BLAST FROM THE PAST: DAY 14
The Life and Times of Brian Paul Mulholland


I can't think of a better way to end Blast From the Past than with an autobiography I did in 6th grade. I hope you enjoyed this look back into my past. I know I certainly did. I still can't believe my teachers didn't think I was insane.



My Life
I was born at 9:14 pm at a hospital in Philadelphia. My mother, Joanne Mulholland, and my father, Paul Mulholland, were both present. My grandmother on my mother's side and my grandmother on my father's side ("Anu") were alive, but my two grandfathers had both unfortunately passed away by this point in time. My mom and dad both agreed on a name - Brian Paul Mulholland. If I were a girl, my name would have been Laura.

I lived in Springfield, Pennsylvania until late September, 1983. On that day I moved into our house at 18 Newtown Woods Road in Newtown Square. We moved to make room for Kevin, who was expected to be born in a few months - probably in April, the doctors said. But on January 15, Kevin was born. He was premature, so he had to stay in the hospital for a couple of months after that. But Kevin came home eventually and was fine.

I mentioned earlier that I moved into our house in Newtown Square. I still live there and have very friendly neighbors. Russel Reed, who lived near me, was my first best friend. Unfortunately, he moved away when I was about 2 or 3. But I would never want to move away. The Eatons, who moved into the house next to ours when I was about 4 or 5, had a sone named Jack, who quickly became one of my best friends. He has still not moved away, luckily. Now my best friends are Jack, Eddie McMearty, who used to go to school with me, and Chris Dunne, who goes to school with me now.

I began my schooling with the Newtown Square Presbyterian Church nursery school. Then after a few years of that, I moved on to Kindergarden with Mrs. Lennox in St. Anastasia's Kindergarden building, a building off to the side of the 2 buildings for the 1st - 3rd graders and the 4th - 8th graders. And then I moved to the 1st - 3rd grade building. For my 1st grade teacher I had Mrs. Facciola for half of the year, and when she left to have a baby and Mrs. Core taught us. For second grade I was taught by Mrs. Kelly. They were both nice. But for third grade, I had a very strict teacher named Mrs. Kiefer. But for fourth grade I had my first nun teacher - Sr. Marie Mount. For fifth, I had another lay teacher, named Mrs. Walls.

The next year after I left St. Anastasia, the sisters, who lived in the convent right next to the school, were all assigned to new parishes. But I moved to Devon Prep, where I am presently in 7th grade. I made many new friends, and kept some, like Dan Borginis, who went to St. Anastasia also until 6th grade, moved to Devon Prep the same year that I did. At Devon, I have many teachers, including Mrs. Doerr, Mr. Iezzi, Mr. Owens, and our headmaster is Father Shea. I am involved in Devon's Radio Club. I do not participate in any of Devon's sports because I play soccer and baseball in my township's leagues (for the 1993 season our team came in 1st!). I have many likes and dislikes. I like my pet birds, Calvin and Hobbes. Actually he's Hobbes 2 - Hobbes 1 died a few months after we got him, because of a nasal infection. At first, we thought that he was lonely, so we bought Calvin. Hobbes 1 died, so we bought Hobbes 2. Calvin is a mean bird, but Hobbes is really nice.

Before the birds, we had 14 fish. We gave 6 away and kept the rest. Two of them lived for almost 5 years, but then died within a few months of each other. One of the fish was named Black Eyed Pig, because one of his eyes was black and he ate all the food in the bowl. One day he got really sick and so the other fish got revenge by ramming him against the wall. He died a few minutes later.

I like pizza, cheeseburgers, french fries, stuffing, coffee, tomatoes, mashed potatoes, vanilla ice cream and milkshakes, white chocolate, and pretty much anything else that you put in front of me. But NOT asparagus or dark chocolate. Anything with nuts or shellfish in it i cannot eat, because I have a serious allergy to them, called anaphilaxis, that makes it difficult for me to breathe, break out in hives (sometimes), throw up, and have to go to the hospital.

My favorite radio station is 100.3, which is also called Y100. I like to listen to Green Day, my favorite rock group. My favorite song is called Basket Case and is performed by Green Day. They also make lots of other songs that I like. I also like Aerosmith, Counting Crows, and many other groups. But I cannot stand country music. Most rap I don't like, but I have heard 1 or 2 songs that are okay.

I used to take piano lessons, but quit after 3 years because it conflicted too much with my busy schedule. I also quit because after about one year the group of 3 kids (me and two other girls) broke up, meaning that each child would now take individual lessons. This was caused because our teacher left Taylor Music in Springfield, where I had been taking the lessons. During the next year I had about one or two other instructors before Taylor Music had to close down. The next year I took lessons with only one instructor, the instructor that I had right before it closed down, in his parish church (it was the only building that had a piano that he could get access to). It was then that I quit, because, as I said before, I just didn't have the time to practice or make it to the lessons, and everything just got too hectic.

I like to watch T.V., also. My favorite shows are Star Trek: The Next Generation, Animaniacs, and the Simpsons, but I HATE (and I can't stress the word hate enough) Barney, Rosanne, The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, or Beverly Hills 90210.

My favorite toy is Legos, and my favorite comic strips are Calvin and Hobbes, The Far Side, Mutts, and Fox Trot. My favorite room in my house is the basement, which is like our family's playroom/activities center. In it we keep our computer, train set, and one of our family's 3 TV's. A close second is my room.

I also enjoy working with computers. At our home we have a NEC Powermate SX\20 personal computer. We have Print Shop, which lets you create signs and greeting cards; Paintbrush, an art-like program, Write, a word processor, and many other games like Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame and Tetris. I am also interested in electronics. In fact, I have a large plastic box that I keep all of my little gadgets, wires, experiments, and other oddities.

I also used to keep a small coin collection. I have at least one penny from every year since 1909! Well, a little more than 2/3 of the dates, but I do have 1909 - the first year the mints issued the penny that is what we still use today. I also have many other interesting coins, like a 1924 silver dollar, which is not printed today.

My father works for Sun Company in Philadelphia. Before he worked in Philadelphia, he worked for Radnor Corporation, a division of Sun Co. He does many things for sun, including helping to manage their budget and meeting and talking with bankers and other dealers. My mother is a housewife, but she is a very good one at that.



Future Goals
At the present time, I have no future plans for what I want to do. I might want to work with computers or electronics in my job. Or I might want to start a comic strip. But in 10 years I should be in my senior year in college. I do not know what to major in, but possibly something that involves math and computers. And I do not know what college I want to go to. But I do know that I want to go to college. I also want to possibly get married and start a family. But, as I said before, I have no definite plans for the future. But I think that's okay because, after all, I am only twelve years old. I will have plenty of time to think about the future when the time comes.