I celebrated my 34th birthday last month. 34 may not seem like a major milestone but in the back of my head it was a slight concern whether or not I would survive past the age of 33. You see several significant people died at the age of 33. Jesus Christ was 33 when he was crucified. John Belushi and Bruce Lee, two influential figures in my upbringing died at age 33. The list also includes Chris Farley, Karen Carpenter, Bon Scott - the original lead singer for AC/DC, Sam Cooke, and even Rob Pilatus of Milli Vanilli fame died at 33.



Although I did not die in my 33rd year, I did experience a kind of rebirth. It was March 16th 2007 when I decided that I needed to change my life. My mom and I decided to begin walking a three mile loop around Bear Creek in Merced. That was the first step in a process of diet and exercise that would lead me to be 50 pounds lighter a year later. I began going to the gym and now I am leaner and much more muscle mass. That metamorphosis has given me more confidence and I feel healthier than I have in a long time.



The other part of my "rebirth" is that I split from my wife of 9 years, Melba. For a long time I had felt that our marriage was not what I had envisioned a marriage to be. In many ways we were good roommates and helped each other achieve some of our goals but our relationship lacked passion and affection. So last May when I returned from Lester's bachelor party in San Luis Obispo, Melba said that she has been thinking and she had come to the conclusion that she didn't want to have children. She said she knew that I did want o have children and that she did not want to hold me back from the opportunity to become a father.



This revalation sparked two responses in me. First of all, it gave me the opportunity to walk away from our marriage in a clean fashion without hurt feelings or animosity. Second, it struck me odd that all of a sudden Melba had this level of conviction to say that she did not want to have children after several years of trying. We had once gotten pregnant but lost the baby after nine weeks. She brought this up mentioning that perhaps it was for the best.



Still, the level of conviction Melba had struck me as odd. Melba had been acting increasingly different over the past few months. So, I decided to investigate and found out that she was in love with another man. Oddly, this fact did not hurt my feelings but rather made it much easier to walk away with out having to worry about hurting her feelings. I was free to leave the relationship without looking back.



Ironically, Melba is now pregnant with this other man's baby and they are set to be married in June. I am extremely happy for them, mainly because it has allowed me to be in the right place at the right time to meet the woman who I think I am truly meant to be with. But that is another story that is coming soon.



So, I lost weight, became more healthy, got divorced, moved out on my own for the first time in my life, learned to be independant, dated a few women, grew, matured and rediscovered joy in my life.



In August, I returned to the theater after taking a five year break from it. My first show was Oklahoma where I reprised my role as Jud Frye. Next was Annie Get Your Gun where I played Charlie Davenport, one of the secondary lead characters. After that was Crazy For You, where I played a couple of characters to great acclaim. Then I did A Streetcar Named Desire, which I had not really wanted to participate in, but the artistic director, Rob Hypes, asked me if I would audition. I relented a couple of times before finally agreeing to do it. Boy am I glad that I did.