My birth name was Joshua Raymond Jones, but I have been Joshua Michael Du Pré Werson since the age of three, meaning I was adopted. I call both Las Vegas and Birmingham my hometowns, but was born in Bartow, Florida. I graduated from Oak Mountain High School in Birmingham, spent my freshman year at Troy University, earned my Bachelor’s in History from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and obtained my Master‘s in History from Jacksonville State University (which has the absolute coolest library in the state). I was invited into Phi Alpha Theta, the National History Honors Society at JSU for my grades and was given an award from the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) as a Teacher of the Year for the work I did with a Title I school in Ocala, FL, teaching Civics.
My father was a professional tennis player, ranked as high as #12 in the world. My mother was a state representative in Arizona and was the top Compaq Computers sales representative for two years in a row but had no idea how to use a computer (ask me how she did it, you’ll see the ingenuity we all have in us). They currently reside in Savannah, GA, but my mother did spend a year (1956) in Huntsville and my father was born in Liege, Belgium, but Mountain Brook (in Birmingham), is where he is from.
I enjoy games: board, card, puzzles, video, etc. If it’s a game, I will learn it and be better than you; it's in my competitive nature. I love to travel, and have not only lived in six states, but have been to 37 of our 50, and 3 countries in Europe (Britain, France, and Belgium where I met some family members). It is also my hope someday to not only be an accomplished writer (I know, hard to believe, right?) but run for office with all intentions to help our society mend some broken fences and heal from present wounds.
I have two dogs that I love very much. Saban, a 14-year-old Shih Tzu, is beyond stubborn but small and fluffy. Ashe, who is still a puppy at one, who is a Reagal, which is a cross between a Rottweiler and a Beagle. I have two children, Aria (7) and Gideon (almost 4), who are both my sidekicks and enjoy playing games with me, all of them. Don’t play memory with Aria, you will probably lose, and I mean it because I must focus to beat her.