CURRENT MISSION:
Get into better physical shape!

ABOUT ME:
I'm excited to graduate with my first MPH on April 28, 2024! I turn 40 on March 26, 2024, and am planning a month-long trip to multiple locations as a celebration of my "Birthday Month." I'm hoping this trip will open up my creative side to write my first book. I'm planning on passing through 3 Western states of the U.S.: Idaho, Utah, and Arizona, then moving on to Central/Latin America, and then end up in the southern Caribbean.

Other than that, I'm just a regular Southern guy who is a certified and licensed massage therapist. Massage experience of over 20 years, on and off. I'm very part-time and haven't returned to it since the beginning of the COVID-19 Pandemic. I finished my massage studies in Salt Lake City, UT, USA, where I lived for 2 years. I love to travel and so far have been to 41 of the 50 states, 2 provinces of Canada, and Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. My next quest in February 2020 was to go to another continent, hopefully Europe. Well, March 2020 changed that plan! I don't know when those hopes will be fulfilled. The country that makes me most excited to visit is Iceland and the Nordic countries.

I returned to Tennessee from living in California in Sept. 2014 after my best friend passed from complications of AML in just 5 short months. I was living there and I figured out the school I was attending and the area I was living was not the right place for me, and with her death, I learned if something is working right in your life, you just have to move on; life is too short.

I am 39 and have definitely been in a transition period for what seems to be a decade now with figuring life out. I've been working on finishing my Master's in Public Health Administration with a Concentration in Functional Nutrition online with Everglades University in Florida, USA, and would like to get into Bastyr University for Naturopathic and Oriental Medicine school in Seattle, WA; a Master's in English from the University of the South, School of Letters, in Sewanee, TN; and a PhD at Yale in Public Health.

PHILOSOPHY:
1.) Don't allow others to feed your seeds of anger.
2.) There are at least 3 sides to every story.
3.) Don't believe anything you hear and only half of what you see.
4.) Processing trauma can feel like a lifetime.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING:
I loved hosting people from around the world when my apt. was accomodating. I also love surfing when I'm able to travel. I had a very long extended surf with a guy who hosted me for 28 days when I first moved to California, and I've hosted people from the U.S. and other countries ever since. My first amazing host experience led to a march on Washington where he led us to the White House.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE:
-November 2012: I hosted a guy from NYC who walked through my town in Tennessee for LGBT Equality.
-April 2014: I have now surfed for a 28-day stretch with a guy in South San Jose, California, as well as hosted 6 surfers.

Interests

• arts
• lgbt rights
• human rights
• yoga
• massage therapy
• meditation
• clubbing
• politics
• survival
• music
• hiking
• baseball
• business
• history
• medicine
• philosophy
• psychology
• science
• statistics
• budget travel
• mountains
• travel
• spirituality
• buddhism
• couchsurfing
• activism
• sushi
• museums
• vegan food
• taoism
• paranormal
• reiki
• thai food
• climate change
• aliens
• hot springs
• university
• homeopathy
• math
• tai chi
• naturopathy
• oceans
• unitarian universalist
• women's rights
• spiritual growth
• ocean conservation
• oriental medicine
• pho
• ufos
• humanitarianism
• scientific research
• virology
• movies & books
• gluten-free cooking
• buddhist philosophy
• ptsd
• dbt

Music, Movies, and Books

Horror, Comedy, and Documentary Movies and TV Series; Alternative, Alternative Rock, Rock, Metal, Heavy Metal, Pop, Dance, Trance, Electronic, EDM, and some Country music.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Worked a Summer in 2002 on Mackinac Island, Michigan.

Worked a Summer in 2004 in Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming at Jackson Lake Lodge.

Went on a 3 month road trip with my mom through 19 states in the U.S. in the Summer of 2012!

In November and December of 2016, I went on a 1 month road trip, flying from Nashville to San Francisco, staying in San Jose 1 week; taking the Amtrak up through Sierra Nevadas to Portland, OR, for 5 days; Seattle, WA, for 7 days; and then Vacouver, BC, for 5 or 6 days! It was amazing: warm at first, then wet, and lastly, very cold and snowy!

In 2022, I ran for U.S. Congress.

Teach, Learn, Share

Any person from a background unlike my own.

What I Can Share with Hosts

A friendly, Southern hospitality attitude, wit, humor, and dead pan.

Countries I’ve Visited

Canada, Trinidad and Tobago, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

United States