becoming
In last week’s post, I told you that a college student I used to mentor interviewed me for a paper he’s writing on “The Happiest Person You Know.” But I also mentioned in the same post that I haven’t always been the happy sort.
If you were to ask just about anyone who knows me, they would tell you that I have the patience of Job. They would tell you that, for the most part, I have a contagious aura of peace about me. They would tell you that I don’t hang on to stress or worry, and that I shrug off even the worst of offenses relatively quickly. But these things have not always been true of me.
Let me take you back – way back – and see if I can explain how I became the happy and patient and positive guy most people know me as today.
My mother will tell you that when I was very small, I used to make entrances by bounding through doorways, announcing my arrival with “Tah-Dah!” as if I were really something special.
From the earliest years, when I had to climb the shelves like a ladder to get my treasures, I spent long days in the library – a place where my sense of wonder was stretched until I thought it would burst. Every one of these books contains adventures and ideas and fascinating new information about everything! (I felt that way then, and that much has not changed a bit.) I was excited about the bugs and art and fancy scientific names; about the way that words sounded; about history and the world and the people in it, both near and far.
I remember one day when I visited the bathroom in said library. I was sitting on the pot, taking care of business and humming, as I often did, when I discovered something else new and wondrous – reverb. The ceiling was high, the floor tiled and the walls concrete; and so the sound of that humming echoed around me and sounded strange and exciting. So I hummed a little louder. Then I added words and sang. And before I knew it, I was belting out my little tune from my porcelain stage, enraptured by the swirling fullness of it all. I reached the end of the song and let the last of the reverberation die out before hopping down, flushing, washing my hands and heading back out for more book exploration. But when I opened the heavy metal door, I was greeted with the sound of applause from a dozen or so parents and their kids, all gathered around. Even Mrs. Bird, the stern librarian, was among them, clapping enthusiastically and smiling. With teeth. (It was weird.)
This was the kind of kid I was.
But somewhere between the days of wonder and unwitting bathroom concerts, my world got very small and dark. I began to see and experience the worst in people everywhere I turned. And by the time I was 10 or 12, I was anxious.
Fearful.
Bitter.
Angry.
And I felt this way all the time.
