someone shaped my life today

As a child, I was good at running away from my problems. I was a scaredy cat, and I ran like a rabbit when anything frightened me. 

Sometimes, I would also hide like a mouse, if the threat was an angry human being.

“Stand and fight” didn’t work for me.

When I was 11, I was on the playground with my friends playing line tag. Someone said something that offended me, and so I ran off to sulk.

Pretty quickly, my friends all marched over to me. Michael Trimbull (not sure about that last name), a pudgy kid with coke-bottle glasses and braces with headgear, marched at the head of the group and addressed me sternly.

“You can’t just run away from your problems! We’re your friends, and you need to talk to us about them.”

Michael was right, and I resolved to change at that very moment.

Some resolutions don’t last very long, but that one went deep and still holds.

I had been raised to stoicism: the Little Engine That Could, Steadfast Little Soldier, Suck it Up, No Whining, “You Do What You Have to Do and You Get Through It.”

My mother’s mother came from poverty exacerbated by the Dust Bowl and the Depression. My great-grandmother raised 4 of her own kids as well as 5 kids left by her deceased sister. She did this in a tar-paper shack in Oklahoma, with a husband who turned to moonshining to try to support the family.

My grandmother went from a dirt-poor failed farm to a millinery shop to marriage at 15 and motherhood at 16, to a 20-year-old mother of two working as a welder for the US Navy, to a career naval employee, to a mobile home in Paradise CA, to another mobile home in Mesa AZ. After about age 30, she had a pretty comfortable life.

My grandmother’s life lessons came to me with a chaser of honey. You do what you have to do, you overcome obstacles, you persevere through the tough stuff, and you get through to the other side, where life is good. All of the difficulties are worth it, because you eventually end up at a place where you are happy.

Michael’s advice to face up to my problems instead of running away from them found ready purchase amongst the stoicism.

Courage was added to my core values.

The choice to change has shaped my life in a great many ways. I’ve felt confident stepping off the well-worn path because I believe in facing up to my fears instead of letting them control me. I’ve been willing to confront injustice and unkindness when I encounter them. I’ve had to be more open, to listen better, and to become a lot more patient.

So thank you Michael, wherever you are, for the kind, honest words you spoke that helped me become a better person.