I: Steven Cunio

My family

My sisters - Claire and Elaine

Claire on the left is the middle child. Younger than me and older than Elaine. When Elaine came along she had to share her room with the new born tearaway. It was hell! Constant arguments, curtains opening and closing, hair being pulled... you name it they probably did it. Now of course things are just the same. Not really! They get on really, really well. Trouble is now I live with the tearaway and there's lots of arguments, curtains opening and closing and hair being pulled... nothing changes does it?! :)

Claire is so similar to me it's scary. We both have the same ideals, the same take on our younger lives and the desire to travel the world and help as many people as possible in the process.

Elaine drives security vans and is not to be messed with. She can be fierce in confrontations and also does kick boxing and swimming.

My mum and dad

My mum and dad, Linda and Mike, have been together since I was about 4. My real dad died when I was 3 and a half years old and when Claire was just a baby. My mum looked after us by herself for a few years and Mike was always there as Uncle Mike, my real dad's best friend. It's amazing but he was only 19 when I was born, just about to turn 20. He's done amazing things with his life and has risen through the corporate ranks of various companies to Chairman. The over riding memory being younger is him reading a newspaper on the settee and my mum knitting. Now though they are both very much cooler!

My mum is a great housewife and mum! She is the type of woman feminists dread. She looks after the home, us and dad because she loves us and because it makes her happy. I believe her only because I am so similar to her and have the same desire for everything to have its place though not to a fault!

My mum loves swimming and Elvis Presley and my dad hates Elvis Presley and Swimming. He loves cars and has far too many for one man but as a boy they are great toys!

My real dad

I never really knew my real dad, David Cunio, and still don't really know much except my mum really loved him. I often wonder what traits I share with him and wish there were more stories of his life that I could recount here. I suppose that is why I'm doing this really, to leave a legacy for my children's children. So that they will always know who I am and to some extent help explain to them who, or why, they are like they are. Afterall, we all are our parents...

My Grandma and Grandad -- my mum's mum and dad

My Grandma lives down in Weymouth close by to her sister, my great auntie Edith. She bought a mobile home with my Grandad in Montevideo Park and lived there for many years, since I was very young, say about 12 years old. My Grandad passed on, on the 31st December 1999 and my grandma lived by herself for some time before finding herself a great bungalow overlooking the sea. I've yet to visit it but it sounds fantastic.

I speak to my grandma on the phone and she insists, probably correctly, that she will never get a computer to get on the email. She does have a mobile phone though and she's a real whizz on texts.

You'll always find her doing crosswords and she used to always be knitting wooly jumpers for my grandad. My grandad used to pick fun at her saying that if the buttons got any bigger she'd be sewing saucers onto his cardys pretty soon.