Benjamin Blackwell :: Approved

General Information
Name: Benjamin Brody Blackwell
Nickname: Benji, Ben
Age: 31 (though he will forever be 18)
Date of Birth: August 8th
Sign: Leo
Gender: Male
Orientation: Heterosexual
Hometown: Melbourne, Australia
Residence: Newcastle-upon-tyne, England
Ethnicity: Aussie
Citizenship: Australia, UK
Language: English

Magical Information
Blood Status: Muggle (absolutely not magical whatsoever)
High School: Melbourne High School
Alma Mater: University of Melbourne (the best seven years of my life!)
Occupation: Professional Football (soccer) Player for Manchester United

Family Information

Son: Heathcliff Blackwell ? 6

Father: Brody Blackwell ? 56; Emu Farmer
Mother: Bindi (n?e Williamson) Blackwell ? 56; Emu Farmer

Younger Brother: Baxter Blackwell ? 25; Emu Farmer

Paternal Grandfather: Broderick Blackwell ? deceased
Paternal Grandmother: Betsy (n?e Rhodes) Blackwell ? deceased

Maternal Grandfather: Walter Williamson ? deceased
Maternal Grandmother: Wendy (n?e Stark) Williamson ? deceased

Appearance
Hair Color: Dark blonde, shaggy around his ears
Eye Color: Awesome blue
Height: 6? exactly
Weight: 173lbs
Skin Tone: Tan
Color of Choice: Greens and blues
Distinguishing Features: His blazing blue eyes
Attire: When not in his football (soccer to you Americans) uniform, Ben favors polo shirts and khaki pants like a douche.
Other: Benji has what is often referred to as having those rugged good looks with scruffy (but always trimmed) beard. His eyes, though as bright of blue as the ice caps in the Antarctic, can melt even the coldest of hearts. As Benji is a professional football player, he is in great shape and has thigh muscles that could probably crush a small child should he chose to. Luckily, since Ben isn?t the totally insane type, he just uses his amazing thigh muscles to show off, often demonstrating his great physique by intentionally ripping his shorts by flexing his muscle. He?s a bit of an asshat.

Personality
Best Qualities: Charming, witty, humorous, loving, charismatic, jovial, always smiling, jokester, caring, determined, persistent, loyal
Worst Qualities: Slacker, holds grudges, hot tempered, show-boater, bad first impressionist (he?s the type of guy you just want to punch in the throat when you first meet him), nonchalant, doesn?t take many things seriously
Likes: Football, rugby, surfing, barbequing, beer, meaty meaty meaty pizza, reading, writing, playing the piano
Dislikes: Americans, needles, uppity 20 year olds
Pet Peeves: Americans, their piss water beer and calling football ?soccer?
Overview: Benji, while not looking very complex from his front as a partying bad boy well into his thirties, is actually a well-adjusted and somewhat less irritating professional athlete. His publicist, Jerry, (also hungry for more fame and fortune) advised Benjamin to act as the Bad Man of Manchester, and encouraged him to go out and do all the things that a young and cocky athlete would do. So, to the public-eye, the 31 year old is seen as immature, a womanizing partier with an attention (meaning all of it has to be on him) problem.

The true personality, the one he has when in private, is vastly different. He is a relatively down to earth man, who is only ever seen extremely briefly at some of the more wild parties. After he makes his appearance, he retires to his quiet home in Manchester and indulges his more realistic hobbies of reading, writing and playing piano. Whenever he?s home, Benjamin?s favorite thing in the world is to go surfing in Runswick Bay in the wee hours of the morning. He will get up often before dawn in order to watch the sun rise over the ocean.

Goals
Career: All he wants to do is play football. He doesn?t care for whom.
Love: None. His ex-wife pretty much destroyed any notion of love he once had.
Family: Has one son with his former wife and is perfectly content with that.
Friendship: Many claim to be his friends, but Benji only considers Micah St. James his one and true friend. They have been brothers since their sandbox and cootie days back in Australia.

Fears
Objects: Needles
Situations: Never being able to see Heathcliff
Feelings: No legacy

History
Family History
The Blackwells are among the most well-known families in Melbourne, Australia, as they have several generations of farming emus under their belts. As it goes, the farm was passed down father to son for eight generations, with each time, the farm growing a little bit bigger. Nearly 300 years ago, the Blackwell farm was not really a farm at all, only boasting and meager three emus and a bull. Good old Grandpa Blackwell, who wasn?t a grandfather at the time, but a brilliant young poker player, had won the property and everything on it in a high stakes game. After taking over the deed to the property, the then eighteen year old Blackwell built a house on it with his own two hands to impress a young woman he had his eye on. After the small cabin was built, Mr Blackwell proposed marriage to his lady, and they were soon married.

Using his unparalleled skills in poker, Mr Blackwell had built up quite a reputation and fortune and funded his new wife?s fondness for the flightless birds. Soon, the three emus became 300 and the bull had been dinner long ago, and thus the Blackwell Emu Farm had been created. Mr and Mrs Blackwell had four children, though only three survived to adulthood. Of the three that survived, only the youngest son showed any interest in the emus, and so, once he reached the right age, his father passed the farm along to him.

While the names and number of emus wrangled on the farm always changed, the story never did. With each new generation of children, only one took interest as a young child and took over the farm from his father, got married, had his own children, and passed the farm along right up until Brody Blackwell, Benji?s father, took over the farm. Today, the Blackwell Emu farm boasts a staggering one-thousand head-count of emus and employs a workforce of over one hundred farmhands.

Individual History
Benjamin Brody Blackwell was born on a scorching summer day on August 8th, 1964 to incredibly proud parents Brody and Bindi. Ben was everything they wanted and needed to the new couple, and Brody had high hopes of little Benji one day taking over the farm as he had form his father before him. Unfortunately, those hopes were dashed fairly quickly as soon as the boy received his first football from his Aunt Messa.

From the time he could run, Benji was always kicking around his new black and white checkered ball, pretending he was an internationally famous Socceroo for the Australian team. It was around this time, that the young Benjamin accidentally kicked the ball into the face of another boy, and after apologizing profusely (?Please, please don?t tell my mama! If you don?t I?ll let you kick my ball!?), the two became fast friends. The boy?s named, Benji would soon learn, was Micah St. James and they would become inseparable. At the same time every day, the boys would meet up and joyfully kick the ball around with each other, or participate in some other three year old activity. Benji has fond memories of playing such favorites as Lava Ball, Bomb Ball, and Save the Princess Ball.

By age five, the pair were enrolled into the same primary school and placed into the same class. Micah and Benji were, of course, delighted to be in each other?s company for hours on end and for days at a time. Teachers would often be forced to separate the two during class time to keep them from playing or carrying on. Even though Micah was the quiet and reserved one, Benji?s outgoing and fun loving nature always brought out the troublemaker in Micah, and the two were often participating in tomfoolery and innocent high-jinks.

Their friendship carried on well into their teenage years, and the pair soon considered themselves brothers. Micah was like a son to Brody and Bindi, and was always welcome at their home whenever the time called for it, and, considering Micah?s own abysmal home life, the offer was always taken advantage of. As they were so close, Micah?s abuse was always apparent to Benji, so was the boy was often happy, and even relieved to have his best friend stay over at the house. Benji always joked that they should sell his younger brother, Baxter Blackwell, and let Micah move in, as he practically did already.

Throughout their years of being best friends, they did what boys did best, and often got into trouble, especially with Benji?s knack for coming up with Stupid Ideas. Aside from the usual hobbies and interests they shared (rugby, football, and surfing, just to name a few), they also had a shared love of emu riding and the various activities that brought. One such activity that was one of Benjamin?s favorites, was emu jousting, in which case each boy would pick up a large stick, jump on an emu, and then proceed to knock the other off with said big stick. Unfortunately, this hardly ever worked, as both boy would chicken out at the last second and end up not hitting each other. Regardless, it is still one of Benji?s fondest memories of his oldest friend.

In between Emu Jousting and school, Benji played on the youth football team, as his love for the sport never diminished. Even at the young age of eleven and twelve years old, Benji knew he wanted to be a soccer player, and was extremely good at it. When school was out of session, Benji was on the summer teams, and advanced quickly, and was called the Football Prodigy by his mother and father. Despite his lack of attention and focus in his studies, Benji was a fury when it came to football, learning everything he could, desperately trying to master a certain move, or coming up with his own.

His obsession with football lead to his playing on the team at Melbourne High School, where he and Micah attended together. Just as it had been in middle school, high school was the exact same as they were each placed into the same exact classes with the same exact teacher. However, despite their teachers? demands for attention, they had better things to do, such as skip class and go surfing. They were both giant slackers, and often always felt they had better things to do than sit around a musky and hot classroom all day, learning things they didn?t need to know.

However, when the pair was around seventeen years of age, the beginning of the end began to loom over the friendship. Benji?s cousin, Willow Harthrowe, came to town with the news that her mother, Benji?s Aunt Messa, had been diagnosed with leukemia and was dying. Ben was heartbroken, as Messa had always been his favorite, and would always think of her as his inspiration for football. Rightly so, Ben was devastated about the news, and was too wrapped up in his own grief to notice the great interest Micah had taken in Willow.

Graduation was soon looming, and a sudden change had taken place within Micah. No longer was he interested in blowing off school to go surfing with Benji, but instead had more of an interest in impressing Willow. Benji, despite feeling hurt at being thrown over for his cousin, was happy for Micah all the same, wishing he himself felt that way for someone special, and soon found himself jealous of all the time Micah was spending with Willow.

While the change in his brother was unwelcome, Benji did his best to work around it, but it never seemed like enough. The time that they did get to spend together was spent talking about their future plans while kicking a football back and forth. The pair had made plans at the start of their final year to attend the same university together, and up until the appearance of Benji?s cousin, those plans had seemed extremely likely to succeed. Benji had won a full ride athletic scholarship through his football, and was ready to attend the prestigious Melbourne University with his best friend and brother.

Despite the resentment Benji was now feeling for his best friend, the boy powered through his final year at Melbourne High School, and still remained on excellent terms with Micah. It wasn?t long, just before graduation that Micah had told Benji that he and Willow were to be married. Taken by surprise, but not entirely shocked, Benji tried his best to be happy for Micah, and jovially accepted the offer to be best man at the ceremony.

Just before he was to start the new school term at UoM, Benji once again breached the subject to Micah. Much to the boy?s anger, Micah had decided to move to London to study to become a doctor with his new wife, and leave Ben behind. That was the last straw for Ben, and he found all the resentment and hatred pouring out of him. How it was completely petty and unreasonable that he should be so angry. How much Ben hated feeling like he was losing his one and only friend and how Micah was choosing to go with some girl he barely knew over an eighteen year long friendship. The shouting match eventually lead to a shoving match, which finally ended after Benji furiously telling Micah to go fuck himself.

That was the last they spoke to or saw each other for nearly ten years.

With Micah gone from his life, Benji immersed himself into college life, doing just as horribly as he did in high school, barely skating by on his good looks and outstanding football talent. It was then, during his freshman year at a football game, that Benjamin met who he thought would be the love of his life. Her name was Gwen Parker, and he would move heaven and hell for her. They dated for a solid two years with Ben refusing to see the horrible faults in Gwen. In his eyes, she was the most perfect thing in the world, while in reality, she was a cold, manipulative, pathological liar sociopath.

It was never obvious that Gwen was just using him for a meal ticket as she was well aware that his skills would take him to the professionals. At the age of twenty, Benji married Gwen at her urging and insistence, and soon, the couple moved themselves to a small apartment building just north of campus. Gwen had insisted that they shake themselves free of the dorm life and start trying to live as normal adults do. The arrangement had worked out well at first, as Benji was always away at games and had to spend little to no time with his new wife, and thus had no reason to believe what a psychotic bitch she was.

The next two years of Benji?s college went off without any more problems. He was the same exact slacker he was back in high school, often skipping classes to go surf. The only thing that saved him, and allowed him to graduate, were his exceptionally amazing gifts with football. Near the end of his fourth year at the University, Benji was approached by a scout, and offered a position on his dream team of the Australian Socceroos. It was only contingent though if he graduated in the next two years. With that in mind, Ben made a mighty effort to only be less of a slacker.

Upon graduation (two years later), Ben received two of the best pieces of news he could ever think of: he had officially been signed to the National Australian Soccer League, and he was going to be a father. Apparently Gwen had made it a point to poke holes in all the condoms he wore. Nonetheless, Ben was the most happy he had been in six years of his life he spent at college, and couldn?t wait to start his new life as a professional soccer player and a father.

In the January after his twenty-fifth birthday, his son, Heathcliff was born. It was such a joy to the new father that all he could do was just stare at his baby boy and not help but smile. It was the most amazing thing he?d ever seen in his life and he was convinced that nothing, not even if he won the World Cup, would feel as amazing as holding his baby. He was convinced he had the perfect life. He was married to an amazing (fucking nuts) woman, had his dream job, and was now a father! Nothing could ever go wrong!

That was until he walked in on his wife mid coitus with their son?s pediatrician. The divorce that ensued was a gigantic and highly publicized affair. Apparently, Gwen had been messing around with anyone and anybody since they were married and didn?t even have enough decency to hide it. Everyone knew his wife was a lying cheating whore except Ben, which left him to feel incredibly stupid and mistrustful of everyone who had claimed to be his friend.

Gwen took everything away from Ben in the divorce, including Heathcliff, claiming that having a father who was constantly on the road for soccer games was unfit. She got the house, citing that Ben was a talented enough soccer player that he would have no problem making enough money to buy another one. However, she claimed half his salary on all games, since she was the one who had to support little Heathcliff all by herself. The judge on the matter agreed with Gwen and ordered Ben to pay out the nose for Gwen and Heathcliff, who he only got to see during supervised visits once a month.

A year after the divorce was finalized was another offer brought to Ben?s attention. Apparently Manchester United had had their eye on him for a very long time, and wanted him to play on their team. After two days of considering the matter, and coming to the conclusion that there was nothing left for him in Australia, did he agree. A month later, Benjamin was playing for Manchester United in London England, and feeling mostly dead inside.

It was then, during a particularly muddy practice with his new team that Ben tripped over the ball and ended up breaking his leg. Feeling as though this was the icing on the cake, Ben laid down in the mud and water, and prepared himself to get struck by lightning. Instead, he blacked out from the constant barge of water and pain in his leg, only to wake up staring into the very face of the man he?d never thought he?d have to look at again.

Doctor St. James had been the one to pick up his case. Neither man was very pleased to see the other, and it was as if their fight ten years ago had never ended. Angry words were exchanged along with some jabs in the chest. Micah was furious that Ben had not shown up to his wife?s funeral, but how the hell was Benjamin supposed to even know that Willow had died since Micah never told him. After an hour of playing the blame game did the two men finally realize that they were indeed acting like children.

Begrudgingly, reluctantly, but with much love, the long lost best friends put their differences behind them and decided to move on. In the three years that Benjamin has lived in London, he have remained close friends, as though the ten year freeze out had never occurred at all. The two are once again, closer than brothers.

Other
In the three years that he has been away from Australia, a judge recently ruled in his favor, and Gwen is now ordered to relinquish custody of Heathcliff every summer so that he may spend it with his father in London. The boy is a fairly decent surfer.

	Welcome, Guest. Please login or register. May 19, 2012, 03:59:02 PM