●LIFΞ○
Resume, Experience, & Treatment and Housing History
(How it is...)
 |
| "History is what you make of it before you go to that great gig in the sky..." -me |
To Whomever Reads This;
My name is Joel Ayers - Brooks, and I am looking for work.
Not just work, but something that I can love and understand it's greater purpose in the lives of those it affects. Work not only to sustain and keep my family together, but earn a living developing new friendships. Ones I pray will grow old with me.
I am a talented artist, writer, a musician of sorts, and I deem myself a comic at times. If you want evidence, there is plenty of it in my website(s), Ozenoz Media. They have been cultivated a decade long to hopefully reach the hearts of my fans, and I have a few.
I have been a golf caddie, professional level. I have held half a dozen titles in the restaurant business from dish to proprietor. I have been a sales and marketing executive nearing management placement. I am a hard worker, and wish to continue on a career path that allows me to learn new tricks, for an old dog.
Married with a disabled daughter of ten years, and a wife of near twelve, we have a full and busy life. It took me years to admit it, but I too have been considered disabled. My daughter and I share the mental illness of bi polar, and every day we face similar challenges.
I am challenged with finding a position that is not dead - end, one where there is room, with heart, to move upward. Without stepping on toes, with no ill will borne, and of natural skill evolution. I want this job to be long term, full time, and be a part of a supportive team.
If this sounds like you, then we are off to a great start.
Check it out:
https://www.ozenoz.media
I will be happy you came!
Sincerest Hopes,
Joel Ayers - Brooks
Business Project Manager
Innovative and effective business management professional with over 22 years of experience in project management, human resources, various database network systems, stock and inventory tracking and cost analysis, sales and acquisitions and business solutions. State-of-the-art technology skills combined with proven ability to manage account relationships, develop and deliver sales growth, and successfully implement and oversee complex projects. Outstanding strategist distinguished for proven leadership and team-building skills, conducting detailed evaluations and implementing processes that improve efficiency. Noted specifically for skills in multiple project management, creating highly competitive product lines, office environment friendly supervision of employees, and highly organized target approaches in competitive markets.
Professional Experience
The Virtual Lending Source, San Diego, CA
Account Executive-
Reporting directly to CEO, provided leadership for five employees, multiple business accounts and thousands of contacts; manage network database of pre-existing and newly established clients. Provided leadership on accounts acquisitions and maintenance, wrote new contracts for newly acquired clients, procured and contacted new leads. Completed multiple deals responsible for generating millions of dollars in financing, with 100% completed within scope, schedule and budget. Team member of business expansion into social networking marketing moving the business into multiple project phases.
• Average four new clients per month exceeding company expectations. Ticket tag kept at a high buy – in.
• Successful projects included the financing of consumers in the market via both clients and lenders in prime, sub- prime and military loan categories.
• Worked in the procurement of new territory and establishing new leads to generate marginal market growth.
• Helped in establishing team procedures for acquisitions and working on multiple executive accounts maintenance.
• Interface with internal and external auditors accounts in the auto loan processing business.
Tasked with creating a competitive business to showcase and sell the new social networking marketing platform. Created an external entity capable of producing complex web design infrastructure to established clients. Drafted legal documentation for the initial start-up, organized Human Resources and Team Leadership Departments where there were none pre- existing, established budget, created templates, developed competitive business plan and strategy and hired staff.
• Able over the next two years to expand the business start-up plan to include both venture and investor capital in the market.
Joel Brooks – Page Two
• Invented a new marketing tool for the web design “Frontiers” project utilizing experimental video sequencing programming.
ATnT, San Diego, CA – Bethlehem, PA
Account Executive/Customer Service Representative
Contracted initially through The San Diego Marketing Group. Responsible for territory management and new account services procurement in Business to Business accounts. Later moved into private consumer market dealing with high speed fiber optics accounts acquisitions. Then at the outset was in a customer service position after relocating to Pennsylvania and was immediately considered in track for the floor management position.
• Responsible for functioning within complex ATnT database used for client retention.
The Wildflower Café And Gallery, Bethlehem, PA
Proprietor
Provided Director level management in organizing musical performances by worldwide famous local celebrities. Cooperated in constructing new menu items and specials on a daily basis. Performed stock and supply status checks and cost analysis, ordered replacement. Helped in development of marketing strategies to further client base. Managed employee functions and pay, special events staff.
• Clients included some very high end and trendy artists whose work was displayed and sold on commission.
• Developed capacity-planning document, which detailed workload, and staffing requirements - instrumental in re-organizing and managing the Project Management department.
Aronimink Golf Club, Newtown Square, PA
Professional Golf Caddie
Provided premier service to the world’s elite leaders in a very private and formal business setting. Responsible for maintaining all etiquette and procedures for grounds keeping and social nuance purposes. Advised players on conditions, club selection, putt reads, swing advice and how – to tips.
• Runner up team in a Member/Guest Yearly Tournament.
• Responsible for highly sensitive notables on business rounds of golf in which the club was booked full for one group’s event.
• Caddied for the club professionals and guest professionals to provide expert advice on our course and its’ subtle tricks and trades.
2011- Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA – Attended Business Lectures, Humanities Classes
2009- Associated Technical College, San Diego, CA – Attended Telecommunications Courses
2003- Jay Mohr’s Looking For The Funniest Man In America, Los Angeles, CA- Special Guest
2002- Penn University Law School, Philadelphia, PA – Offered to attend
1997- Amway Distributors Conference, Atlantic City, New Jersey – Sales Leadership Excellence Series.
I have done this a few times over the years, and it is an effort in futility, but I guess here we go again.
This is the real deal, my “actual chronological resume” and it lays bare the indecency of a career spanning three different paths, primarily: Golf, Hospitality, and Sales and Marketing. I am going to lay to bare bones from the time I was a little tike until now how I made ends meet.
• ︎1989-1991 The Times Union, Albany, NY - Paperboy
• ︎1991-1993 White Manor Country Club, Albany, NY - Caddie
• ︎1994-1996 Aronimink Country Club- Newtown Square, PA - Caddie
• ︎1994-1996 Finley Catering - Philadelphia, PA - Server
• ︎1995- Carmines Pizza- Newtown Square, PA - Cook
• ︎1995 - The Skiing Racquet - Newtown Square, PA - Ski Tech
• ︎1995 - Alberto’s Newtown Squier - Newtown Square, PA - Server
• ︎1997 - Galmin’s Exxon - Ocean City, NJ - Clerk
• ︎1997 - Galloway National Golf Club - Galloway, NJ - Caddie
• ︎1998 - Valentino’s Restaurant - Broomall, PA - Server
• ︎1998 - Aronimink Country Club- Newtown Square, PA - Caddie
• ︎1999 - Boston Market - West Chester, PA - Cook
• ︎1999 - Safeway Grocery - West Chester, PA - Stock
• ︎1999 - Aronimink Country Club- Newtown Square, PA - Caddie
• ︎2000 - The Media Towne House - Media, PA - Server
• ︎2000 - Aronimink Country Club- Newtown Square, PA - Caddie
• ︎2000 - Phish Tour - USA - Entrepreneur
• ︎2000 - Valentino’s Restaurant - Broomall, PA - Server
• ︎2001 - The Heidelberg - Ann Arbor, MI - Server
• ︎2001 - The Red Hawk Bar and Grille - Ann Arbor, MI - Server
• ︎2001 - Starbucks - University Ave, Ann Arbor, MI - Barista
• ︎2001 - The Gandy Dancer - Ann Arbor, MI - Server
• ︎2002 - Aronimink Country Club- Newtown Square, PA - Caddie
• ︎2003 - Citibank Card Services - Allentown, PA - Sales
• ︎2004 - Perkins Restaurant - Bethlehem, PA - Server
• ︎2004 - Mcdonald’s - Bethlehem, PA - Cook
• ︎2004 - The Bridge Works Bar and Grille, Bethlehem, PA - Server
• ︎2004 - Sunnieside Landscaping - Bushkill, PA - Laborer
• ︎2004 - Schneider Trucking - Hershey, PA - Driver
• ︎2005 - The Wildflower Cafe and Gallery - Bethlehem, PA - Manager
• ︎2005 - Saucon Valley Country Club - Bethlehem, PA - Caddie
• ︎2005 - The Bridge Works Bar and Grille, Bethlehem, PA - Server
• ︎2006-2008 The Union Tribune - San Diego, CA - “Hawker”
• ︎2008-2009 - The Hotel Bethlehem - Bethlehem, PA - Pantry
• ︎2009 - T.J. Maxx - Broomall, PA - Cashier/Stock
• ︎2009 - Quizno’s - Broomall PA - Cook/Cashier
• ︎2009 - Mrs. Marty’s Deli - Broomall, PA - Cook
• ︎2009 - Charlotte’s - Broomall, PA - Prep Cook
• ︎2009 - The San Diego Marketing Group - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2009 - *Can’t Remember The Name - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2010 - The Virtual Lending Source - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2010 - ATnT Uverse - San Diego , CA - Sales
• ︎2011 - ATnT - Bethlehem, PA - Customer Service
• ︎2012 - Business Through Government - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2012 - Nationwide Business Resources - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2013 - Reputation Impressions - San Diego, CA - Sales
• ︎2013 - Z57 Internet Solutions - San Diego, CA - Sales
• 2020 - Walmart Neighborhood Market - La Mesa, CA - Cart Associate
I left out some day labor gigs, and a few that were less than a week, but there you have it - 45 jobs, and the last one I held was in 2020.
Mostly since 2013, it has been full time Dad duty, and well, Ozenoz Media.
Like I said, I don’t know why I just did that, but ok.
Depressing, and yet despite it’s spottiness I learned a lot over the years.
A lesson in humility.
• Web Design (10+ years) • Serving Experience • WordPress • Micros POS • Blogging • Proofreading • Branding • Graphic Design • Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
"HUM".
If trees grew upside down
And root houses were in fashion
I'd build me a root house
High up in the clouds
Of the bare peaked mountain
With snow at it's base
There I'd survey everything around
I'd look down at the stars
That shine under the sky
From the seas of illusion
To the deserts of green
And swing from the roots of my lone sanity
Ozenoz: ONE:
http://www.ozenozmedia.com/2019/05/ozozo-raplyrics.html?m=1
• Restaurant experience from the back of the house to the front of the house:
• Microsoft Office Suites
• Micros proficient
• Stock and inventory analysis
• Menu content and design
• Graphic design
• Wordpress and Blogger
• Social Media Marketing
• Web Content Editor
• Arts and Entertainment
• Employee leadership
Experience:
Cook:
1993 Carmines Pizza - PA
2000 Phish Tours - USA
2005 McDonalds - PA
2009/2010 Mrs. Marty’s Deli- PA
Chef:
2006/2007 St. Vincent’s - CA
2010 Charlottes - PA
Banquet Staff:
1994-1998 Finley Catering - PA
Server:
1998 - Alberto’s Newtown Squier- PA
1998-2000 Valentinos Rest. - PA
2001 The Red Hawk - MI
2001 The Gandy Dancer - MI
2003-2005 The Bridge Works - PA
Barista:
2001 Starbucks - MI
Pantry:
2008/09 The Hotel Bethlehem - PA
Management:
1999 Boston Market - PA
Proprietor:
2004-2005 The Wildflower Cafe - PA
2010-2022 Ozenoz Media - CA
Lifetime Treatment History
▪︎3/1998 - Belmont Behavioral Health Hospital
▪︎4/1998 - Mount Trexlor Manor
▪︎5/1998-8/1998 Belmont Behavioral Health Hospital
▪︎6/2000-7/2000 Penn University Hospital
▪︎11/2000 - 1/2000 St. Joseph’s Hospital
▪︎6/2003 Northwestern Medical Center
▪︎6/2003-7/2003 Crisis Residential
▪︎7/2003 - 4/2004 BET-EL COUNSELING SERVICES, INC
▪︎11/2004 St. Luke's University Hospital - Bethlehem Campus
▪︎1/2009 - 4/2009 Jamaica Hospital Medical Center
▪︎10/2009- 10/2010 Areta Crowell Center
▪︎2/2011-3/2011 Lehigh Valley Health Network Muhlenberg
▪︎11/2012 - 7/2019 Areta Crowell Center
▪︎03/2015 Bayview Behavioral Health Hospital
▪︎09/2017 Psychiatric Hospital of San Diego County
▪︎11/2019 Psychiatric Hospital of San Diego County
▪︎11/2019 - Present- East County Mental Health
"And Then It Happened To Me"
I returned home from living in Ocean City, NJ and being a caddie at Galloway National Golf Club (all 44 of my jobs to date are listed on my "Chronological Resume") when the season ended for cold months. I came back to Newtown Square, PA to be close to my family, and was rejected due to my mental state. I lived in a friend's garage with heaters and had a short stint as a waiter at Valentino’s Restaurant in Broomall over that winter. In the spring the severity of my delusions, auditory and visual hallucinations became so bad that I could not function at all.
▪︎3/1998 - Belmont Behavioral Health Hospital
~Address - 4200 Monument Rd, Philadelphia, PA 19131-
~Phone: (215) 929-8829
☆Medication, inpatient stay and transfer to:
▪︎4/1998 - Mount Trexlor Manor
~Address: 5201 St Josephs Rd, Coopersburg, PA 18036
~Phone: (610) 965-9021
☆Month long stay, medication and treatment
▪︎5/1998-8/1998 Belmont Behavioral Health Hospital
~Address - 4200 Monument Rd, Philadelphia, PA 19131
~Phone: (215) 929-8829
☆Daily Outpatient Treatment, Medication management
In May of 1998, I was released from Mount Trexlor Manor and moved into a cheap boarding house in Germantown, in the slums of Philadelphia. I went to outpatient care at Belmont, and began caddying back at my old club from my teenage years, Aronimink Golf Club. My work was poor, and my income suffered due to my mental disability.
I was not at the time very experienced in dealing with my illness, and, afraid of stigma stopped treatment and medication in August of 1999, when I got a shared apartment closer to work in the Philadelphia suburbs in West Chester, PA. Caddy season rolled to an end, and with financial difficulties, I was forced out of my apartment by my roommate. I was already under the weight of a $42K bill from my first treatments with Einstein Behavioral Health, yet unpaid to this day.
I got a job doing night stock at a local grocery store, and found a sublet from students nearby at West Chester University, where I aspired to be a student. Soon the students decided I didn’t fit, and one night, when they went on spring break, I came home to find a note on the door, and the locks changed. My stuff was left in the basement, and I was left without a home in the cold snow.
I tried to make friends with my garage live - in buddy late one night, and he didn’t show up. Upset, I slipped on black ice in his driveway and broke my ankle. I had no car, not ever up to this point. I was forced to walk around for months without a cast as it healed from there on out.
I moved into the West Chester Salvation Army, and immediately after there was a racial Union Dispute, and the minority side put me, unknowingly, on their paperwork. They lost the dispute, and I lost my job. So I got a job at the (at the time) local “Boston Chicken” training under the GM to be the Assistant Manager. I worked there from March of that year until May of that year, when “Boston Chicken” became “Boston Market” and the GM was forced to change districts, and the new manager did not honor my promotion opportunity. The money was not as good as caddying, and, still living at The Salvation Army, I went back to my old job.
In summer of 1999 I moved into my first solo apartment in the basement of a house in Media, Pennsylvania. Due to my illness I could not keep up with caddying, which required two hours of trolleys and buses each way, and hitchhiking and a twenty minute walk for the final part of the journey. I barely made rent all summer and into the fall. Winter came, and I had no way to pay rent at all, and no savings. I got a job at “The Media Towne House” as a waiter to try and make ends meet, but my paranoia and high anxiety led to me not being able to function.
One day, mid winter, I left all of my worldly possessions, which I never recovered, a slew of thousands of dollars of unpaid bills, and headed for the West Chester Salvation Army. I got in, and thankfully endured a few months with nothing but my music to temper my spirits.
In the spring, I went back to caddying, and got a room in downtown Philadelphia on Green Street, in The Art Museum District. It was a foul boarding house in a segregated row home, full of rats and cockroaches, and shady housemates. The pressure of the job was such that it would now take almost three hours each way in commute, with no car, and I couldn’t make it most days in time to get a round of golf. I lost a good friend to tragedy, and my adopted father’s mother died, and my illness went nuts.
In June of 2000, I took a day's pay and took the train to the Jersey Shore. I told everyone that I was “walking to Florida” for Phish’s Big Cypress Festival which was to happen at New Years. I walked for fifty miles, and severely sunburned, aching, and broke, I gave up. I called my parents, and my Dad came and picked me up. He told me how bad I was, and had me involuntarily committed at Hanuman Hospital in downtown Philadelphia, who transferred me to:
▪︎6/2000-7/2000 Penn University Hospital
~Address: 3400 Spruce St, Philadelphia, PA 19104
~Phone: (215) 316-5151
☆Medication, Treatment and inpatient stay
I got out of the hospital, and being uneducated about my chances of survival without treatment and still bucking stigma, that my experiences were spiritual in nature, psychic and supernatural “gifts”. I fled and hitchhiked and ran cross country following The Grateful Dead (actually now called “The Other Ones”) and the tour band “Phish” until November of 2000, when I returned to Philadelphia to relate my new adventure to my family.
I sent a disjointed email from the downtown library after getting off of the Greyhound to my adopted father about a story in which when I was young, he disarmed a fellow gambler at our home blackjack table of a gun. He has never liked or trusted me since I was young, and me having breached security and ran into his work at KYW Newsradio and CBS Television News 3 downtown to get them a message, he was alarmed. My craziness led him to tell my (biological) mother that I was coming to their home with a gun to kill them.
I traveled to the suburbs where they lived, and visited briefly with the neighbors, who allowed me a phone call to my father at his country club and gin rivalry, Penn Oaks Country Club. I left a message with the pro-shop, that I was almost home.
♧Well, my mother phoned the Newtown Square Police Department, and told them I had a gun, and was almost there.
When I went through the neighbors backyard to my parents backyard as I had done so often in my youth, there was a cop who drew, and screamed “Freeze! Don’t move!”
I was fucking scared, and ran.
♧By the time I reached my neighbors front yard again, ten policemen swarmed on me and beat me down hard, and cuffed me. The policeman in the car I was detained in snidely made fun of me and said vulgar things about me and my mother, and that I was tripping for life. They then involuntarily committed me while treating me sweet as pie and hitting on the nurses.
▪︎11/2000 - 1/2000 St. Joseph’s Hospital
~Address: 1600 W Girard Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19130
~Phone: (215) 787-9000
~Dr. Silverman
◇Diagnosed with Schizophrenia and treated inpatient with medication. Released under Judge’s orders to a “Respite Full Time Nursing Care Home”
☆Received outpatient services and Personal Care Advocate
With heartache from missing my fiance, whom I met in Michigan on Phish Tour, I received a credit card in the mail, the only one I had in my life to this day, and I told the round the clock nursing staff there in Upper Darby that I was going to the library. I fled to the Greyhound, and moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan.
I worked in Ann Arbor, Michigan at three spots. I was a waiter at The Red Hawk Bar and Grille, and a part time barista at the new University Avenue Starbucks. Late in the game, I earned a spot on the team at The Gandy Dancer as a fine dining waiter in the Historical Society Train Station restaurant, but due to the high pressure, left the job.
My fiancee wanted to live in Murfreesboro, Tennessee near her brother and take classes at MTSU, so I moved us. I got a job as a waiter there in town immediately, but what could be considered symptoms of my illness led to an arrest late at night on campus. I was bailed out, but a few nights later I was picked up again in a psychosis and put in jail, where I stayed for an agonizing six months for a misdemeanor. I had plead not guilty and they were trying to prove me “incompetetant to stand trial” so as to have me put in the state hospital.
I finally got in front of “Judge Ash”, and afraid of what would become of me, plead guilty to the charges I was not guilty of so I could be released. A short time later I walked from Murfreesboro to Nashville on crutches, as my legs were atrophied while incarcerated to get out of the state.
I fled to Michigan by hitchhiking, and then got my tax return. I traveled to Eugene, Oregon and spent the spring there homeless in the rain with no job. I hitchhiked back to Pennsylvania in the spring, and returned to work at Aronimink Golf Club while living at the West Chester Salvation Army again. I eventually moved in with friends, and then in with the WCU hockey team.
Fall came, and the caddying season was at an end, and my symptoms set in again. I took the car I had bought that season and fled to California. I spent the winter and spring homeless in Berkeley, Venice, and then Los Vegas, losing my car along the way. The city of Nevada paid for a ticket for me to return to Pennsylvania to caddie, but when I reached there, I had a psychotic episode.
Unmedicated and crazed from my desperate situation out west, I verbally attacked my boss at the club during a group teeing off for the Senior U.S. Open practice round going on. I was arrested and sought treatment to get out of jail.
I was treated at:
▪︎6/2003 Northwestern Medical Center
~Address: 7096 Decatur St, New Tripoli, PA 18066
~Phone: (610) 298-8521
☆Inpatient Treatment and medication
I was taken from there to a crisis house in West Chester, PA:
▪︎6/2003-7/2003 Crisis Residential
I can’t find record of the house I stayed in currently existing, but it was on High Street near the University,
☆Treatment and Medication
I moved from there into a boarding home in Bethlehem, PA where I received county assistance for treatment at a local clinic.
▪︎7/2003 - 4/2004 BET-EL COUNSELING SERVICES, INC
~Address: 307 E 4th St, Bethlehem, PA 18015
~Phone: (610) 849-2291
☆Treatment, therapy and medication
While there I worked as a telemarketer in the winter, and then as a waiter in the spring. I stopped getting county funding for my treatment in the spring, and didn’t find a way to continue supporting getting medication. I moved to a row home on the east side in the summer, and worked as a landscaper over the summer into the fall. I then started training at truck driver training school in Hershey PA, but had an episode and was never able to return. I was hospitalized at:
▪︎11/2004 St. Luke's University Hospital - Bethlehem Campus
~Hospital in Fountain Hill, Pennsylvania
~Address: 801 Ostrum St, Bethlehem, PA 18015
☆Treatment and medication, inpatient stay
I moved from there into another boarding house in Bethlehem, and collected unemployment and barely survived until I sprung a caddy job at Saucon Valley Country Club in the summer.
Over that time I moved several times. I lived with a girlfriend, then at a motel, then at a cheap boarding house, then at a shared artists house. Fall came, and I lost my job at the club due to car failure, and my waiting job was not hacking it part time.
I took my money, and on a manic high, flew to San Diego with no place to go, and no money. I ended up at St. Vincent De Paul, Father Joe’s Village, where I had an episode and was treated there at the clinic while applying for SSDI/SSI
▪︎1/2006 - 08/2008 St. Vincent De Paul Clinic
~Mental Health Psychiatric visits
~Diagnosis of Bi Polar, Schizoaffective, with Psychotic Features
☆Treatment, counseling, groups, psychoanalysis and medication
My claim for Social Security was denied and I was kicked out of St. Vinnie’s and returned to Bethlehem.
I had no insurance, and no way of getting treatment back in Pennsylvania, but I got a good job working as a dishwasher at The Hotel Bethlehem over the holidays who intended to keep me on, and offered health insurance. The wait proved too much to get help insured, and in January I had an episode and fled to NYC to fly out to California, this time San Francisco. At the airport, awaiting my flight, a policeman noticed my psychosis symptoms and had me involuntarily committed to:
▪︎1/2009 - 4/2009 Jamaica Hospital Medical Center
~Hospital in Queens, NY
~Address: 8900 Van Wyck Expy, Richmond Hill, NY
~Phone: (718) 206-6000
☆Inpatient stay and treatment. Therapy and medication. Almost forced into state hospital.
I withdrew my case, and convinced my Mom to pick me up so they would let me go in NYC. I lived on her couch for a few months and worked at four different jobs I was unable to keep due to the severity of my symptoms and the heavy doses of medication daily. I moved to a room in a shared house for a month, but went broke and my mom sent me away to California where I had been an easy non - burdening factor to her years earlier.
In San Diego in 2009/2010 I went through 3 sales jobs and a failed college attempt while living in a home for the mentally ill homeless. I received treatment at:
▪︎10/2009- 10/2010 Areta Crowell Center
~Address: 1963 Fourth Ave, San Diego, CA 92101
~Phone: (619) 233-3432
☆Treatment and medication
I moved into a boarding house for a month, and lost my job. I did a schizophrenia research study for an experimental drug and used the money to leave the state. In the winter of 2009/2010, back in Bethlehem, PA, I spent the entire winter homeless and outdoors in the snow and ice. A few nights a week I would seek warmth and a cot at a rotating church shelter that was running until my psychosis led to them banning me.
I was banned from a warming day center due to my psychosis, and told that visiting Lehigh University campus would be considered trespass. I was banned from City Hall and the main library, who gave me a trespassing ticket.
During a blizzard in February, I checked in as a voluntary inpatient at:
▪︎2/2011-3/2011 Lehigh Valley Health Network Muhlenberg
~Hospital in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
~Address: 2545 Schoenersville Rd, Bethlehem, PA 18017
~Phone: (610) 402-8000
☆Inpatient treatment and medication. Released to a maximum care mental health rehabilitation facility in Bethlehem, PA
After six months in rehabilitation, I won my SSDI/SSI case and was granted benefits.
I was unsure of my next steps, and a friend in San Diego invited me to move in with him. I did so in September of 2011, the month of my first disability checks.
I could not find a psychiatrist to give me an appointment within less than three months, and in December 2011, just short of getting to treatment, I had an episode. I left my home and wandered the streets of Los Angeles, homeless. I struggled with finding treatment there, but the big city is tough. When I returned to San Diego I sought treatment and was put into Isis Crisis House, which has since closed down. I met the mother of my daughter there, and we are all still together.
When Rosalee became pregnant, I was asked to give the family some space due to some stupid actions on my behalf, being unmedicated. I went roaming the country, very troubled, and yet untreated. When I found myself in St. Louis, homeless, I went into the hospital, voluntary, inpatient for two weeks. I was 142 pounds, severely underweight for a 5’10” man. I could not tell you which hospital.
I begged Rosalee to help me get out of St. Louis, and rode out $100 worth of travel “west” as I had told the ticket woman at the Greyhound there. This landed me in Topeka, Kansas. There, my previously administered month long lasting Haledol injection worked as I stayed on at a homeless shelter. When payday came, I returned to San Diego on the train in November 2012.
I sought treatment, and got shelter at the homeless shelter for mentally ill adults I had lived at in 2009/2010. My treatment was at:
▪︎11/2012 - 7/2019 Areta Crowell Center
~Address: 1963 Fourth Ave, San Diego, CA 92101
~Phone: (619) 233-3432
☆Treatment and medication
♡Dr. Lisa Kutner
During these years I went through various things, held sparsely and for little time several jobs (all listed on my Chronological Resume of 44 Jobs) and was hospitalized a few times:
▪︎03/2015 Bayview Behavioral Health Hospital
~Address: 330 Moss St, Chula Vista, CA 91911
~Phone: (619) 426-6310
☆Inpatient stay and treatment, medication
▪︎09/2017 Psychiatric Hospital of San Diego County
~Address: 3853 Rosecrans St, San Diego, CA 92110
~Phone: (619) 692-8200
☆Inpatient Stay and medication
◇Moved to Crisis House in El Cajon, CA
▪︎11/2019 Psychiatric Hospital of San Diego County
~Address: 3853 Rosecrans St, San Diego, CA 92110
~Phone: (619) 692-8200
☆Inpatient Stay and medication
●○I am currently receiving services at○●
▪︎11/2019 - Present- East County Mental Health
~Address: 1000 Broadway # 210, El Cajon, CA 92021
~Phone: (619) 401-5500
♧Dr. Fukui
☆Treatment and medication
It has been a long road, especially since my SSDI/SSI was taken from me in April of 2018. I haven’t been able to work since 2013, and Lord knows I have tried. I just can’t seem to even land a job now. I don’t know what gives, so I am trying to get back what little money we were granted before. I don’t know, but I think it is a good case. Using this all as ammo I hope does the trick.
“We shall see."
Housing History
So, here I am, typing away on my bluetooth backlit keyboard, summarizing my life as best can be managed with little to no funds, and no equipment.
If there is anything I want to impress here, for my own personal safety, is that none of this writing is going to get anybody in trouble. If you are reading this blog, and feel that I hold something in the way of knowledge that could be detrimental (dangerous) to you, I ain’t gonna go there. I have had too many near brushes with death due to my own need to grow the fuck up and live and let die, peacefully.
Yes, I am writing to you on my lifeline phone, on a stimulus bought backlit keyboard that requires a slow twitch after working all night by the light of an old fridge.
Why am I writing? Well, I find that though nobody ever cares to donate, email, comment, watch my youtube, or buy any of my stuff that having been read by over a quarter of a million people lifts my spirits.
It also teaches me lessons, for instance the “hood rat” lesson which imparts, “don’t tell on anybody, ever, or else there’s no guaranteed future for you, except maybe death.” Pretty straightforward, though but becomes more and more treacherous as you accumulate more and more writing, more than your average hood rat victim can keep up with to tell if you told on them or not.
I choose to live.
So the topic for tonight, to keep me going on the amazing annals of my life as I know it: residences.
We have covered:
Resume (40+ jobs)
Treatment History (dozens of hospitalizations)
Now lets’s gaze into the crystal ball that depicts my home life.
At age 3, my Dad died and left us holding down a mortgage of the house over our mom and pop grocery store. My Mom was 21, and this was a little much all at once.
That house became an apartment which I have vague recollection of in Central Pennsylvania, then one I have good memories of in Roaring Springs at around age 4. We stayed there, living one floor down from my Dear Aunt Margie and her kids for over a year until me moved back into the City of Altoona, Hench Bro.’s townhouses.
I lived there through fast and fun advancement through accelerated “gifted student” LEARNING until my Mom met Brandon, the father of her other two children.
He moved us into a home (house) on Walnut St. in a real neighborhood until his old habits got him fired from his WTAJ TV10 News Anchor position with that station. We were then forced due to he and my mothers marriage / having a child (Asher) to move to Philadelphia where he began work as a Radio News Anchor at KYW1060Am, the position he actually returned to eventually and retired from last Friday the 13th, November 2020.
There I got into trouble being the prissy white boy in a hard knocks gang hood middle school, and generally figured the answer I would find in girls, and my involvement with them gaining me respect, and an escape from solitary pubescent fantasy.
In the Fall of of 1992, we moved to accommodate Brandon’s career again, this time as an NBC Morning and Noon Television News Anchor in Albany, New York. The house was awesome, and the times I had there snowboarding, running through the local dense forest with my German Shepherd/Husky mix “Cassie” were some of the best times of my life.
But all good things must come to an end, and Brandon moved us again to the Philadelphia area where he began as a New Anchor both TV and Radio side at KYW, while my mother expanded her home based day care facilities.
I played football, lacrosse, trumpet in the band and pit bands, was a quality actor, and my academics were a mixed bag of unparalleled excellence and lackadaisical “cruise control” style effort to balance my many endeavors.
I got into pot, though now I know judging its potency and my pattern, I was treating early bi polar symptoms. I started reading college texts on psyche, and writing became a thing I would begin then as a go to outlet for the serious stuff.
We moved houses during my junior year, though only two houses down, and because they were buying it.
I began my love of Phish, and in the summer after my senior year was in a locally successful new Grateful Dead Cover Band.
Then it began. Adulthood. My parents would not have me, or my habits in their home any longer.
I stayed on a buddy’s couch for two nights. I was officially “:couch surfing” for the first time.
The my girlfriend found me a room in a guys house. Guy was a bookie, practically a made man, and the shit was awkward at best.
Trouble found me, and I moved (after a stint in rehab for consuming a ½ ounce of hallucinogenic mushroom) to a, “Oxford House” in Ocean City New Jersey, court mandated.
I relapsed, and ratted myself out, ended up couch surfing on a buddies couch for a few.
With a job at one of the worlds best golf clubs as a caddie, I moved out of that home and into a residential hotel for the remainder of the summer.
With cold weather apoun us, and no job in sight, I moved back home, where I hoped my family would help me. No such luck.
I ended up living on the garage band’s couch at my friends place until I could take it no more.
I had a nervous breakdown, and was committed for what I claimed at the time was drug induced, but was really just panic/anxiety at my situation at age 19.
After that rehab, my adopted “Dad” dropped me off to live under the Market Frankford El in Kensington, the worst ghetto in Philly. He had “blessed me” with a room if I were to continue financing it with a couple of crackheads running a scam recovery home.
I went to caddying (3 hour commute) and earned my way out to West Chester into a shared apartment.
Same old song and dance, fall came with no golf left to caddie for, and I was ass out again. I got a job doing night stock at a local grocery store, and found a sublet in student housing on High Street. My roommates went on spring break, and fucked me over, changed the locks and when I came home one night, I had no where, no things, no one to turn to.
I had changed jobs in the interim to this and moving into the Market Street Salvation Army, and was working at the local “Boston Chicken”.
Boston Chicken as it was then, was training me to become the Assistant Manager, when it changed hands and the franchise became “Boston Market”. My G.M. was transferred and my job was out the window. So, I went back to golf caddying.
This spring while caddying, I found a new one bedroom basement apartment I moved into and had a wild summer. That summer, I worked very little, just barely got by. But I played guitar over 2500 hours in like two months, became very good. Very good.
Winter came, and I got a job as a waiter at The Media Towne House (fine dining), but too little was too late to cover the full apartment and out the door I went.
I had no choice. I went back to the West Chester Salvation Army to lick my wounds and wound my licks.
In the spring, I was caddying and living in their special shared living transitional house when I decided to call it quits and move downtown.
There, I really lost it.
A close friend died, victim of a fall in Cancun, and my adoptive grandmother died. I was going through hell torn between wanting school, music, money being so hard, and my love life so tore up.
I left in July for what would become a summer and fall journey I can never forget. I asserted my independence and left and toured with The Grateful Dead and Phish until November 2000.
When I returned my “parents”had me committed and moved to a respite bed, Judge mandated.
The second I got a fistful of cash I left the supervision of their failing marriage and fled to Ann Arbor, MI, a favorite spot on the map for me.
There I held three jobs, four in all, three at once. Two waiter jobs (one fine dining) and a barista job at University Starbucks.
I had a sublet just off campus on Washtenaw, and a love affair that I must say, taught me of trust, and issues mine and needed.
We moved to Tennessee. I got a job at The Golf Club of TN, as a manager at Peter Demos Steak and Spaghetti, and a home for us to begin.
She got, a protection order and a violent reaction from me.
After that I drifted. Released in January, I made my way to Ann Arbor, then spent time in Eugene (Ken Kesey R.I.P. 2000) and then headed back to Philly.
There I held down my caddy job again, went from The Salvation Army, to a couch surf, to living as a tenant at The West Chester University J.V. Hockey House.
When fall came, I ran to try and tour, but my legs were not under me fully, and I ended up homeless in Venice, CA all winter.
In the spring I found a ten speed bike by the railroad tracks just outside of Canyon Country, CA and rode it over 200 miles through Death Valley to Vegas.
There the city of Las Vegas loaned me the money to return to caddy in Philly.
Well, that would have been all well and good, but it wasn’t in the cards, this joker. When I got there the club was holding The Senior U.S. Open, and during a practice round on the tee, I got into an altercation with my boss.
He and the local police decided to make an example of me, and I haven’t stepped foot on the grounds again.
I got out of jail for a misdemeanor by pleading that I would seek recovery as previously pleaded in years past.
I lived in an Oxford House through that Fall, into the Spring of 2004. That spring I moved into a house with a roommate I was dating off and on, until I met my son’s mother. She became pregnant, and I moved to cut costs and start a truck driving career. When my son’s mother dumped me while she was pregnant it was all I could take, and I would end up hospitalized for another breakdown.
I moved into town into a short lived stay at yet another Oxford House. While there, against any kosher good sense, I dated a local restaurant owner. She became pregnant by another restauranteur in town (I think he was married) and she gave it to me like so: You claim my child as your own, we will get married and raise both yours and mine together. She even lined up the Mayor for the marriage.
Then, she got an abortion and backstabbed me until I was railroaded out of town by her and her ultra cool artist circle of friends.
I was ruined, in shambles. A son now my family would not let me see, a reputation that would never recover, and no where to turn to.
I fled to San Diego, in hopes I would find a new start and return for my son one day not long after.
But my reputation followed me via petitioning by my family. I was forced to pursue (though quite capable) Social Security or face a promised worse fate.
I lived as a recluse hermit at St.. Vincent De Paul Village for three years trying desperately to fathom how everything could have turned so bad, and so permanently.
Denied SSI, I returned to Bethlehem, PA, evidently hungry to get bit by the hand that feeds again.
Oxford House. Dishwasher job.
Then, Mom told my roommates I needed psychiatric evaluation and had me kicked out. Recovery home for a month.
Fled to San Francisco, but was picked up by the cops and nearly sent to a State Hospital while in NYC.
On one hand, you had the 5000 Sq Ft. artitst loft offered me for $750 month if I would redo it, on the other remit my case and live under Judge Mandate.
The lawyer took pity and got me a couch surf spot at my Mom’s, but a few months after not becoming instantly self sufficient, she ordered me and my bags into her car for a flight she bought to “get rid of me” (back to Diego)
I arrived with $0.
That became a stay at a mental health facility where I held a number of jobs. In Fall 2010 I moved into a boarding house. In December I tried to move home to my son.
In March I got a job, about to lead into a Managers position of the Customer Service Floor of an ATnT Facility. In March they threw me in another psyche rehab for no reason.
In September they forced me onto SSI, and promised all would be good.’
They would:
1 supervise all visits with my son
2 turn me into a loving disabled person
3 manage my money
4 take most of my money for food and rent
5 make sure I got nightly rehab
6 force feed me meds by law
7 destroy whats left of my future
8 teach me that i was always wrong
In September I flew back to San Diego.
They immediately took all $4900 of my back pay, and garnished $278 a month from my $850 checks...do the math.
In January I quit couch surfing and went to L.A.
In April 2012, I met my wife in San Diego.
My SD history is as follows:
J.E. Ayers Brooks
3692 Gracia Paseo
Spring Valley, CA 91977
(619)251-4873
February 2, 2022
We The People
In Order to Form a More Perfect Union St.
America The Beautiful, USA
To Whom This May Concern;
Just watched an incredible documentary on homelessness that moved me tremendously. It was done by an L.A. Times reporter who lives there with her eyes wide open to the “Invisible People” that are all around us. I myself have been homeless on those streets, Skid Row, Santa Monica, Venice as well as here where I currently live in San Diego off and on over the last 16 years.
I have had many residences, so many in fact that the number is literally, unbelievable.
*09/ 2005 - 10/2005 - San Diego – Homeless (Streets)
*11/02005 – 08/2008 St. Vincent De Paul Village, San Diego
*08/2008 – 11/2008 Oxford House 508 E. 4th Street Bethlehem, PA
I did not, and do not have a substance abuse problem, but lived there because it was cheap. I was a dishwasher at The Hotel Bethlehem
*11/2008 – 1/2009 Step by Step Recovery Home
I ran out of psyche meds, and my insurance hadn’t kicked in, so as one house threw me out over mania, another opened their doors.
*1/2009 - 3/2009 Jamaica Hospital, Queens/Brooklyn NYC
I kneeled and touched my head to the ground in prayer (prostrated myself) before boarding a plane to San Francisco, and was forcibly removed to a hospital by police. They nearly put me in a State Hospital, but I withdrew the case. While there, I received an offer to rent a 6500 sq. ft. Brooklyn art loft if I would redo it with my art for $750/mo. I couldn’t get any deposit for them.
*3/2009 – 6/2009 Lived on my Mom’s couch.
Overmedicated forcibly, and unable to get good work.
*06/2009 – 07/2009 Lived at some recovery one percenters house in the finished attic. Mom paid, but when I couldn’t get work, out the door I went. She threatened me at 4am saying she couldn’t “deal with me” anymore and bought me plane ticket to San Diego. I left with no cash.
*07/2009 – 11/2009 Commercial Avenue , San Diego, CA– Homeless
I remember Murph and Harley, getting drunk watching The Black Eyed Peas play on a stage a block from our encampment.
*11/2009 – 8/2010 Downtown Safe Haven, SD
I worked a lot of sales jobs, probably half a dozen, went to Tech school for awhile, had a fling, and discovered meth.
*08/2010 – 11/2010 El Cajon Blvd. , SD ,Boarding House
Lost my job, and went after cleaning up my act to a Psyche Meds Research Study.
*11/2010 - 12/25/2010 Research Study. Escondido, CA
Had a heart attack, a vision from God, and flew home to my son (so I thought) on ☆Christmas.☆
*03/2011 – 09/ 2011 Psyche Rehab in Historic Bethlehem
Went from getting a job as Customer Service from the streets and nearly landing the floor manager job, to forced in to a psyche rehab. Applied and given Social; Security.
###The Social Security was garnished illegally, making me unable to get a start. Child Support took $4.4K in back pay due to me, and $270 a month of my $850 ###
Disgusted, and defeated, I left for San Diego when I could, fleeing unlawful persecution. Arrived in a sorry state, with not nearly enough money to survive.
*09/2011 – 1/2012 El Cajon Blvd., SD Boarding House
I could not afford rent, and left for Venice.
*1/2012 – 4/2012 Homeless in Venice, CA
Found a house to live at affordably, but was unhappy and left to San Diego.
*04/2012 – 09/2012 San Diego, Pacific and Mission Beaches, Spring Valley
Homeless with hustle. Met my wife. Scavenged thousands of dollars of merch from beach goers trash, was tight and 140lbs by the end. Fought with my wife’s brother, and had to get outta town and let things cool off.
*09/2012 – 10/2012 Ann Arbor Michigan – Homeless
Such a beautiful town to be in at the fall time I was there. Drinkin’ Jack and puffin cigars, down by the railroad track. St. Andrews oatmeal at 6am, good company and good cheer. In love with life, even this one.
*10/03/2012 – 10/17/2012 St. Louis, MO – Homeless
After tearing up my Greyhound ticket home, not knowing it was not re-printable, checked in to a Psyche Ward. Then a second. The second gave me a month long lasting time release Haledol shot and after another caper, wife sent me on a bus as far as $100 could get me.
*10/17/2012 – 11/03/2012 The Topeka Mission – Topeka, KS
God Bless, this is one of my favorite small towns ever. One with a big heart.
*11/03/2012 -11/09/2012 San Diego – Homeless
I found my way into a familiar groove now with a baby on the way and my head screwed straight.
*11/09/2012 – 06/2013 - Downtown Safe Haven, "C" Street San Diego
Rosabella Gonzaga Ayers Brooks born 4/4/2013 with the help of this community. Peed on my roommate in the middle of the night, sleepwalking, don’t know why woke up at his bedside zipping up. Moved, obviously.
*06/2013 – 09/2013 The Baltic Inn – Downtown San Diego
Won “Who’s Who in the World” for my resume and worked at a bleach plant under the table, burning the skin off my body.
*09/2013 – 04/2014 The San Diego ALPHA PROJECT Winter Shelter Tent-
Lived and worked on my manuscripts. Got a song written about me by Atmosphere while I slaved getting 100K views on my ozenoz.com in a few short months.
Thought I was headed for soon success.
*4/01/2014 - 04/03/2014 Venice, CA – Homeless
Lost my shit and permanently deleted my blogger with the views.
*04/03/2014 – 04/08/2014 The Rodeway Inn La Mesa, CA
My little girl’s first birthday. Me, Mom, and her. BTW people. They always had a home, Just me trying to get it together, visiting them every day.
*04/08/2014 – 09/17/2015 Island Village Apartments
Wow. PATH Program paid my rent 6 months, and deposit. When it fell on me, no hussle, $865 income and $803 rent. What a time. Got behind on rent, and viola. No more.
*09/17/2015 – 10/4/2015 East Village SD (homeless/streets)
Got attacked by a man with a long staff in the night. Shattered my left knuckle brushing off a wide hard swing at my head. Wife’s family took me in.
*10/04/2015 – 1/07/2016 The Krenn’s (wife’s family)
God Bless ‘em they just want me to do good.
*1/07/2016 – 1/06/2017 St. Vincent DePaul Paul Mirable Center, San Diego, CA
A slow time, but growing all the while.
*1/06/2017 – 4/01/2018 The Trolley Court (SRO) San Diego, CA
Diverticulitis, hospitalizations. Hell, most of the time I spent on my wife’s floor for weeks at a time loving family life. Lost my SSI income and out the door I went.
*4/01/2018 – 07/2019 The Krenn Family Home
Hell, I don’t know why they put up with me. Guess I’m loved.
*07/2019 – 11/2019 Venice, CA – Homeless
Deep and long and winding journey.
One I lost 100 pounds on in three and a half months. Came back looking like a stick figure at 200 lbs. Trained a right fucking hard.
Deep hurt caused to my family during this time. My illness was out of control. I regret much of my actions and words towards them, not to mention the unrewarded time spent working there wasted in our time for the benefit they are owed by me.
*11/2019 – NOW - The Krenn Family, Spring Valley, CA
This is my home.
I just got my San Diego County Section 8 Voucher in January (12+ years on the wait list)…
I still have no income. I still struggle with my illness. I now have a good phone (Lifeline but a Samsung S10), and am getting a new laptop this week.
I am not lucky, but I am Fortunate. I am pretty sure of it.
It is good for me to reflect and relive, map out these timelines, as it pools my experience and I can expand past just having dates and places.
How is my life? Blessed.
We live.
In a house.
As a family.
Who actually love each other.
What a concept.
Of all of the things that exist on this Earth, the most important is love.
That spoonful.
Comments
Post a Comment