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| As Hootie, Darius once said, "I'm such a baby that the Dolphins make me cry." As a life-long Jazz fan, I understand his pain. |
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| Don't you judge me!!! |
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| Remember the scene where Spidey loses his powers and is just a normal guy like me? Oh, come on, of course you remember it. Everybody loves those movies. Right?!?!? |
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| Pretty much how I felt about soccer. |
But, while Nikki was hitting her stride, I found out that my genes from my Cannon side were killing the genes from my Edwards side. While my Edwards cousins were shooting up like trees, I was lucky to make average height. With each year, my fastball had even less zip, my feet were slower and slower, and I found out that I couldn't take a hit like my Grandpa. It was a sobering day when I realized that not only would I not be a professional athlete, I wasn't even good enough to play on my high school's b-ball team that only won 1 game, I rode the bench in baseball and I couldn't seem to not get concussed while playing football. What was worse was that I wasn't even being bitten by any radioactive spiders!
By the time I was finishing up high school, I turned my thoughts and dreams to serving a mission for my faith. I saw my brother before and many of my friends going on missions--some to exotic places like Brazil, Belgium, or Tonga. So I turned my ambitions towards going on an exotic mission where I would preach the gospel of Christ to stunned citizens of a new land with such force that they would have sworn that I was Paul the Apostle.
But, when the time came, I couldn't go. I had some things that I needed to work on and I was deemed not healthy enough to serve. I watched all my best friends go, and even saw some of them come back. When I was pushing 21, I finally got things straightened out so that I could serve....in Wisconsin. Definitely was not expecting that. Where were my droves of people who just couldn't wait to hear me? Where were my beautiful, humble natives of a distant land?
When I came home from Wisconsin, I found that not much had changed (except that I was 50 pounds fatter...mmm, cheese, brats, butter burgers and custard). I got repeatedly turned down by girls when I asked them if they would like to go on a date with me (or if I said 'can I sit there?' on a crowded bus...or just said 'hello' to a girl). I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and discovered that leaving for two years and only reading scriptures had not made me a better English major (you mean people don't say thee and thou in everyday speech?).
Well, this blog post seems kind of depressing...until you realize that Darius Rucker's chorus states, "thank God for all I missed, because it lead me here to this." Things did not turn out exactly how I planned, it's true. But, I had experiences in Wisconsin that I would not trade for the world. I met people there who have had a major impact on my life. And, as it turns out, the first person that I baptized was a beautiful, humble Native American woman. I also received a Hmong name and was adopted into their culture. I had a Mexican, Hmong, and American Thanksgiving (all on the same day) and met an African American man from a much different background than mine that turned out to be one of my most favorite people in the world. Apparently there is more in Wisconsin than just cows and the Packers!
Later, I met the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life and she agreed to go on a date with me. It turns out that she was also fun, funny, and very intelligent. In Wisconsin we had a saying that every time you worked in the snow, your wife got a little hotter. While that may be extremely shallow, Julie is living proof that it is true. I am so grateful that all of those girls turned me down when they did because Julie was in the midst of breaking up with her moronic ex-fiance and could not yet date me at that time.
Now that woman and I have the most beautiful baby girl in the world. She just started to crawl, last week, and now the world is even more her playground. I did not become a professional athlete, but I am doing something much more meaningful with my life. Julie helped me find out that English was not for me (I don't speak it well, anyway) and that I could find something that fit me better. Now, I am helping families overcome their problems and find happiness together. Plus, the Yankees are in first place and Jules allows me to catch their games every now and then. She also took me to go see the new Spider-Man and did not judge me when I tried to imitate his moves in the movie theater.
In other words, at the end of the day, THIS is not what I expected but it is so much better.
