I'm having a blast using the gifts and talents that God has given me as a platform to minister to people and love them and shine the light that He wants me to shine.

Two weeks after the arrested I was on the phone with my wife and we said a prayer and I was crying and just so happy, I can't even explain it. It was euphoric. People said I went from freedom my whole life to prison, but in reality, I went from imprisonment and bondage of sin and death my whole life, to finding freedom in a prison cell.

Skateboarding and that whole industry just became so far away. I was trying to find that ultimate place, that place of contentment but I couldn't. I didn't find it in pushing the dark things of life to the limit either.

I was introduced to skateboarding through my father. He was a surfer back in the 50's & 60's in Hawaii, where my parents grew up. They later moved to California and I was born. Skateboarding was the thing for surfers here in California in the 60's and my Dad immediately made me a homemade board.

I tried partying and going out, doing drugs and even dealing drugs to support my habit. I was hanging out with people from the underground who were doing illegal things all the time. I was experimenting with more and more drugs to the point where skateboarding was the last thing on my mind and my family was next to last.

It felt like I was a bucket full of holes. Things kept going in but just as quickly, they'd drain out. So I had people telling me I was this and that and then I'd feel pressure to perform up to their standards, jumping through hoops so I could live up to their expectations.

Gerry Lopez was a famous surfer back then and his board had a lightning bolt in the in the middle, so my Dad made me a surf/skateboard with a lightning bolt on it.