John David Cholewa
One of the many Johns of the Forum, JC is a thirtysomething Forumite who continues to actively visit and contribute to the Forum
Pre Forum History
JC was born on November 3rd, 1975 in a Long Island Jewish hospital in Queens. In 1976, after his parents' apartment burned down, he and his family moved to a house in Valley Stream, NY, where he has lived for the bulk of his life. He went through the local primary and secondary schools, being generally nerdy and playing cards (most notably Bullshit) with a small group of outcasts in his high school. Notable among his friends and acquaintances at the time were Gerry Garcia and Rob Kopp, both future Forumites.
He started working at the age of 12 initially doing delivery for a periodical called "Pennysaver". Afterwards followed years of lawn mowing, gardening and snow shovelling.
When it came time to look for a college, he found Stony Brook to be an ideal match and decided that it was the only school he wished to attend. It seems that this worked out quite well.
Forum History
Introduction to the Forum
JC's mother worked for a pair of pediatricians in Valley Stream, and among that office's patients were Colleen and Kerry Skadl. Since it was known that he was so focused on going to school in Stony Brook, he was invited to their dorm in the Spring of 1993 for something called a "Science Fiction Convention", a thing that he'd not heard of before. He went and it was amazing. Many interesting people were met, many sights were beheld, and he was told to come back and visit a place called the Forum, which was moving from a place called Central Hall to a place called Harriman.
Upon beginning his Freshman year at Stony Brook, JC helped with the latter stages of moving the Forum into its new home. He had a chance to see the water damaged Central Hall basement that held the old Forum room and rooms of associated clubs.
Signing up for many, many hours of shiftholder duty, JC donated his soul to the Forum to the detriment of his grades (he did not, however, manage to make it into the Square Root Club). This, in addition to panic caused by a slightly abusive roommate and depression caused by his initial major not quite working out, put him on academic probation.
During his first Semester, JC was introduced to "Born Again Christians" -- or "Rebos", as the Forum called them. A nice fellow named Tom handed him a book called "1994", which explained that the world was going to end in that titular year.
1994
The world did not end.
But JC's grades did not improve enough to keep him in Stony Brook. Placed in academic suspension, he took classes at Nassau Community College, a place with far better teachers but without awesome cool clubs. This was an interesting tradeoff, but JC learned that he was much better off as a commuter than as a dormer.
Relationships
JC did not end up in any relationships stronger than friendships. He was very, very interested in doing so but had tremendous difficulty communicating with people in the proper way. It was a sad story. But the ending was not sad, as he eventually ended up with a hot girlfriend in a long-term, open relationship. He has no idea how this happened but would like it to happen more. :P
Links
Coined the term "useful people".