I walked across the stage to get my high school diploma right on my eighteenth birthday in 1990. I’d been devouring books long before I ever got a driver’s license. The house was basically one giant library, with closets full of Stephen King and Louis L’Amour paperbacks that we all fought over taking turns reading. My dad, an engineer and teacher, kept a stash of textbooks and math puzzles for rainy afternoons, but if those didn’t grab me, my mom always had some new creative project going on. There was literally always something to make or read in that place.
That environment is exactly what Antonelli was supposed to tap into. It was meant to be my ticket to an artistic career—a fresh start where I could finally channel the creativity I’d been carrying around like a live wire. For a little while, it actually felt like it worked. I loved the classes, the smell of ink and paper, and how the whole world seemed to burst into Technicolor. Being surrounded by people who genuinely wanted to create things was magic.
I’d spent years trying to fit in with the athletes until I finally grew into my own skin. The truth is, I never really belonged there. I fit much better with the weirdos—the thinkers who saw the world sideways.
But loving the idea of art isn’t the same as doing the actual work. And Cincinnati had other plans for me.
The first major distraction hit before I’d even finished unpacking. The Reds had just stunned everyone by sweeping the A’s in the World Series—their first title since the legendary Big Red Machine days. My dad used to listen to 700 WLW religiously; I grew up falling asleep to Marty Brennaman and Joe Nuxhall calling the games. But this time wasn’t about the radio. This time, I was there, or close enough to feel the pulse of it.
Chip and I weren’t brave enough to cross the river and join the downtown chaos, so we watched from the apartment parking lot as Cincinnati went wild. The city was pulling me in, and I wasn’t fighting it.
Foreshadowing in Neon
My real education didn’t happen in a classroom. It happened on the riverfront.
Chip landed a bussing job at a weird spot called The Glass Menagerie in Covington, perched on a hill overlooking the Ohio River. We’re talking themed dining rooms, a working carousel, Tennessee Williams meets a carnival fever dream. It closed almost as soon as I started paying attention, but it taught me something I couldn’t quite put into words yet: a restaurant could be theatrical, not just functional.
Soon after, I started valet parking at Covington Landing. The barge was moored near the Embassy Suites on the Kentucky side, right by the floodgate. It was massive—two floors of businesses. You had Howl at the Moon, TGI Fridays, Skyline Chili, a video arcade, and a nightclub packed with Bengals and Reds players plus anyone lucky enough to orbit them. B&B Riverboats were docked next to us, running tours.
We operated inside the floodwall at water level, dwarfed by the current. The little Licking River back home looked like a ditch compared to this. The sheer volume of water moving past was mesmerizing, and standing next to it made me feel curiously powerful. Between the fireworks from Riverfront Stadium, the hum of tires on the steel-grated Roebling Bridge, and neon reflecting off the water like a rhythm, I had stepped out of the parking lot and straight into the party.
I was eighteen, fast, hungry, and stupid. It was perfect.
I ran those streets for hours every night—winding through crowds, dodging drunks, juggling keys, and raking in tips that felt like a fortune. I drove cars I couldn’t afford and met people I’d only seen on TV. It was intoxicating in a way alcohol hadn’t even touched yet.
One night, Joe Pesci walked up the gangway toward the waiting cars. He was in town for the premiere of The Super, part of which had been filmed there. I noticed his shoes first—penny loafers on the Ohio River in the cold. They didn’t belong there. I looked up, made eye contact, and blurted out, “Hey, I know you!”
He didn’t miss a beat. “Naaaaw, youse don’t know me.”
Deadpan. Brooklyn. That look told me he’d delivered that line a thousand times. It was such a tiny moment, yet it felt enormous. I was a weird kid, and somehow, that world made me feel less weird.
The Corvette Heist
The VIP cars were parked inside the floodgate circle or in the lot under the gangways—the one that flooded every spring. We always left the VIP keys in the car for a quick pickup, tucked under the floor mat. Don’t judge; it was all about the tips.
One busy night, a white Corvette lurched forward and stalled. Then, a tiny head popped up in the driver’s seat. Wide eyes. Pure panic.
A kid. Maybe twelve years old. He was stealing the Corvette.
My manager shoved a stack of cash and valet tickets into my hands, yelled for me to call the police, then sprinted after him. He jumped into an IROC Camaro parked in the spot the Corvette had just vacated and took off in pursuit like a low-budget action hero. He caught the kid near the I-75 on-ramp. Neither car was badly damaged, but the owners were definitely not thrilled.
An older man, it turned out, had recruited him. Gang-related, maybe. Someone had watched our operation long enough to find the weak point. It took planning.
I’ve thought about that more than once since—that somewhere out there was a grown man who’d studied a bunch of teenagers running cars for tips and figured out exactly where we were soft.
Cincinnati made me feel free. But freedom without any structure is a dangerous combination.
I was working too much, partying too much, sleeping too little, and ignoring my classes entirely. I told myself I’d catch up. I told myself I could handle it. I convinced myself I was living.
The truth was simpler. I was running from the same anxiety, the same restlessness, the same noise that had followed me from Florida to Ohio to Cincinnati.
At nineteen, I ended up on Prozac. My mom was taking it at the time, too. I don’t remember how long I lasted on it. I was terrible about medication—I skipped doses and then doubled up to catch up, which isn’t how any of that works—and I was drinking on top of it, which I’d also been told not to do.
It culminated in a long-distance phone call home late at night. I had a bottle of Jack Daniel’s in my lap, sobbing, with no idea what was wrong with me.
There have been many breakdowns in my life. I don’t use the word “suicidal” about that night because I don’t remember ever wanting to end it. I was at the end of my rope and completely desperate, and those are different things. The difference is very hard to see from the outside—especially in the moment, when everything is raw.
Eventually, the running caught up with me.
I failed out of Antonelli by the middle of my second year. Chip moved out and found a better place. The bills piled up. My landlord started calling my mother. Game over.
By the time I packed up to go home, the white Phoenix was on her last legs. I’d driven her hard, neglected her even harder, and treated her like she was indestructible. She wasn’t.
I killed the second Phoenix in Cincinnati the same way I killed the first one in Florida. Just slower.
Two cars, two chapters, both ending the same way: me standing in the wreckage of something I wasn’t mature enough to take care of.