Hello and welcome to all!

I've had this site since 2000 and have long planned to develop a member's area. Within the next few months it should be up and running. This is the first of weekly "journal" entries which I will begin posting on the site. I enjoy writing but have no idea if anyone wants to read any of my musings.

It is Christmas Day 2002 as I write this. (You will be reading this several weeks later.) A few weeks ago at my gym a young man named Jimmy came in. No one had seen him in the better part of a year. He is about 18 and had begun coming to the gym when he was about 14 or 15. Since he was a local kid some of the members knew him. It was quite evident that he came from a troubled background. The owners of the gym allowed him to take martial arts classes and use the facilities in exchange for his doing some cleanup work around the place. They also told him he could sleep upstairs in the offices if he needed to.

No one seemed to know what had become of Jimmy's parents. He lived with two older brothers in a rough section of town. One brother was about 3 years older than Jimmy, and the other may have been about 5 years older. Both were drug users and had been in and out of jail for a series of petty offenses. Of course neither was equipped to be raising a young brother, and presumably, they had not received much in the way of parenting themselves. They seemed to care for Jimmy and tried to help him out as best they could, but Jimmy was already experimenting with drugs and doing poorly in school.

One of the martial arts instructors had taken a particular interest in helping him, but Jimmy started taking classes less and less frequently. When he was about 16 he started using speed. An older sister who lived in Arizona found out, came to Los Angeles and brought him to live with her in a better environment. For whatever reason that did not last long and Jimmy returned to L.A., but barely came to the gym at all anymore.

About a year and a half passed and someone from the gym was out jogging and saw Jimmy in front of a house in her neighborhood. He was sitting by himself wearing a T-shirt with the gym's name on it. She said hello, gave him a hug and told him to stop by the gym again. He was clearly under the effects of some heavy drugs. The sweetness in his personality was still there, but he communicated as if his conscious self was a great distance away. He promised to stop by and say hello to everyone. Armando, one of the martial arts instructors, heard the story and went to the same neighborhood over the next few days trying to find him but had no luck.

Others who knew Jimmy wondered where he was, but at the same time they almost feared to know. Almost a year went by and no one saw him again until a few weeks ago. He walked into the gym out of the blue looking upbeat. His demeanor was far different than it had been in the recent times that anyone had seen him. He had a clear look in his eye and told everyone that he had enlisted in the Army. He had just completed a six-week stint at one of the Army camps and was heading back for more training after Christmas. It was beautiful to see him excited and happy and having a positive direction in life.

Today, on Christmas, I think of him and hope that he will keep his life on a promising course and find happiness. No child should ever be abandoned by his parents and left to find his own way without adult guidance. There was probably more that a lot of us at the gym could have done to help, but maybe, like me, no one knew how far they should intercede in Jimmy's life. As I think about that today I still am not sure what the answer is.