arter, I hung out at the beach with family and friends, and of course I found a tree in the back yard to climb on. I would hang with Ryan all day eating oranges and really doing pretty much what every other kid did at this age. We got a dog named Buck. He was a black lab and crazy. We raised him from a pup so I can’t blame anyone but ourselves for his insanity. (What a surprise!) Jumping through screens, running away, ripping the couch to shreds, a real well behaved canine. We finally had to get rid of him because he became totally out of control. My dad found him a home with some friends. A few weeks later we got a call that Buck had been hit by a car and died, it was horrible. This was the first time I had seen my dad cry and I must say it was a humbling experience. Up until that point I was raised not to cry, to be tough, and get things done. But I guess there were exceptions to the rule and a mans best friend was one of them. I love dogs, always have. I love their unconditional love, their loyalty, and their friendship. I can see why my dad was hurt. 

Around this same time I started learning about “The Hump”. I can’t remember the first time I heard about “the hump” but I totally remember the first time I saw it, and it was awesome! Well sort of. My friend Ryan was away visiting his dad and I was bored as a maggot on a vegetarian platter. I remember going to his house every day trying to find out when he would be home. One day I made my daily trek to his house in hopes that he was finally home. I looked into the window and Ryan’s mom was doing the hump with some guy on the couch. It looked strange and I wondered why the hell anybody would want to do it, but on the other hand I saw a naked woman for the first time so it was pretty cool…. Aaahhh, the memories. About a year after we bought the house these crazy drug dealers moved in next door to us. They would make noise at all hours of the night cranking music, and yelling at the top of their lungs. It began to make my mom a little batty. Pretty soon she lost her shit and started going out in the front yard. She would blow my dads trombone in her blue robe or better yet start the boat out of the water, which is louder then a helicopter. I can just picture the drug dealers yelling at each other trying to figure out who sold the crazy bitch next door Meth Amphetamines. It was a storybook childhood. On another fine Florida day my dad thought it would be a great idea if we all went to the beach together. We all agreed, packed into the car, and headed off. To this day I don’t know how my dad got the balls to do this, but we get to the beach and every one is naked, I mean everyone. There was a lady with just a sun hat on walking past us. Then there was an old dude with his junk hanging out trying to catch up to the lady in the sun hat. Hell even the life guards were naked, It was unbelievable! Immediately my brother and sister got out of the car and started walking down the beach to check out the scene. (Again the mother goes ballistic)! Somehow my dad got her to calm down and go in the water. He obviously hadn’t learned his lesson yet because he coaxed Madre into taking her bathing suit off in the water and he wouldn’t give it back to her. (That’s right build up her confidence then shut it down) she waded in the water for hours trying to get the guts to get on the beach naked like everyone else but she never did. Finally my dad gave her the bathing suit back and we went looking for my sister and brother. At the time I assumed there were no repercussions for Plankton like medieval schemes because the old man had gotten away with it, but I was wrong! We now enter what I like to call “KARMA @ WET and WILD”. The fame use to go to this water park near the house called Wet N Wild. It was close to the house and we all really liked it. On one occasion my dad had decided to go down the corkscrew. A sixteen story massive slide that towered over the entire park. I think my mom may have even talked him into doing it. So my dad starts climbing up the sixteen stories as we wave to him from below. When it’s finally his turn he lets go and starts winding and twisting down the slide. Suddenly a piece of the plastic PCP pipe on the slide caught my old mans Clark Griswold shorts ripping them right off his flailing mid air naked body. As he proceeded down the slide all you could see was a pale, slightly pink, hairy naked man, jetting down the slide at incredible speeds. When he reached the bottom of the slide the water slide lip catapulted him into the air and he landing with a giant crash into the tiny kiddy pool. Not the actual pool for his slide, but the pool four feet to the right because he shot out like naked beef stick. It was hilarious and we heard crowds of laughter. The only thing that stopped the comedy session was the fact that Poppie's shoulder was really hurt. He was screaming “FROZEN SHOULDER!”, while little kids stood around him crying in horror….It was a tender moment. The next episode begins soon after when my parents weren’t home. My sister was watching us or maybe we had a babysitter but it begins with my brother getting a jelly ball caught up in my favorite tree. He told me he was going to kick my ass if I didn’t get it. And yes he would really kick my ass. So I didn’t have much of a choice. The tree was huge. It was so big that if you climbed to the top you could see the whole God forsaken town. It was way higher than my roof and of course so was the damn jelly ball. I started climbing and within 15 min I was at the top. I grabbed the jelly ball and started down the tree when I heard a clean break and immediately started free falling through the air backwards. It was in slow motion and I could feel the branches cracking underneath me.

I spread my arms out and again let what ever happened …happen. I really did think I was going to die as I crashed through the picnic table and landed on the ground. For some reason yet again, I only had some scratches on my back. I was more upset that my parents were going to be mad at me for breaking the table then any pain I felt. As you may have guessed. They were more afraid of my Injuries than some table in the backyard. I was out of trouble. I never told my Parents about the jelly ball in hopes that in the future I would get some brownie points from my brother but we all know that’s not the way it works in human land. But like a light of awesomeness, yet again the mystic karma came into play. About a week later my brother was climbing a tree the size of a bush and fell breaking his arm in two places.“ Damn, that mojo’s quick. All in all everything was good. I lost my two front 

Teeth, I got a brand new BMX bike for Christmas and Karma seemed to be in my favor 

At least until my bike was stolen along with my dads' Caprice classic 2 days after Christmas. (What the hell did I do? Better yet what did my dad do??) My parents thought it was the neighbors, but who really knows, we never found out! Soon we were off again to a new destination. I don’t know how my father got a job in Vermont but he did. Vermont national Bank in Woodstock, Vermont. One of the most she she towns in America. And we were far from she she. This time when we were leaving, we had accumulated a lot of things. A boat, a bird, even a cat. It was much more difficult to leave because us kids were growing up and we had friends. I didn’t want to leave. It was upsetting at least for me. I liked Florida. The bugs never really bugged me and the heat was no big deal. 

Everyone else in my family thought otherwise. So we packed. Put the bird in the 

back of the boat. Stuck the cat in the car. And we were off.