Differentiation

Essays

Aug 15

One of my first real summer jobs was working as a beach boy at a beach club in the Hamptons. I worked my ass off, most of the time. More setting up and putting everything away, but those were long days dragging mats and chairs everywhere, and getting umbrellas stuck in the sand on a windy day. Did I also bilk the club of more Cherry Coke than a human could drink in one summer? Yes. Small perks.

The difference between skill and luck is hard work. There’s a reason lottery winners usually run out of money in a couple of years. They didn’t try to learn how to be wealthy. They just became wealthy. And they didn’t have to work hard for the windfall. Easy come, easy go.

In 11th grade in California, I didn’t even make the JV basketball team. I don’t know how. Glen Rothstein was on varsity for God’s sakes. My parents decided to send me to boarding school to repeat 11th grade. When I got to the Peddie School, I didn’t know how good I was. No one else did either. I easily made the varsity team at a much better school and started the season as the sixth man. After the fifth game, I was the starter. Two years. 44-8. Two State Prep Championships. Once ranked in the Top 20 when St. Anthony’s with Bobby Hurley was #1. My senior year team, of which I was the captain, is in the Peddie School Hall of Fame. A change of scenery can make all the difference

I went to Babson College to play basketball after the coach at Dickinson College said I had gotten in, but made an error. I thought I would start as a freshman. I had a lot going on in my life that no one knew about. I got mono the first day of my freshman year. Everyone from Babson still calls me Mono. I pulled both hip flexors before the season started. My grades were an elephant turd wrapped in whale blubber. I never played a second of varsity college basketball in two years.

I’ve never followed the herd. It just seemed stupid to me to go in the same direction as everyone else. Where’s the fun in that? But a lot of the time, it left me feeling lonely and misunderstood. Sometimes, it led to giving up on something too early because the long tail was too far away. Just like some people are scared of success, most of us are scared of being different.

For Halloween in 5th grade, I went as myself. When we rang the doorbells in our apartment building, the adults shunned me for not “dressing up.” I tried to explain how meta what I was doing was, but they didn’t get it. My friends probably got full-size Mounds while I got an old Jolly Rancher. I was tired of wearing the store-bought costumes. Even the adults didn’t want me to be different.

Maybe it’s harder to be different than I think. Maybe it’s too much risk for some people. They may not have the same cushion I have. The thing is, though, the sea of sameness is just a shade of light gray. It’s never going to be lilac.