About the book and why I wrote it - two reasons, Jennifer and Jessica, my daughters. Several years ago I sat in my studio in Los Angeles wondering if I would ever get the opportunity to grow up with my daughters, who were living in the Bay Area (northern California). I wondered if they would ever get the chance to know who their father really was.That would be difficult to find out from anyone else but me. You see, no one ever really knew me as I was.I shared some of my life with their mother, but not all, so she couldn't give them the real me. My parents and three sisters only know what took place in our home and not the real life that I lived and had kept from them, afraid of criticism and guilt from my parents. I grew up in Brooklyn, in not one, but several different neighborhoods at the same time. I experienced many other walks of life. My family and our group couldn't or wouldn't understand the other, so I never shared with anyone. I want to now. I wrote this book with pencil and paper, and never read any of it while I was writing it. I wrote until my hand got tired. I was forced to proofread it after it was typed. It was like reading about someone else at times. I laughed, I cried, I smiled - I hope you do too.