About Me

My name is Pete Morillo, and I am a storyteller living in America. I believe I have always been a writer, but only recently began to try to accept it. I know I would rather be a writer than anything else. However, I still have my doubts as to my ability to be a writer. My sister and eighth-grade English teacher insisted I was a writer, but I couldn't hear them. It wasn’t until just a few years ago that I began to believe my love for stories and storytelling could be transferred to the written page, and so far, it feels right. 

My decision to write didn’t come easily. As with many significant life changes, it all started when terrible news upturned my life. On my birthday, in 2017, my oldest friend called me to tell me he only had six months to live. His name was Reggie Mason, one of the best human beings ever. I met Reggie in second grade, and we have been lifelong brothers ever since. We always had each other's backs.
Reggie died of cancer at 48 years of age because, in America, it’s more important to make money than to care for people. I miss my brother, Reggie.

Losing Reggie really shook me. I became disenfranchised with my own life. I had followed the path, I was told, I should follow. I graduated from college. I worked hard and was successful at a respectable job for eighteen years. I took care of the people who took care of me. I had put in the work and was supposed to be happy, but I felt unsatisfied and unfulfilled. I thought I was doing it all right until life wouldn’t let me pretend anymore. 

Spending the last few weeks of his life with my dear friend had changed me forever. Still, life had more in store for me. In the 20 months after we lost Reggie, we lost my friend/aunt Nancy. Her hospice was in my home just 3 months after Reggie's. Then we lost Tyler, who was one of the teenagers that we had unofficially fostered. He drove off the road and died on impact. He had just graduated from high school, and he was gone. Then my good friend, Smitty, drank himself to death—finally, the hardest of all. My dad, Petronio E. Morillo, passed away in April of 2020 after fighting COVID-19 for over three months. Death was staring me in the face as it took loved one after loved one in rapid succession.

The life I had built and the person I had been were both gone. I felt alone and more vulnerable than ever. Many people would chalk this up to a simple "midlife crisis." The prevailing wisdom is that when we get to age fifty, death becomes much more prevalent in our lives. It's just a natural occurrence. 

Let me be the first to say that no crisis is simple. If something is so consistent that everyone is aware of it, isn’t it something we should try to understand? 

It is not a coincidence, nor a good thing, that people reach a point in their lives and suddenly decide they are not happy and need to make fundamental changes. 

Mine was not so much a crisis as it was the stripping away of the set of false priorities that I had learned growing up. 

After having Reggie at my house for his hospice and then losing my father, the reality could no longer be denied. Life is all that matters. In the end, the only thing we want is more of it. Suddenly, my eyes saw things differently. 

Now everything is about living my life in the best way possible. I want to be happy. I want to enjoy whatever time I have left with the people I love. I am now making myself a priority, and I won't feel guilty about it. I know what is important, and it's about living. Enjoying your time is the only thing that matters. Gather with friends and savor life. Life is fleeting. We must enjoy our lives. Nothing has ever been more apparent to me.

The reality is that we have no idea how much time we have left. Perhaps, if we did, we would spend our time more wisely. 

I decided to do what makes me happy. Nothing in the world makes me happier than sharing a delightful story with friends, so I tried to write one. It has taken time for the storyteller to find his way out, but I am making the journey. To me, writers have always been mythical, like dragons or unicorns. Writers create stories, and those stories and books are the foundation for sharing knowledge and ideas. 

What greater endeavor can there be?

As I grew up, I lived in worlds created by the authors of my favorite books. I was a greaser in "The Outsiders," by S.E. Hinton. I rooted for the rats in Robert C. O’Brien’s "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of N.I.M.H." And I hunted the Ozark Mountains alongside "Old Dan" and "Little Ann," when I read "Where the Red Ferns Grow" by Wilson Rawls. Those were the first books to leave an impression on me.

My thirst for good stories didn’t stop with books; movies brought the stories to life in front of my eyes. Movies expanded my ability to find great stories. “First Blood, Aliens, The Godfather, Scarface, Life Is Beautiful, Forest Gump,” and so many more. 

I would sit in a theatre or in front of the TV and become completely submerged in the world created by those magical writers. What a gift they had to share. Their stories will last forever.

So here I am, my name is Petronio Morillo, and I am trying to be a writer.

My first book from my Advice From A Friend Series will be available soon!

Thanks,

Petronio Morillo