PERSONAL BIO

John Donnellan

Born in NYC circa 1960

Never named (last name only)

Entered NYC Bureau of Child Welfare several months prior to the age of 3

20 months in McCloskey’s Orphanage (White Plains) Catholic Charities

1 April 1977 – Aged-out of the system

May 1977 - Dropped out of Middletown High School

Moved 18 times in sixteen years. Labeled with 14 different DSM diagnoses

1980 - Homeless – struggling with alcohol, meth, weed, bleeding ulcer

1981 - While living in a car, joined the United States Air Force

1983 – Keesler Air Force Base, Honor Graduate Medical Laboratory Technology

2003 - 22 years of honorable service to country (pathology field)

Post military; worked as a substitute or full time English teacher in England, Italy, and San Antonio, Texas

Education: 5 academic degrees, to include 3 Master’s (Education (OU), Counseling Psychology (Bowie), Modernist Literature/Philosophy (UEA)

Note: I didn’t do a Psych degree to be a Counselor. I did it to understand myself and my records

I teach AP Literature and Composition, AP Language and Composition, and AP Psychology

Sifu 3rd level Ving-Tsun Kung-Fu. Lineage: Ip Man, Yeung Ting, Gilbert Leal, me

Note: I kept a diary for most of the above delineated journey. Presently on sabbatical from

teaching to work those diaries for the The Last Leaf project.

The rest of your questions might get answered through the readings. Eventually.