Who am I?

I’m loud. I’m obnoxious... I’m quiet. I’m reserved... I’m smart. I’m cunning... I’m moronic and stupid... I’m strong. I’m tough… I’m weak and I’m fragile… I’m tireless and dedicated… I’m lazy and untalented.. I’m respectful.. I’m defiant. I’m energetic and outgoing. I’m boring and shy. I’m courageous. I’m timid. I’m a leader. I’m a follower.

I am everything, and I am nothing.

Not many people understand me. I don’t even think my own parents understand me, and I don’t have a problem with that. I’m fully aware that there is a good number of people who think I am the most annoying, obnoxious, and intolerable person they know (or at least in the top 3). I’m not that stupid. I see people’s reactions and I hear the things they say even if they don’t think I do.

But again, I don’t have a problem with that.

Over the last couple of years I’ve developed a very simple outlook on life. Since coming to LeTourneau University I have learned to open up and simply be myself. I’ve learned not to take things personally and to make my own happiness. Obviously everybody wants to be accepted and liked, and so do I. But I’m not going to change who I am, act the way other people want me to act, or say the things other people want me to say to gain that acceptance. I tried that for a long time and I most likely still would be if I hadn’t come to this school. These nerds, the ones we all like to make fun of and look down upon,.. they’re the ones that have it right.

I’m not exactly sure when it happened, but there came a point in my life when I decided to free myself. I decided I was going to let myself go and defy the normal decorum of life and be a lunatic because that’s primarily what I am. I don’t do it in the name of being defiant or rebellious, I do it because that’s who I am and what I do. I’m not different just to be different. I’m different because I am different.

So who am I?

I’m a product of two recently divorced parents. And by recently I mean like 3 days ago recently. We just sold and moved out of the house I had grown up in from the time I was 7 years old. I’m not looking for sympathy.. lots of parents are divorced (not to justify it or deem it as acceptable). Anyways, It’s been ongoing for about a year now but my Mom and Dad both lived at home until the sale of our house just 3 days ago.

Not that I was ignoring it, but I never gave the situation much thought since nothing had seemed any different to me. Plus I was away at school for 9 months out of the year. But there sure isn’t any dismissing it now.

The house was practically empty during the last couple days. It was weird. I laid in the jacuzzi one last time during the final night. I tried to think about my earliest memory in the house. 90% of the things I could think of related to sports in some way, whether it be playing floor hockey with by Dad, or my Grandpa trying to teach me how to catch balls instead of running away from them, or my mom taking my to and from school and practices practically every day of the week. I miss being a kid.

When I was finally done reminiscing the thing I thought about most was birthdays. I had 14 of them in that house and at every single one there would always be someone that asked that stupid question, “So do you feel any older?”

The answer was always no.

But after that night when I thought about everything in that empty house, for the first time I can now say, I feel older..

It doesn’t bother me.. the whole divorce thing. And if it did I would tell people. Its just life. Make your own happiness.

I’m also a product of my environment. From ages 14-15 I grew 7 inches in 19 months. All of the sudden I was tall and lanky and I had no idea what to do with these long arms and legs. I was gawky and unathletic and when I finally made my high school baseball team during sophomore year I was an easy target: The new kid, less talented, and funny looking. Also known as the Trifecta of Doom. In all honesty it wasn’t that bad. I never went home and cried myself to sleep and never wanted to either. I actually consider most of those guys good friends. I just wasn’t as cool and was given a hard time from time to time.

My sophomore and junior years of high school I was awful at baseball. God-awful. I still scratch my head at times as to how I even made the team. Anyways long story short I made varsity my senior year not because I deserved it, but because you weren’t allowed to put seniors on the JV team. But I used those guys on the team who gave me grief as motivation to get better. I grew into my body a little and slowly improved. Soon the guys on the team started to see me as a peer not just the tall skinny kid who sucked. And that help me be myself a little more too – and looking back, that was the key to everything. I felt less pressure at practices and actually felt like the guys were rooting for me instead of against me. We made the CIF Division I playoffs my senior year and I started both playoff games after being subjected primarily to scrub time during the previous 30 or so games that season.

In coming to LeTourneau and being on the baseball team I felt instantly accepted. I had a fresh start in a new place where nobody knew how gawky or unathletic or untalented I once was. But at the same time I wouldn’t change anything about my past. From my great struggles and brief successes in high school I knew that my best chances to succeed in this place was to let everything hang out, be myself, and make the most out of every single day.


I haven’t looked back since.