Call me Crazy

but I can sense my writing is getting

better

each day.

I still write crap

but that

is to be expected.

If we put in the time

we get better

but time isn’t enough.

Talent is something our teachers might say we have

but they tell children that

all the time.

Trust me

I work in a school.

“You’ve got talent,” is the most overused phrase.

Every teacher wants to discover the next Hemingway.

Now, there are other teachers I had (the ones who didn’t like me—English Teachers)

who told me, “You should be a teacher—you have no talent as a writer.”

But for some reason, getting up in front of a class

and talking, seemed like a waste of life

and I told them so,

and they hated me, for saying that, but I was only being honest—

and that’s what a writer should do.

Now, I’m going to tell you about my 7th grade year

I have always found success through persistence.

Barriers melted away, during this golden year

and I am convinced, our early experiences shape our future beliefs.

God was going to bless me, if I followed Him.

The result:

MVP of my Basketball Team. MVP of my Golf Team. I won the middle school chess championship each quarter. I won the Table Football Championship each quarter. I won the Ping-Pong Championship. I won the Hoop Shoot Championship. I had 107% in my English class and a 4.0.

I was invincible.

I won everything.

Winning is a phenomenon that repeats itself, like failure.

These experiences solidified my reputation as being extremely intelligent.

Everything that happened after 7th grade was built on this foundation.

One of the developmental psychologists—I think it was Adler, but it might’ve been Erickson—suggested that children

move through a period called industry versus inferiority. This is the time in a child’s psychology when they develop competence for the first time, or they experience failure, and resulting, inferiority.

I had a pure does of success in 7th grade, which has inoculated me against chronic failure, but I have never been able to replicate

the aura of winning, that I once had.

I was a success in middle school.

Nothing was going to stop me.

I had one year of spiritual purity.

Last year, my spirit has changed. It’s growing stronger.

I’m getting back to my old self again.

And the strangest part—I work in a middle school.