Ronald Mears:  

My name is Ronald Mears, 'Ron' in conversation, and I need to tell my story about SHS. On Sept. 2, 1997, after my summer break that year, following a Grade 9 graduation from Hazen White-St. Francis School, I began my time at Simonds, despite the fact that I was a North End resident, dwelling at Anglin Crescent. My reasons for going to Simonds, instead of either Saint John High, St. Malachy's, or Harbour View, were that A] I wanted to go to the largest physical public school in all of Saint John, and B] go to a school that was WELL out of eyeshot and earshot of my family's apartment. When I started my time there, I was probably not expecting to be in a place where the sheer number of students was what it was. In a way, I found it a bit too easy to get lost in things. Stuff for me seemed to start easy enough, but eventually, I started to get a bit 'amped' up about the general activity there, to where I was doing some rather odd things, like moving faster than I should have in the hallways, and crashing my body into lockers and walls, just to be crazy. So, in a bid to calm me down a little, or enough to function as normally as I could, I was given a supervisor, who helped me get to my classes in an undistracted fashion, which did work. I think a few months after that supervisor was with me, she was replaced with another. I didn't really seem too bothered by it, as we established a good rapport, and found that there were some common interests between me and her. Anyway, it would be Simonds where I first got into use of the Internet, in the school library. In 1997, there were I believe 14 computers there, and, from Tuesday-Friday, it helped me relieve a bit of stress I felt from simply getting to school in the morning. It was a gateway for me to take a look, primarily at websites for a favorite gaming franchise of mine that spread into the TV and comic book worlds then, the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise. At that time, as I had since my time in HW-SF, starting back on March 28, 1994, I'd only been going to school in the mornings. I never went in the afternoon, because, frankly, I was nowhere near ready for going to full-day school then. The 1st year of my time there was, in a word, fluid. I took my 2 January mid-year exams on Jan. 19 and 20, 1998, and then had a 1 week break from school, before the 2nd Term started. By then, I'd moved to Flemming Court, down the hill from Anglin Cres. The 2nd Term was rather un-eventful, and I took my last 2 exams for the year on June 8 and 9, 1998. By the Spring of 1998, thanks to having Internet use at the school, I searched out ANY place in Saint John where I could get a budding 'fix' for that, primarily at the 3 libraries, McLean Micro in Loch Lomond Mall, Staples on Rothesay Avenue, NBTel in McAllister Place, and a computer store that used to be Blockbuster Video on Rothesay Ave. I spent that 3 month period mostly in a techno-haze, on the Net and Web, where I could access it. When I started my 2nd year at Simonds, my supervisor from the previous year had been with me. But that all changed about 4 to 6 weeks into that year, and, sadly for me, the wheels came off for me. I'm someone who never really felt comfortable with being crowded around too much. Whenever a lot of people would zone in around me, I sometimes felt I couldn't breathe. It's something that really scared me, and I didn't take it well. During some classes in my 2nd year, I felt as if everyone in them was giving me a hard time, just for being near them. Because of that, I started lashing out at them, which included me triggering off a REALLY bad mental impulse...emulating my favorite WWF(WWE) wrestler, The UnderTaker, who, at that time, in the company's creative narrative, started to lapse into some dark things. One day, I ended up doing a throat-slash gesture, what Taker always did/does before giving an opponent a Tombstone Piledriver, his primary finisher, to a female student, not aware she was about to have a kid. That came back to bite me in the rear-end on the night of the 1998 Santa Claus Parade, as I was found, caught, and forced to apologize to that person while swarmed and cut off from leaving by other students of the school, near John's Convenience at Brunswick Square. I did so, but after that, I just stopped caring about anything, and engaged in ugly misbehavior, such as telling all the other students and all of the teachers there, in no uncertain terms, where to go. I then started emulating 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin, trusting no one, and trashing everyone who looked at me. As a result of all that, I, sadly, was suspended from SHS, on Dec. 3, 1998. However, I didn't take it seriously, and went to school the next morning. After I went, I was told to pack my stuff, and leave that school permanently. I faced my 2nd school expulsion in my time as a N.B. public education...Expand for more