Biography

I was born on August 2, 1966, in Flushing, New York. I am a Leo with Taurus rising, Aquarius moon void-of-course, three planets conjunct in Cancer in the fourth house. I am currently 42 years old.

I grew up in a dysfunctional single-parent extended-family household in a neighborhood where everyone had more money than us, and spent much of my early years running away from bullies, or escaping parental disapproval. Somehow, I survived.

When I was ten years old, I ran away from our Queens, New York home. To Virginia. This act of uncommon defiance would set the tone for my adolescence. Due in large part to my complete inability to get along with others my age, I began skipping school at around that time, spending my time instead roaming the subways and the streets of New York City. On one of these forays, I met up with a group of wonderfully insane kindred spirits, who became my close friends for the next several years.

When I was thirteen, one of our number was killed in a tragic accident, and the group of friends largely disbanded. I began frequenting rock and dance clubs with a fake ID procured in Times Square. This was during the early 80s, when the punk rock movement was at its peak. I became a fan of the group The Ramones, and with my mother's assistance, followed them to about seventy-five concerts around the tri-state area between the ages of fourteen and seventeen. To support my rock-show habit, I held a variety of jobs ranging from the grueling to the absurd, not the least of which was handing out leaflets dressed in clown makeup, and selling newspapers outside Grand Central Terminal with the aid of a monkey hand puppet.

In the latter half of the eighties, long-haired men in eyeliner and spandex began taking the spotlight away from the new-wave acts of earlier years. I spent several years going to concerts by Motley Crue, Ratt, and especially KISS; I saw fifty KISS concerts over a period of three tours across the U.S., of which a high point was my loss of my virginity to drummer Eric Carr at a Hilton in Augusta, Georgia on December 30, 1985.

Fueled by my rabid interest in popular music, I decided to pursue a career in the recording arts, attending the Institute of Audio Research in New York City for a year at the end of the 80s. I spent a wonderful summer interning at the Prospect Park Bandshell for their Celebrate Brooklyn! concert/theater festival, but was unable to parlay my schooling into a paying job afterwards. Instead, I went to work for a carpeting/home decor outlet as a secretary and bookkeeper. On January 8th, 1993, I attempted to prevent an ex-employee from leaving the shop with sensitive paperwork. In the ensuing scuffle, I sustained some seemingly minor head injuries that led to a period of near-total disability that lasted nearly five years.

During my confinement, I discovered the Internet. I signed up my first AOL account, using the screen name "immajer" (Jamie M.R. anagrammed) in early August, 1995. As spending time on the Internet was about the only thing I could do between bouts of crippling headaches, waves of nausea and disorientation, I spent most of my able hours exploring the then-newborn World Wide Web. From the beginning, I was fascinated by these things called "web pages", and the way anyone could publish words, images and pictures for all to see. I learned HTML, and began to develop web pages of my own.

Another offshoot of my newfound interest in the Internet was my discovery of online fandom. I discovered that I was not the only fan of a little-known television show called "Forever Knight", and became involved in the show's fandom. In a group effort to prevent the show's cancellation, I designed the "Save Forever Knight" web page, which garnered 50,000 visits in its first eight months of life - not a bad total for a non-commercial page in 1995.

By 1997, the symptoms of my head injury had diminished enough for me to consider independent living. In October of that year, I moved from New York City to Las Vegas, where I spent a year perilously close to the poverty line, working for the Salvation Army in a job that paid me just barely enough to cover my rent. During that period of time, a friend who I had met through Forever Knight fandom was continually urging me to move to Atlanta. In December of 1998, with the aid of another of our friends, I accomplished that goal, and landed in Atlanta on Christmas Day Eve.

Following a period of uncertainty, I was finally able to put my love of the Internet to good use with my employment by a web hosting company in their technical support department. Following this, I went to work for CNN's Interactive department, first providing quality assurance for the flash and javascript ads gracing their websites' pages, then managing the web statistics for the various sites. I moved to a studio apartment in midtown Atlanta, becoming, for the first time, fully and completely self-sufficient.

Immediately following September 11th, 2001, facing not only the uncertainty gripping the U.S. but also the extreme stress facing anyone working for a news organization during that time, I felt the need for some stress relief. Due to my involvement with the Harry Potter fandom, I created a Harry Potter "Sorting Hat" in Flash, and later, an online community devoted to Harry Potter fandom. The community, during its heyday, was an amazing amalgam of fans from every nature, every walk of life, ranging in age from early teens to, well, older than me. In addition, both projects got me started with web programming, which formed the foundation of my current career. (Both Sorting Hat and the online community can be found at vh.7dragons.net.)

As of April 2006, I am employed by the web development arm of a public relations firm, and am very happy with my job, my co-workers, and everything else about the place. I live in the Northlake area of Atlanta with my new kitty friend Cameo and my roommate, an old friend from my rock-band-following days. I am still sporadically involved with Harry Potter fandom, and am proud to say that I own not only a Slytherin school costume, but also a pirate costume. My health, despite a few small issues, is relatively good. I am, overall, content.

And life goes on.