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Why write the Adventures of Jack?




Building a Toolbox


Just imagine, as a young boy you were compared to Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn, but most of all Dennis the Menace?

 In a sense, honestly, I was trying to mimic my story as a young boy.  Don't we all have stories and dreams?

 While trying to reach children of all ages,  I wondered do students today read Mark Twain, Jules Verne, or even Alexandar Dumas?  Had they even heard of them?  Would they have even heard of Dale Carnegie’s Golden Book?

 So in an open reading session of Jack's Adventures with friends; the first comments were kids today wouldn't know who they are!

 Let's see some of why; The Adventures of Jack?

  My mother started calling me 'Dennis the Menace.' ( the Dennis the Menace comic strip debuted on March 12, 1951. ) Being such a good boy like Dennis;  I was thrown out of the fourth grade twice and at sixteen in the ninth grade for the last time.

 There I was hang-in out at the corner soda shop; no job, no money, and no education! Just one cool kid, hair slicked back, and my sleeves rolled up, just like Fonz!

 Then life got even better; I started stealing cars to joyride.
But then you even get luckier you go to jail?

 See Curtis "Wall Street" Carroll: How I learned to read -- and trade stocks -- in prison |  https://youtu.be/F89eycANUrQ

 You know you're lucky when you realize you weren't going to spend the rest of your life in jail, Like Curtis!

 But, like Curtis, it is where I started reading.  When you spend long days on the rock pile, and the evening's in your cell with cable TV, the internet, and your iPhone ( wait this was 1960).Life was tough back in the day!

 Because I was this well-educated kid? I went to the library ( just like in Jack's Adventures).

 Wow, thinking back to 1960, eke, what books did I read? Maybe 150, in my two years in this five-star hotel?

 I remember my first book The Mysterious Island, by Jules Verne. I was so well read I needed a dictionary to understand the words.

 But Like Jack, I began to dream!

 Back to being cool like Fonzi, then my Dad said son you have too now pay twenty dollars a week rent. WHAT? (how could my dad do this to me?)

 In one of Jack's Adventures, I said " It's who you know, not always what you know" well here it is again that 'luck' thing. Down the street from the soda shop, where the cool kids hung out, Dick Riley owned a lawn mower repair shop. The owner of the cool soda shop said Dick Riley's son Bob was looking for someone to mow grass.

 In The Adventures of Jack, he meets many mentors: and Bob Riley was about to change my life.

 As we travel in this life we realize you have (to pull yourself up by the bootstraps ), the golden spoon is reserved for only a few.  

 Only you get to reserve the right to decide which is better: to earn your way, or just have it given to you?

 I hope Jack's Adventures will impact your life and you will read and relate these stories to our future leaders.

 In one of Jack's adventures, his father introduced him to Toastmasters ( a worldwide organization that teaches public speaking ).

 In 2010, I created Youth Speaking to America ( youthspeakingtoamerica.zohosites.com) to teach the Toastmaster Youth Leadership Program. My goal helps young adults understand the importance of staying in school.

 I call it 'Building a Toolbox.'

 Please help spread the word about 'The Adventures of Jack'

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Next: Jack's first adventure; (1)  The Imaginary Man
What's next: www.weebeworld.blogspot.com 

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