[Pix: Ahualoa, Hamakua, Hawaii - the region of ferns, guava trees and various vines where I was born and reared - also known as "Up Bush"]
A brief autobiography
I was born Anthony Dias Souza (aka Leroy Dumont) in 1935 at Ahualoa, Hamakua, Hawaii at the foot of Mauna Kea, the tallest mountain in the world (measured from the ocean floor). Actually, my mother gave birth at Haina Hospital with Doctor Brown attending and my first reported act was immediately peeing in the doctor’s face before he could swat me on the butt. instead of crying like a newborn, I let out raucous giggles which my parents later discovered that, like my Uncle Mack, my brain was crossed wired causing me to laugh when experiencing discomfort or pain. I only cried when I was sentimental or happy, only uncle mack understood my reactions and taught me how to take full advantage of them. later my classmates were startled when someone punched and knocked me down and I got up laughing. they decided that I enjoyed pain and never wanted to fight me, fearing that I would beat them to a pulp, laughing as I did it. my Uncle Mack utilized his skill to become a bare-knuckle barn champion in San Fransisco for over four years before he returned to Hawai'i. he began grooming me for the golden glove, training me from age six. since his wife had turned his son into a wimp who could not stand to be struck, I became Uncle Mack’s de facto son and between him and my father, who was cut from the same cloth as Uncle Mack and was my best friend growing up (living in deep country, he and I did everything together, hunted, fished, spelunked, mountain climbed, and more). briefly, I had two very macho role models whom I admired and sought to emulate, who bred the Leroy Dumont (king of the mountain) aspect of my personality.
Another factor in my formative years was the fact that during the first six months of my life I had just about every childhood disease including scarlet fever which gave me pneumonia and which, in 1935, was a death sentence. when Doctor Brown gave up on me, my father took me to our Auntie Pinau and gave me to her to be my nursemaid. My Auntie Pinau, a kahuna and devotee of Pele, goddess of fire and brimstone (the active volcano of Kilauea that is in the perpetual state of erupting). She consecrated and gave me to the Hawaiian goddess as her son, setting the mode of my personality for life. I am a "keiki o ka aina", an offspring of the land". As a proficient herbalogist, Auntie Pinau nursed me back to health in an astounding three months, promising me a long life and i have not been seriously ill with anything but common colds since. Auntie Pinau kept me for three and a half year, instructing me in Nature and the patterns of life. She still is the most intelligent person I have ever met. I loved her as dearly as my mother.
From my maternal grandfather, I inherited a wicked combination of DNA. the "parents" that raised him had him had a peculiar background. They sailed from the Azores with their natural born son of eight. however, on the trip to Brazil (a way stop on the voyage to the Hawaiian Islands - their ultimate destination) their son died and was "buried" at sea. (actually, his body was thrown over board with little ceremony - the usual disposition of the lower classes who died at sea.) grieving, my great grandmother and great grandfather went ashore to transfer vessels whereupon my great grandmother spotted a street "child" of nine who reminded her of her deceased son. here, the story gets a bit fuzzy. my maternal grandfather was the product of a Norwegian sailor and a Jivaro woman who had been expelled from her tribe and resorted to living on the streets of Rio De Janeiro (we assume as a prostitute). my great grandparents either purchased or kidnapped the boy with his cooperation. He had been trained in the ways of the Jivaro who were headhunters and, at that time, not very civilized. at least, in his seventies, my grandfather acquiesced to our (my oldest sister and myself) badgering and began relating a laundered version of his procurement by his adoptive new parents, in the process, I learned much of the Jivaro and the art of shrinking trophy heads. now, you know from where the Leroy Dumont of my psyche evolved. It is hereditary. A contrary twist to my DNA helix.
A highlight of my life was when, at the age of eight, my father, two officers from the 2nd Marine Division, and I rode on horseback and climbed to the top of Mauna Kea (13,776 ft.). A breath-taking experience. We regularly hunted sheep above the high-snow line. being told that I was on top of the tallest mountain in the world, I declared myself king of the mountain, from whence I derived the name Leroy Dumont (Le Roi Du Mont). It reminds me of the exhilaration I felt that day on Mauna Kea, realizing i was looking down on the rest of the world (Mount Everest notwithstanding).
Another highlight of my young life was "sparring" with the soon to become heavy weight champion of the world who, at that time, was the 2nd Marine Division heavy weight champion. During world war ii, Rocky Marciano was the driver for Colonel Fagan who believed in the strict separation of the ranks. Thus, when he came to visit my father, Rocky Marciano was stationed outside standing at the Colonel's jeep. Upon my mother's request, Rocky was permitted to accept the coffee I delivered and, upon seeing my boxing setup in the nearby shred, inquired about it. I proudly proclaimed that I was aspiring to be the island champion in my weight division and he offered to help me improve my style since professional boxing differed greatly from my Uncle Mack's bare knuckle days. As I knew he was a marine champion whom Colonel Fagan boasted would one day become world champion, I gratefully accept and, during the course of many nights, I ferried coffee to Rocky in exchange for boxing lessons. Later, when he did become world champion, i wrote to him and he invited me to New York for dinner. However, circumstances forced me to decline. My memory of Rocky was that of a warm and friendly piasano family man of the cut of my uncles. I considered him a friend.
To the mundane realities of my young life, i attended Honokaa Elementary School on the island of Hawaii, Saint Patrick's School, at Kaimuki, Oahu, Hawaii, and graduated Saint Louis College, Kaimuki, Oahu, Hawaii (now called Chaminade College). Drafted, I spent two and a half years in an ordinance battalion blowing up various parts of the planet's terrain. after which i attended the Yale University Institute of Far Eastern Studies courtesy of the United States Government and served in U.S. Intelligence in the Pacific/Far East theater for three years. our version of PTSD was being Pissed off, Tired, Sex starved and Drunk.
Killing people was our profession and we excelled at it. I never lost a partner except a native guide who was taken out by a sniper whom I toasted. We prided ourselves as being full-fledged members of the GCBAs (government certified bad asses) which sounded a lot better than CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) or NSA (which, at the time, was jokingly called No Such Agency who ran the ultra-under belly of foreign intelligence. I acquired my French from serving in the former French province (Burma) that broke up into several countries after the French got their butts kicked at Diem Bien Phu. Laos, where almost all of the natives spoke French, was my turf. I also flew aerial recon in a "Bird Dog", a piper cub-like two seater (one in back of the other) armed with a thirty caliber machine gun that we jury-rigged into being able to swing from one side of the aircraft to the other. The "Bird Dog" was joy stick steered and easy to learn how to fly. At any rate, the entire Laos scenario had a defined impact on my personality and gave birth to "Frenchie" Leroy Dumont. Relax, we are all schizophrenic. we just talk to each other inside of our heads. Just try listening to yourself and the debates that take place. "Should I do such and such?" And the counter "no, I better not because..." It is the normal course of daily life. We decide in partnership with our other selves. and, if you establish a healthy relationship with your other self as I have with Leroy Dumont, you will always have a backup and never be alone. just do not break it up into multiples of more than two, then you will be scattered and really be sick. If somebody gets in my face, I call Leroy to the fore. He is my pit bull with whom you never want to contend. He is a government trained killer with a couple of years of practice who takes the moniker badass seriously. Me, Tony, am a mellow guy, the one men call a friend and women call a lover. I really have no simple, pat description of Leroy because he still is evolving. Caveman Loner is the best I can come up with but, down deep he is a nice guy who loves children and respects women. That is why we both get along.
Upon returning stateside, I joined a partner (who watched my back in Laos) in the formation of an outlaw biker club. It was difficult adjusting to Western civilization. I was accustomed to killing people who really bugged me. For four months, the government psychs tried to convince me there were separate rules of conduct depending upon the time and place. I often thought I should have continued on being a killer. With all my government training and experience, I was better qualified to be a hit-man if anything. It would have been more profitable than my brief smuggling career. Instead, my partner and I took up organizing and staging rock concerts in the region culminating in the calamitous California Music Faire where we lost our bankroll and shirts.
After I almost killed myself in a motorcycle accident, I gave my skoot to my partner and settled down a bit, deciding to further pursue my education in Southern California during which time I developed an interest in politics and wound up serving as special liaison aide for Los Angeles area congressman and, later, as area coordinator for the mayor of Los Angeles. during this period, i served as editor and publisher of a Los Angeles Harbor region bi-monthly community newspaper and as a partner in a public relations firm, primarily geared to political campaigns, and garnered some academic credentials. It was sufficient to call myself "doctor" with a scattered background of majors. I became over-educated and decided to become an electronic tech (hacker) at the dawn of the computer age. The phenomena of Bulletin Board networking (before the Internet and persists to keep the government out our affairs) intrigued me and, with a group of ham radio aficionados, devised our own "invisible empire" to survive after social order collapses. During this period, aside from several girlfriends, I was married twice, my first dying of brain cancer after ten plus years, and spawned six sons who have produced a crowd of grandchildren and great-grandchildren to help over-populate the planet and compensate for the millions we kill off in wars. Hell, it is a numbers game to see if we can out produce the cockroaches.
Now retired, I reside in Santa Cruz County, California and devote my time to research and writing while sponging off the Veterans Administration and Social Security. (the Pentagon finally owned up that I served and bought me off by paying my rent and other perks and offering unlimited medical benefits.)
As Leroy Dumont, I have written fifteen novels and a few scholarly books as Anthony Dias Souza published primarily in the Serbian language (Don't ask! I will not explain ever!), and am presently continuing to write both fiction and science. my research and hobby is inter-dimensional contact and travel which I believe we are on the cusp of authenticating and achieving. I always say, if you are going to dream, dream not just big but cosmically. Your mind has the capacity to embrace more than just the physical universe we explore. As a student of authentic (non-mystical and devoid all of the Hindi religious distortions) Yoga, I have been in the process of translating the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali and the Sankhya Karika for the last twenty-one years and hope (all fingers crossed) to produce publishable copies within the next two years. As usual, I have said too much but, cheerfully, I like to bend an ear. Contact me if you also are so inclined.
Another factor in my formative years was the fact that during the first six months of my life I had just about every childhood disease including scarlet fever which gave me pneumonia and which, in 1935, was a death sentence. when Doctor Brown gave up on me, my father took me to our Auntie Pinau and gave me to her to be my nursemaid. My Auntie Pinau, a kahuna and devotee of Pele, goddess of fire and brimstone (the active volcano of Kilauea that is in the perpetual state of erupting). She consecrated and gave me to the Hawaiian goddess as her son, setting the mode of my personality for life. I am a "keiki o ka aina", an offspring of the land". As a proficient herbalogist, Auntie Pinau nursed me back to health in an astounding three months, promising me a long life and i have not been seriously ill with anything but common colds since. Auntie Pinau kept me for three and a half year, instructing me in Nature and the patterns of life. She still is the most intelligent person I have ever met. I loved her as dearly as my mother.
From my maternal grandfather, I inherited a wicked combination of DNA. the "parents" that raised him had him had a peculiar background. They sailed from the Azores with their natural born son of eight. however, on the trip to Brazil (a way stop on the voyage to the Hawaiian Islands - their ultimate destination) their son died and was "buried" at sea. (actually, his body was thrown over board with little ceremony - the usual disposition of the lower classes who died at sea.) grieving, my great grandmother and great grandfather went ashore to transfer vessels whereupon my great grandmother spotted a street "child" of nine who reminded her of her deceased son. here, the story gets a bit fuzzy. my maternal grandfather was the product of a Norwegian sailor and a Jivaro woman who had been expelled from her tribe and resorted to living on the streets of Rio De Janeiro (we assume as a prostitute). my great grandparents either purchased or kidnapped the boy with his cooperation. He had been trained in the ways of the Jivaro who were headhunters and, at that time, not very civilized. at least, in his seventies, my grandfather acquiesced to our (my oldest sister and myself) badgering and began relating a laundered version of his procurement by his adoptive new parents, in the process, I learned much of the Jivaro and the art of shrinking trophy heads. now, you know from where the Leroy Dumont of my psyche evolved. It is hereditary. A contrary twist to my DNA helix.
A highlight of my life was when, at the age of eight, my father, two officers from the 2nd Marine Division, and I rode on horseback and climbed to the top of Mauna Kea (13,776 ft.). A breath-taking experience. We regularly hunted sheep above the high-snow line. being told that I was on top of the tallest mountain in the world, I declared myself king of the mountain, from whence I derived the name Leroy Dumont (Le Roi Du Mont). It reminds me of the exhilaration I felt that day on Mauna Kea, realizing i was looking down on the rest of the world (Mount Everest notwithstanding).
Another highlight of my young life was "sparring" with the soon to become heavy weight champion of the world who, at that time, was the 2nd Marine Division heavy weight champion. During world war ii, Rocky Marciano was the driver for Colonel Fagan who believed in the strict separation of the ranks. Thus, when he came to visit my father, Rocky Marciano was stationed outside standing at the Colonel's jeep. Upon my mother's request, Rocky was permitted to accept the coffee I delivered and, upon seeing my boxing setup in the nearby shred, inquired about it. I proudly proclaimed that I was aspiring to be the island champion in my weight division and he offered to help me improve my style since professional boxing differed greatly from my Uncle Mack's bare knuckle days. As I knew he was a marine champion whom Colonel Fagan boasted would one day become world champion, I gratefully accept and, during the course of many nights, I ferried coffee to Rocky in exchange for boxing lessons. Later, when he did become world champion, i wrote to him and he invited me to New York for dinner. However, circumstances forced me to decline. My memory of Rocky was that of a warm and friendly piasano family man of the cut of my uncles. I considered him a friend.
To the mundane realities of my young life, i attended Honokaa Elementary School on the island of Hawaii, Saint Patrick's School, at Kaimuki, Oahu, Hawaii, and graduated Saint Louis College, Kaimuki, Oahu, Hawaii (now called Chaminade College). Drafted, I spent two and a half years in an ordinance battalion blowing up various parts of the planet's terrain. after which i attended the Yale University Institute of Far Eastern Studies courtesy of the United States Government and served in U.S. Intelligence in the Pacific/Far East theater for three years. our version of PTSD was being Pissed off, Tired, Sex starved and Drunk.
Killing people was our profession and we excelled at it. I never lost a partner except a native guide who was taken out by a sniper whom I toasted. We prided ourselves as being full-fledged members of the GCBAs (government certified bad asses) which sounded a lot better than CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) or NSA (which, at the time, was jokingly called No Such Agency who ran the ultra-under belly of foreign intelligence. I acquired my French from serving in the former French province (Burma) that broke up into several countries after the French got their butts kicked at Diem Bien Phu. Laos, where almost all of the natives spoke French, was my turf. I also flew aerial recon in a "Bird Dog", a piper cub-like two seater (one in back of the other) armed with a thirty caliber machine gun that we jury-rigged into being able to swing from one side of the aircraft to the other. The "Bird Dog" was joy stick steered and easy to learn how to fly. At any rate, the entire Laos scenario had a defined impact on my personality and gave birth to "Frenchie" Leroy Dumont. Relax, we are all schizophrenic. we just talk to each other inside of our heads. Just try listening to yourself and the debates that take place. "Should I do such and such?" And the counter "no, I better not because..." It is the normal course of daily life. We decide in partnership with our other selves. and, if you establish a healthy relationship with your other self as I have with Leroy Dumont, you will always have a backup and never be alone. just do not break it up into multiples of more than two, then you will be scattered and really be sick. If somebody gets in my face, I call Leroy to the fore. He is my pit bull with whom you never want to contend. He is a government trained killer with a couple of years of practice who takes the moniker badass seriously. Me, Tony, am a mellow guy, the one men call a friend and women call a lover. I really have no simple, pat description of Leroy because he still is evolving. Caveman Loner is the best I can come up with but, down deep he is a nice guy who loves children and respects women. That is why we both get along.
Upon returning stateside, I joined a partner (who watched my back in Laos) in the formation of an outlaw biker club. It was difficult adjusting to Western civilization. I was accustomed to killing people who really bugged me. For four months, the government psychs tried to convince me there were separate rules of conduct depending upon the time and place. I often thought I should have continued on being a killer. With all my government training and experience, I was better qualified to be a hit-man if anything. It would have been more profitable than my brief smuggling career. Instead, my partner and I took up organizing and staging rock concerts in the region culminating in the calamitous California Music Faire where we lost our bankroll and shirts.
After I almost killed myself in a motorcycle accident, I gave my skoot to my partner and settled down a bit, deciding to further pursue my education in Southern California during which time I developed an interest in politics and wound up serving as special liaison aide for Los Angeles area congressman and, later, as area coordinator for the mayor of Los Angeles. during this period, i served as editor and publisher of a Los Angeles Harbor region bi-monthly community newspaper and as a partner in a public relations firm, primarily geared to political campaigns, and garnered some academic credentials. It was sufficient to call myself "doctor" with a scattered background of majors. I became over-educated and decided to become an electronic tech (hacker) at the dawn of the computer age. The phenomena of Bulletin Board networking (before the Internet and persists to keep the government out our affairs) intrigued me and, with a group of ham radio aficionados, devised our own "invisible empire" to survive after social order collapses. During this period, aside from several girlfriends, I was married twice, my first dying of brain cancer after ten plus years, and spawned six sons who have produced a crowd of grandchildren and great-grandchildren to help over-populate the planet and compensate for the millions we kill off in wars. Hell, it is a numbers game to see if we can out produce the cockroaches.
Now retired, I reside in Santa Cruz County, California and devote my time to research and writing while sponging off the Veterans Administration and Social Security. (the Pentagon finally owned up that I served and bought me off by paying my rent and other perks and offering unlimited medical benefits.)
As Leroy Dumont, I have written fifteen novels and a few scholarly books as Anthony Dias Souza published primarily in the Serbian language (Don't ask! I will not explain ever!), and am presently continuing to write both fiction and science. my research and hobby is inter-dimensional contact and travel which I believe we are on the cusp of authenticating and achieving. I always say, if you are going to dream, dream not just big but cosmically. Your mind has the capacity to embrace more than just the physical universe we explore. As a student of authentic (non-mystical and devoid all of the Hindi religious distortions) Yoga, I have been in the process of translating the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali and the Sankhya Karika for the last twenty-one years and hope (all fingers crossed) to produce publishable copies within the next two years. As usual, I have said too much but, cheerfully, I like to bend an ear. Contact me if you also are so inclined.