The Suffering of Chasing Dreams

By Danny Duran

If you really and truly want God in your life, you owe it to yourself to read this book. This story is about a young boy who sufferedand still sufferingchasing dreams and facing a lot of suffering along the way, and how he achieved most of his dreams. After fifty-five years of his life, he came to find Jesus Christ even though he came from an extremely dysfunctional family, feeling rejected, not loved, was sexually, physically, and verbally abused. He faced the nasty words from his father, You are way too stupid and black and ugly. Youll never amount to anything! Those nasty words from his father were the words that motivated young Danny to execute his dreams. At the tender age of ten, Danny was put into the juvenile hall for incorrigible boys. But after three long years, he was released and became a matador (bullfighter) in Tijuana, Mexico; prizefighter, Rodeo Brahma bull rider and bareback bronco rider; professional roller skating derby skater for thirty-two years, a professional Texas bounty hunter; a repo man; a successful entrepreneur, was in a few motion pictures and Hispanic soap opera called Padres con Poder; and an author. Danny also spent five years in prison, and thats how he found our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and his ordained minister wife Dharma. She came to the prison to minister to seven hundred inmates, and thats how Danny met her. Dannys partner, Jane P. Peterson, was killed in an arrest attempt. His son was shot, and his house was bombed. Danny had been shot and stabbed multiple times and was left in a coma for seven days in an attempted arrest as a bounty hunter. And while he was in a coma, Danny had his second Christian spiritual experience with God. The first spiritual encounter was in the juvenile hall. The story you are about to read may seem like fiction or something out of a movie script. If you enjoyed the books Divine Revelations of Hell, by Mary K. Baxter, or Proof of Heaven, by Dr. Eden Alexander, or the movies Forrest Gump or Walking Tall, then youll love reading this book. Ninety-five percent of what you will read in this book is true. All of the names have been changed to protect the innocent. God bless.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 28, 2013
• ISBN: 9781479794652

Book preview

Chapter 1

February 2, 1946, was a beautiful, wonderful day. The sun was shining. The sky was very blue. The grass was extremely green. The birds were singing. The bees were humming, and my mom seemed to be extremely happy. Why? Because she was having her first baby, a baby boy. They named him Roman Ramos Jr., born to Roman and Ramona Ramos. One year later came Richard, my brother. Then another year later came my sister Lisa. Everything seemed to be going well as I remember until I was about three years old. I saw my dad smacking my mom around. The sun was not shining anymore. The sky wasn’t so blue anymore. The birds were not singing anymore. Maybe they were, but after seeing what I saw as a little three-year-old, it scared me for some years later.

We lived in an extremely bad neighborhood. At that time in the ’40s to the late ’50s, there were extremely bad Chicano gangs. We lived in the backyard of my grandpa and grandma’s house. We lived in an extremely small trailer, only about twenty-five feet long. My brother and sister and I had to sleep on the floor.

In 1951, things seemed to be getting better. Or so I thought. Roman Sr. got a small loan from his friends named Bill and Carole. I remember both of them being extremely attractive and always driving a big beautiful green convertible Caddy. I’ll never forget what Roman said, Some day, I’m going to have everything that Bill has: a big beautiful car and a beautiful, blonde, blue-eyed lady.

Roman opened up an extremely small bakery and meat market in Hawthorne, California. At that time, it was an all-white neighborhood, and boy, talk about a place that did not like people of their own race. It was very bad. We got beat up, spit on, and we were called apes, monkeys, and other bad names. Roman seemed to be doing well as far as the small business did; we even went on a vacation to Texas and Alabama, which turned out to be a nightmare.

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Danny Duran, standing by the American flag

1964

When we were in Alabama, we stopped and went into a small restaurant; and as we were walking in, a man came over to my father and said, Mister, you’re in the wrong restaurant. They serve tacos and enchiladas down the street for your kind of people. My father said, Sir, just what do you mean ‘my kind of people.’ The man said, Yes, your kind of people. Mexicans and Negroes eat with their own kind, not with the white people.

My father Roman ignored the man and went and sat down in one of the tables, and before one can blink an eye, there was fists flying; around seven men were beating up Roman and our mother. Then grabbed our little sister, Lisa, and started pulling on her hair. Lisa was only three years old.

The police came and arrested my father and our mother. The next thing that happened, I heard one of the police officers calling us monkeys. But they did finally let us go. We were on our way back home with our mom and Roman arguing all the way and Roman slapping our mom all the way home. And when we got home, the beatings got worse. But as far as the beating to my mother and me and my brother goes, Roman never hit our sister Lisa. Our mom wanted to start taking us to church, but Roman said to our mom, You will not take our kids to any church, do you understand, you fat bitch?

One day, our mom lied to Roman and told him that we were going to visit our aunt Sally but took us to church instead. It was Ash Wednesday in a Roman Catholic church. After the service, mom drove us to a gas station and took us into the restroom to wash the ashes off our foreheads, but she forgot to wash the ashes off Lisa’s forehead. So when we got home, Roman saw the ashes on Lisa’s forehead. and Roman said, Come here right now, Lisa. What the hell is that on your forehead? Lisa started crying, and our mom said, Roman, all that is a little bit of dirt. Roman said, Bullshit! You said that you were going to visit your sister Sally. Junior, come here now! He asked me if I enjoyed the service. I made a large mistake and said, Yes, Dad, I liked the church. He said, Get your little black ass in the bathroom right now. I began to cry out loud.

He took me to the bathroom and said, Take your pants down. I started crying out loud, Dad, I’m sorry. Please don’t hit me. He said, Don’t worry, you little bastard, I’m not going to hit you, I’m going to bite a big piece out of your ass so you can’t ever sit down in a church again. So he took a big piece of flesh out of my buttock.

I was bleeding profusely, and my mom had to take care of me. Then Roman called Lisa. Come here right now. He asked her, Did you enjoy sitting there, listening to the service? Lisa didn’t know what to say and started crying.

Lisa, don’t you ever go to church again. Do you understand me?

Yes, Daddy.

Then Roman called our brother Richard and asked him, Did you like the service in the church? Richard said, No, Dad, I did not like the service. Roman said, That’s good, Richard. Just for that, I’m taking you and Lisa to buy you both some ice cream. Then Richard said, Dad, I hated going to church, so can I have two scoops of ice cream? Roman said, Yes, you kids need to understand that I’m your god and don’t ever forget that.

Roman didn’t spank us. He beat us. On many occasions, Roman would take my brother and I on top of the house roof and slam our bodies to the ground. On one occasion, he broke my brother’s arm and my leg. On another occasion, he took my brother and me to the bathroom, and he urinated and defecated in the commode and made my brother and I eat his waste. If we didn’t eat it, he would start slamming our heads into the commode where we would start bleeding profusely. It was so bad that we would start vomiting. Roman would make us eat the waste, blood, and vomit.

I had a bed-wetting problem. Each time I would wet the bed, Roman would beat me then take me out to our big German shepherd and pull my pants down so his dog would bite me in the buttocks. Roman was way too stupid to know that I had a medical condition called enuresis disease that a lot of kids have.

On another occasion, Roman took my brother Richard and put him in the bathtub with boiling water and burned the skin right off my brother. He did go to jail over that.

Roman always used to tell us that one day he would be the next heavyweight champion of the world. That was his biggest dream, but that’s all he did—fantasize and dream; he never executed any of his dreams.

Roman was a very big man at six feet five inches and at 255 pounds and extremely good looking. A lot of people used to tell him that he looked like Clark Gable, and he took that at face value. He had affairs with a lot of the neighborhood wives. One day, one neighbor’s husband came home early, and Roman and the neighbor got into a fight, and that made our family look extremely bad!

The next week, our aunt Tiny moved in. She was at the time nineteen years old. After a few weeks, our aunt Tiny started sexually molesting me. She molested me from the age of six till I was ten years old.

Roman also was sexually molesting me. He used to take me in the bathroom and make me touch him inappropriately. Till this day, I have horrible nightmares about that, and that went on for a few years. One day, my mother noticed a check missing from the checkbook. My mom asked Roman, Why is there is a check missing from our checkbook? Roman answered, Maybe that stupid son of yours, Junior, took it and drew cartoons on it. At a later date, my mom found the check; it was made out to a Joann Hollenbeck. Mom was extremely angry. The check was made out for thirty-five dollars for a pair of shoes. Roman started coming home very late from work. We lost the small business we had. So Roman went to work for Bowie Pie Bakery. That’s where he met twelve-year-old Barbara and got her pregnant. Well, Roman didn’t come home anymore but only to visit and beat us.

One day, a man came knocking on our door very hard. Our mom went to open the door. There stood a very angry man. He asked our mom, Where is the SOB husband of yours? Our mom said, Roman does not live here anymore. The man said, Do you know that your husband ran off with my twelve-year-old daughter and got her pregnant? Our mom said, I’m sorry, but that has nothing to do with me. The man ran off extremely mad.

Two weeks later, Roman came over to our house to pick up the rest of his stuff, and he and our mom got into a very bad fight, and Roman ended up throwing our mom through our big front pitcher window, scarring her face for life. Once again, Roman went to jail. One day, Roman came over to visit us kids, and he told us to go outside and play, so we did as he said. I remember that I had to use the bathroom, but the door was locked, so I couldn’t get in. We were still playing outside when we saw our mom drive up in her older model Buick. She went in the house, and right away, we and all the neighbors heard a bunch of screaming. It turned out that our mom caught our aunt Tiny and Roman having sex. Roman left, and our mom threw our aunt Tiny out.

While all this was going on, us kids were playing outside. We were playing with the other neighborhood kids. I remember hiding behind the little trailer that we used to live in at our grandpa’s house. Roman had moved it in our backyard, and that’s where I was hiding. While I was waiting to be found, I looked up; and at first I thought I was just seeing things, but I rubbed my eyes looked up again and saw the Virgin Mother. She was looking right at my face. All the sounds in the background seemed to have been cut off; I couldn’t hear anything except music that I’ve never heard before. All this lasted about one minute and a few seconds. I ran and tried to tell my brother and sister and the rest of the kids, but they just laughed at me.

Two weeks later, I was in our backyard playing when all of a sudden, our dog was barking; and for some reason, he stopped barking and sat down just looking up. And then I looked up, and there was the same vision I saw two weeks ago: the Virgin Mother, all dressed in white with blue trim. I have never seen such a beautiful sight. I didn’t know what all that meant. I’ve told many people about what I’ve seen, but nobody believed me. But I’ll always remember what I witnessed that day.

As Roman was leaving that day he and Aunt Tiny got caught having sex, as he was walking to his brand-new yellow mercury, he saw me and said to me, Junior, what the f—— are you looking at? You’re so black and ugly and stupid, you’ll never amount to anything in your life, do you hear me, you stupid little bastard? Roman always said that I would never be anything but black, ugly, and stupid, that I would never amount to anything. I used to think that I would never be able to do anything in my life. Roman then drove off into the sunset.

A couple of weeks went by, and I finally told my mom what Roman and Aunt Tiny were doing to me. I was totally shocked as to how she reacted to me. She looked at me in front of our aunt Rosie and smacked me so hard that I started bleeding profusely. I felt rejected, lonely, not wanted. Then mom started beating me and telling me that it was my fault that Roman left. She started breaking plates over my head and than started cutting me up with them. The only people that ever loved me were my brother and sister. I wanted to get away. I told my best friend Gary Slaughter what was going on. He said to me, Roman, let’s run away. I was only ten years old, and Gary was sixteen years old. But he was my very best friend at that time. Gary got me a job at Frenchys Horse Riding Stable. We worked our tails off. The owner brought us hamburgers and milk shakes. Also, we got to ride horses free, at no charge. That’s where I truly found my love for horses. I also met a new friend; his name was Frosty Wells. Frosty became my very best friend for many years to come. Frosty was the conduit for introducing me to roller skating derby and Bull Riding at the Paramount Ranch up in the mountains in California. As young as five years old, all I ever talked about was becoming a professional athlete. Roman used to laugh at me and tell me, You stupid little ass, you’re too stupid to ever amount to anything in your life. Boy, there is no way that you could have possibly come from my loins. You don’t look anything like your brother and sister. They’re both white skinned and good looking like me, not black and ugly like you.

I truly have a very vivid recollection of running away from grade school. I remember telling big fat lies because Roman always asked why I was so late coming home from school. I hated school because it was an all-white school, and all the other kids used to beat me up and spit on me, so I never stayed in school. So I made up tall stories about when I was coming home and a big gorilla attacked me, and I had to fight him off; then a big snake attacked me, and I fought him off until I finally killed him. So that’s why I was late from school. Roman and my mom knew that I was lying. I lied because I knew what was coming next, a beating from Roman. I, at the age, of five, I dreamed of becoming a professional athlete.

After a while, I came home and Mom told me that I was going to live with my grandpa and grandma in east Los Angeles. I was only ten years old. I called my friend Gary Slaughter and told him what my mom was getting ready to do. He said to me, Roman, my father just got paid and just cashed his paycheck. It’s for four hundred and sixty-five dollars. Meet me in the morning at four o’clock, and we will run away together. I said, Gary where will we go to? Gary said, We will catch a bus to Kansas City. So the next morning at four, Gary met me on the corner of 134th and ocean gate street, and we walked over to the bus station in downtown Los Angeles where we got on a bus to Kansas City. We had a lot of fun, and for the first time in my life, I was happy. I knew that we were running out of money, so Gary got us a job at a restaurant washing dishes and cleaning up. The lady owner noticed that I was very young, so she started asking me a lot of questions, things like where was I from, and how old I was. She asked if I was running away from home. I started crying and said to her that I wasn’t happy at home in California. As soon as I told her that, she went in the back room and made a call to the police department, and within ten minutes, the police came and took Gary and me to the police department. They asked us a lot of questions and found out that we were runaways. They contacted my mom and Gary’s father in Hawthorne, California, and then fed us and put us on our way back to California. The police department gave us a little bit of money so we could get something to eat.

We started hitchhiking back home. Gary always talked about committing suicide. While it was snowing hard, out on the road, Gary took off all his clothes and was totally naked. He said to me, Roman, take your clothes off and lie in the snow so we can both go to heaven together. I saw that Gary’s body was turning blue, so I ran out in the street, and I flagged down a car. It was a beautiful white Caddy. I told the driver what was going on, and he got out of his car and helped me put Gary in the backseat of his car. As we were driving, the driver asked me if I new who he was. So I looked at him and said, I’m sorry, mister, but I don’t know who you are. He said, have you ever heard of Elvis Presley? I said, Why, yes. Well, that’s who I am, I’m Elvis Presley." I was only ten years old, so that didn’t mean much to me. He dropped us off at a local hospital, and as he was dropping us off, he turned his head so the nurses couldn’t see his face. Then he left.

Gary’s life was saved for the time anyway. When we got back into LA, Gary was in a lot of trouble, and I was going to live with my grandparents in East L.A., right back where I started as a baby. My uncle Alfonso’s nickname was Poncho. He came to me and said, Junior, you have to be in a gang if you want to live in East LA. So he took me to a local gang called El Hoyo Mara. In order to be in an east L.A. gang, you needed to fight four or five gang members, so I did and got beat up badly. My uncle Poncho just watched and did not help me. So here I was, in an east L.A. gang. This meant I had to hang around with these kids. After a few months, I most indubitably did not like what I was seeing: gang members raping young girls and doing drugs and robbing and stealing and going around just looking for trouble. A few of them lost their lives. I went to their funerals, and seeing them in a casket wasn’t my idea of having fun, and seeing their parents in such an emotional state was not funny. One night, a few gang members and I were driving around with three other gang members. I was in the backseat trying to get some sleep when I overheard one say, Let’s find some girl or woman and rape her then kill her. They saw a lady talking on a public telephone booth and said, There’s a lady talking on the phone. The car came to a stop, and Coda, the driver, told Gabby, the one sitting by the door, to get out of the car and grab her. I sat up from the backseat, and I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was my mom. I jumped up and told Gabby, Stop! That’s my mother! My mom saw that it was me in the back of the car and said, Junior, what the hell are you doing out this late in the morning? I said to her, What are you doing out here in a bad neighborhood at one in the morning? I’m your mother, you don’t talk back to me like that. She then pulled me out of the car and took me back to my grandpa’s house and started yelling at my grandpa for letting me go out. I went to bed, and the next morning, I received a call from my aunt Sheila, my uncle Albert’s wife, asking if I would like to be in a motion picture, a movie called the Ten Commandments. Sheila said that to my mom. Our mom said it was OK. That’s what the boy may need. It just might change his life.

My brother and I were in the movie, just a little part as extras. My friend Frosty Wells was also in the movie; it was great to see him again. After the movie, things in my life got even worse! At this point in my life, I was so unhappy and felt so not wanted. My grandpa Alfonso Rosa did care about me. He always used to tell me, Junior, I can just tell by being around you that someday, you’re going to amount to something in your life! I love you, grandson. I know you’re different from the rest of the family.

About two weeks later, three juvenile counselor officers came to the door of my grandparents’ home with my mother and said, We are here to take young Roman to juvenile hall for bad boys. My mother and family have signed an affidavit, saying that the boy is extremely incorrigible! I started crying, pleading with my mom, Mom, please don’t do this awful thing to me. Please don’t. One of the counselors handcuffed me. Here I was, only ten years of age and being sent to a place where extremely bad kids were at! And who knows what? I cried all the way to the juvenile hall detention center for boys. I thought my life was over at the age of ten. I really and truly felt rejected, lonely, not loved by anybody, and not wanted.

I, at that moment, just wanted to die! I for some reason started thinking about the Virgin Mary that I saw a few years before. I felt so alone, and I didn’t know what was coming up in my life next. Yes, I was extremely scared and didn’t know what was going to happen to me next. One of the officers said to me, Don’t worry, son, it isn’t going to be that bad. The juvenile counselors are all good people, and they understand little kids like you. I quickly started praying the only way that I knew how. I started praying to the Virgin Mother, saying Hail Mary full of grace, and the Our Father who art in heaven hollow be thy name. Those were the only prayers that I knew. I couldn’t stop crying. As we arrived at our location, I jumped out and started to run, but two of the officers grabbed me and said, Just where do you think you’re off to, Roman? I said, Please, sir, please let me go. Sorry, son, but I can’t let you go. It’s my job, and sometimes I don’t like my job. It hurts me to see little boys like yourself be incarcerated when I know you didn’t do anything to get here. I’m sorry, son!

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Chapter 2

Well, I was in juvenile hall for bad boys. A correction officer took me downstairs and booked me, took my fingerprints and my mug shot; then he took me upstairs where there were at least fifty or sixty other kids. The music was very loud. I will always remember that song; it was called Daddy’s Home, Daddy’s Home to Stay. I saw a bunch of boys dancing to the music. Well, I’m nobody’s daddy, but I am here to stay a while. As I walked to my bunk bed—bed number 17—the boy on top said, Hi, my name is Rusty, what’s yours? Hi, my name is Roman. Rusty said, It’s not so bad here. You’ll get used to it after a while. I’m in for GTA. I asked, What’s GTA mean? Rusty said, Grand theft auto. In another words, I stole a car. Why are you here? I said, My family just didn’t want me anymore, so they called my crime being incorrigible. Rusty asked me what that meant. I said, A boy that can’t be controlled. I lay down on my bed and was just feeling emotionally devastated. I made my bed and went to sleep. The next morning, I was woken up by somebody yelling, Reveille, reveille, reveille, reveille, reveille, reveille! Time to rise and shine, everybody, get up for breakfast! So we all got out of bed, went to eat breakfast then we went school for six hours then out to the playground. That’s when I saw some of the gang members that I knew on the outside.

They were congregating in one corner by themselves. I walked over to them and said, Hola, vatos, and one answered, Hola, Coyote. That was my gang name. Gabby asked me why I was incarcerated. I lied and said GTA then Coda said, That’s real cool, vato.

About four months went by, and we all were still congregating in the same spot as always. Until one day, a very tall black boy came over and started to swing his jacket in our faces. Coda said, Just don’t pay any attention to him. The tall black kid came over to me and swung his jacket, hitting me in the eye. I jumped up and smacked him to the ground. Boy was my gang members totally shocked. I had KO’d him. It took a while to get him on his feet. The gang didn’t know it, but I got in a very lucky punch. There was a bench that he fell over when I hit him before hitting his head on the ground. That’s what knocked him out colder than Cootie Brown’s grandmother. But