I grew up in St. Charles, Missouri, where I graduated from High School in 1975. I was a baseball pitcher, but blew my arm out before my senior year. I played the French Horn in the orchestra and band. I worked at a restaurant all through high school. After I graduated high school, I was offered a job in restaurant management in Sarasota, Florida. Three years later, I moved back to Missouri so I could continue my education. I worked my way through college and law school while doing "hot tar" roofing, landscaping work, and private security work. I met my wife, Judy, in college, was married in 1981, and have been happily married ever since. I have two daughters, a grandson, and a new granddaughter. After my graduation from law school at St. Louis University in 1984, I started practicing law. For the first five years of my career, I worked for a law firm in downtown St. Louis and learned the practice of law from some of the very best attorneys I have ever known.