When I look back on it, bullying made me who I am; to say I wouldn’t be as creative or as free minded as I am today, minus the harassment regarding how big I was or how I performed at sports on the playground, that would be an informed supposition, but we can’t change the past, so who’s to say? All I know is that in many cases, I’ve grown accustomed to putting my image before my happiness, and I hate for it to be that way. I’m 22 now, so I’ve been doing it for about 18 years, day in and day out, questioning whether I’m good enough to even be seen, or whether my decisions to not be a part of a crowd are spurred by a simple state of unrest.

   We live in a messed up society where children are taught to judge or be judged, but I became something great as a product of my own pain, and I’m proud of the person I’ve become. To say that I wouldn’t be the same man I am today without my various puffy-face-moments would be an accurate and slightly frightening assumption; my quirks, awkwardness, and eccentricities come from those torments of my youth, and I truly believe that they make me great….. even still, if I’d been given the option to not be judged, and to grow without having to bend or cower in the lights and nature of society, I’m not entirely sure I would not have taken that chance. Tropism is for the plants, i’d have loved the ability to choose.