Forgetting Who I Am

“Whatever you do, just don’t take last”

A simple sentence spoken by my father soon dropped on my 12 year old ears like a giant anvil.

I turned my back and began to walk across the track to the field to do my warm-up.

 

“Man,” I thought. “I really need to get better at this, I can’t even touch my toes.” My fat little fingers were begging to grab my Nikes but fell short as they dangled even to my white tube socks that stretched halfway up my calves.  I brushed my long dark hair out of my eyes and looked back across the track, to try and find my family. Standing on my tip toes, my 5 foot 2,  140 pound body finally caught the attention of my uncles and aunts off to the side, I gave them a wave, they smiled and waved back.

After a few short jogs, I was soon feeling ready to go… Then I heard my call, “Boys 800 Meter, report to starting position”

It was time…

Being who I am, I honestly thought that my short, fat, 12 yr old, un-athletic frame could actually compete with 9^th graders. I had never ran 800 Meters before. And anyone who knows ANYTHING about running, will tell you the 800 Meter race is the worst race you can run, (Next to the 400 Meter)

So there I stood, in my lane with 30 other boys. My head was not even above most kids waists, and my blue uniform that read “TH BELL” on the front could have been considered a dress.

I paid no attention to the crowd as my ears silently stood still, waiting to hear the gun.

BAM

We all took off, and within the first 50 meters I found myself in the back of the pack. My arms began to swing frantically and my legs sped up to try and keep up with the long, lengthy strides of the much older competitors.

After the first lap, my lungs began to burn, my heart began to pound and my already slow pace began to slow even more; almost to a crawl.

By the time I had started around for my second lap, the first 10 people were just starting their last 100 meters in a dash for first place.

On the back 100 I found that I wasn’t alone, after all this pain and embarrassment of this event, I had somehow managed to pass a kid, who was my age, but hailed from an opposing school. But my speed was still rapidly decreasing, and his was staying the same… Slowly he began to catch me. 

I could hear his footprints pounding behind me around the 200 meter mark. He was clipping my heels around the 150 mark and as soon as we turned the corner for the last 100 meters, I found him pulling up next to my right side. I couldn’t tell if he wasn’t breathing hard or not because my gasps for air were growing louder and louder. The only thing louder than my lungs was the voice in my head, the voice of my dad, “Whatever you do, just don’t take last”

I realized now that my dad knew I wasn’t competing for first place, but instead of having me get upset about being blown away, he wanted me to compete nonetheless… For anything but last place.

My little hands clinched in a fist and I began to push my body to the limit. With all my muscles firing, I was running like I had never ran before, trying to push myself, and at the same time, hoping that this kid next to me didn’t have much left in the tank. I pushed, my legs began to feel heavy and my mind kept telling me to quit, the kid was now dead even with me, and I knew that I was about to get passed for last place, right in the front of my uncles, aunts and my parents…

So I did what any competitor would do when they know they are beat.

I cheated.

I moved over into his lane and began to throw my elbows as hard as I could into his chest.

WAM
WAM
WAM

You could tell he was shocked, he didn’t know that track was a contact sport. But when a PoVey is competing, you never know what can happen during a competition.

He tried moving a lane over, but I followed, I kept elbowing and pushing him until we were all the way to the outside of the track, and now he had no where to go, on one side was me, elbows flying, waiting for him to come back in, on the other side, a steel rail.. Reality set into his mind and he began to realize that I would slam him into this rail if I had to; there was no way I was taking last.

Knowing that my will to win would go as far as to bodily injury, my competitor began to back off…

As my tired body crossed the line, a smile came on my face and I knew that I had accomplished my goal…

I probably should have been disqualified, I probably should have been in trouble, but I think that either the coaches forgot there was still kids trying to finish, they weren’t paying attention, or the battle for 30^th place ment nothing to them and they just sat and enjoyed the show. Either way I didn’t care if I would’ve been disqualified, I didn’t care if my coach would’ve been mad… cause all I cared about was crossing that line…

Crossing that line as being anything.. but last…

You are so lucky. Every man on the entire planet envy’s you. You are always on every page of hot magazines and you are all over the best looking women this planet has to offer. You get to sit around all day, you don’t have to worry about a job or anything, you just hang out til your hot woman picks you up and takes you around all day. You hug her tight and get to see places us single guys can only dream of. You are a thong.. a wonderful peice of fabric that stays high enough above the jeans just long enough to say, “i’m not coverin much.” You are full of different colors, patterns and fabrics. You adapt to many different cultures.. All the way down in Brazil with the florecent orange color over to Austraila with the reptile pattern, back to Africa with your line of grass thongs and up to Canada with your extra padded thongs for warmth.  You cover the whole world bringing joy to every boy.. you are always changing your look yet you remain consistant with getting the job done.  Your job is to make guys go crazy.. you are also the reason a lot of guys behave. We see the back of you gradually get smaller until you disappear behind the jeans of our date..  You make us smile.. you make us wonder.. you make us have to go to our bishop. You are a ray of sunlight on a cloudy day. So, Mr. Thong, i would like to speak on behalf of all the men across the world when i say, THANK YOU. Thank you for being there when i need a smile, thanks for riding up along the hip when a girl is wearing a belly shirt and most of all.. thanks for being there every time a girl drops something. Keep on truckin, keep doing what you do best. Never stop, never give up and never add more fabric. Thank you for everything Mr. Thong, I salute you.

hmmm.. what should i write about… i don’t know.. ummm… i have to think of something.. i want to get home cause i’m hungry.. i wonder what we have to eat at the house. i hope dinkel got paid.. he always buys the best food.. except when he buys white bread.. GROSS.. white bread is sick.. it makes you get colon cancer and the last thing i need is some guy prodding around in my ass. i leave that to the gays.. how can you be gay? gay people are gross.. don’t get me wrong.. lesbians are hot.. but not hot as in i approve hot.. but its hot.. i bet there isn’t a guy in the world that doesn’t think two girls making out is hot.. well.. except gay guys. gay guys are just weird.. you know what else is weird? computers.. how can you store words and pictures on a peice of metal with wires.. thats weird.. thats just like a cell phone.. how does your voice go into a phone and through the air and into another phone.. if satalites carry the signal then how don’t the cell phones get crossed up? how does your voice get to a satalite and how does the satalite not accidently send it to one of the other 50,000 phones being used at that time? that reminds me.. i should call my brother.. he just graduated from law school.. i hope he’s a good lawyer.. not a crappy one who cheats the system.. we need more good lawyers and judges.. our system and government is becoming so currupt.. there is no hope for our country.. our country really needs to get out of iraq.. WHY ARE WE THERE?.. our president is so stupid.. i’d like to pee on his front porch.. not the white house but just his regular front porch.. haha that reminds me of the time my buddy pooped on this kids front porch.. it was hilarious.. it was even more funny cause when he got done he realized he had nothing to wipe with so he ran back to the truck we were in.. he ran like a penguin.. haha.. it was hilarious.. we made him ride in the bed of the truck til we got back to his house.. he had his pants down the whole time.. haha. after that we nicknamed him icky.. it was originally sticky cause he said his butt cheeks were stuck together.. but by the end of the season we just shortened it to icky. Surgery’s are icky.. surgery’s scare me.. although i’ve had 7 of them.. my dads had like 17.. i hope i don’t catch him.. if i ever throw like he does my baseball career would be in trouble. i hope i have a baseball career.. that would be awesome.. i hope no one calls me Tycen.. thats not my name! i’m so used to bein called Tag by my family.. hmm.. maybe one day i’ll put Tag on the back of my jersey. well.. shit.. i can’t think of anything to write.. i’m going to eat..

If you throw away your paper
Dispose your disposible razor
Be the clean human being you should be
If you always lift the seat
And always wipe your feet
You will unknowingly fire me
(Cause I’m a)
Janitor
Janitor
Janitor of your daily life
Janitor
Janitor
I’m 64 and never had a wife

Scrubin up your spew
Isn’t the funnest thing to do
But someone pays me money to clean it
The grossest one i’ve seen
Was blue red and green
Mixed with corn.. oh you should have seen it
I pay for the movies
Cause I wipe up your poopy
I’ve been mopin since i could crawl
I get home by nine
Unless i’m workin overtime
Tryin to afford some new overalls
Janitor
Janitor
Doin this 50 years and will not quit
Janitor
Janitor
I’m always in the room when you shit

Never got a degree
Just my sweet GED
But I get along just as fine
Anytime I feel lonely
need someone to hold me
Dial the numbers in the stall “for a good time”
Janitor
Janitor
Garbage is my bride and i’m the groom
Janitor
Janitor
Never leave the house without a broom

Shave that shit
on your upper lip
who’d ever kiss you?
thats just sick
nastiest thing
i’ver ever seen
you need four razors
and some shaving cream
all through class
it grows thicker and thicker
this chick behind me
is lookin like adolf hitler

Karma.. Its a funny thing.  Its very true.. what goes around.. comes around. I’m sure all of us have witnessed Karma in one form or another.. whether its the cheating boy friend getting a taste of his own medicine.. or seeing your buddy on crutches when the week before he was making fun of “gimps.” I actually had a little bit of karma come my way last night.. But before i tell this story i must set the stage.. When i was a little kid.. i was.. well, a little bit out of control.. ok i was a lotta bit out of control. i was a compulsive liar, i fought with everyone around me.. and i had so much energy my teachers probably thought i sat down with a spoon and ate a bag of sugar every morning.. the biggest thing i was known for was my fighting.. i was in the principals office alot.. i even had my own personal chair with my name sewn into the back. Its not a good thing if the principal of the school knows your home number and your parents cell and work numbers by heart.. but mine did. Everytime i walked through the doors i would get a look from my principal that said “again?” Don’t get me wrong.. i hardly ever picked a fight.. i don’t remember a lot of them.. but my dad told me that 90 percent of my fights were because some popular kid would pick on the geek or a fat kid.. so i would beat up the popular kid in defense of the underdog. So although i fought.. it was for a good reason.. well good 90 percent of the time.. the other 10 percent.. well.. thats where my story from last night falls into place. My mom works with a girl i went to school with. Her name is Erin. a couple weeks ago i took Erin out and while we were hanging we ran into a friend of hers. I knew i knew her from somewhere.. but i couldn’t put a name to her face.. and even when she told me her name was jessie.. i didn’t know where i had met her before.. well the night ended and we hung a couple more times since then. there was about a week or so when me and Erin did not talk.. i didn’t kow why.. i knew i was busy and she had a guy she was dating so i thought nothing of it. well last night i finally got a hold of her and she came over to hang. When she got over here she asked me if i had remembered jessie.. i told her i knew the face but didn’t know where from.. she laughed and said.. “well.. after we had hung out that week, i went to church and ran into her again. she asked me how it was hanging out with you and i said it was good..” then she got  a weird look on her face.. and she continued her story, “then she told me that she thought you were cute.. but the only thing she can remember about you is what happend between you two in 2nd grade..” i sat there and thought.. hmm.. 2nd grade? her face did look more familiar now.. i had gone to elementary with her and hadn’t seen her since.. but i had no idea of what happend between me and a girl in 2nd grade.. i mean.. did i break her heart? cause i wasn’t exactly a heart breaker.. girls had Kooties til i was a freshman.. so i asked.. “wait.. what happend in 2nd grade?” she laughed.. “you don’t remember?”      “no” i said.. so she went on “well i guess after recess everyone ran to the drinking fountain and there was a huge line.. jessie tried to butt in front of you and you grabbed her.. turned her around and punched her in the stomach.” my face dropped in awe of my actions.. i couldn’t believe i decked a girl for butting in line.. no wonder jessie hates me.. to make matters worse jessie told erin in detail how bad it hurt and how bad she cried…       who would have thought that my tiny fists would one day effect my dating situation.. Who knows how many girls i come in contact with know this jessie girl.. i’m never going to be able to date anyone in utah now cause they are in fear of being in a abusive relationship. i guess all i can do is hope jessie moves to another country.. til then.. who knows if i’ll ever get a date.. but who is jessie to ruin my dating life.. it was her fault.. butting in line should not be tolerated..

It all started when i woke up.. My older brother, jason, was laying in his summer position, sprawled across the couch with the remote in his hand.. ofcourse i didn’t even have to ask what he was watching.. i knew it was TRL. He and I would wait patiently for certain music videos to come on.. christina, britney or jessica.. it didn’t matter.. just any of the 3 would do. The moment their music video came on we’d jump to our feet and dance across the basement singing the lyrics as loud as possible. This was our daily routine.. my parents thought we were crazy due to the fact that jason was a junior in college and i was going to be a senior in high school.. but we didn’t care. I rubbed my eyes and sat up.. i glanced across the room to see my little brother, Skye, throwing on a pair of swim trunks. “Where are you going ya little bitch?” i asked. “To classic waterslides,’ he replied. ” kyle and eric are on their way to pick me up.”  I looked over at my brother ease dropping on our conversation. “whose money are you going to steal to get in?” jason inquired. A blank look came across skye’s face.. you could tell his little 10 year old mind had forgotton about one thing.. a big thing.. money. “do you guys have any money?” his eyes bounced back and forth between me and jason looking for an answer. “ya.. i got some money.” jason said with a smirk. For some reason i knew by that smirk that he was up to something. i didn’t know what.. but i knew i wanted to find out.. jason always had the best ideas. “what will you do for me?” jason asked, still smirking. The two negotiated out a deal, clean the bathroom, no, wash your clothes, no. nothing seemed to please jason. “i have an idea!” the words slipped through jason’s mouth like a snake.. a sly, cunning snake. He stood up and motioned for the two of us to follow him.. He flung open the cabnit doors and started digging through the shelves.. “here we go.” he said as he pulled from the cabnit a roll of duct tape. My mind was scanning for what he was doing.. Jason dropped to his knees on our wood floor and started to tear off peices of duct tape and place them on the ground. When he was finished he had a 2ft by 2ft box of duct tape on our wood floor. “what the hell are you doing?” i started to laugh. i couldn’t even think of what  he could possibly be up to. i think the questions started going through skye’s head as well, for his face was in deep thought. “ok, here is the deal,” jason went on,”if you stand in this box and pee your pants i will give you 5 bucks.” he grinned and pointed to the box he made of tape on the floor. “what?” skye asked. “oh my hell! hahahahaha” i began to laugh. i mean, who would honestly think of that. My brother had major brain damage or something. “No way, There is no way i am doing that.” “ok,” jason said. “then how are you going to get into the waterslides?” I sat in aw as i looked at skye.. he was seriously debating on whether to do this or not. “5 bucks?” skye motioned with all 5 fingers toward jason. “ya.. thats enough to get in right?” jason’s face started to turn red as he was trying to hold back laughter. “ok,’ skye said, “i’ll do it.”  No way i thought.. he’ll chicken out.  Skye took his position in the gray box, me and jason sat on the near by counter to observe. No way, NO WAY.. there is NO way he’s going to go through with this.. but the thought of him actually peeing his pants made me laugh, which made jason laugh. about 3 minutes passed, then my brother announced, “ok here i go.” Jason jumped off the counter and squated next to skye to get a closer look, i slid off the counter and stood behind jason.. curious to see if skye was full of it. Not too much later a trickle of pee began to flow down skye’s leg. It took me a second to realize he wasn’t faking. His face turned a bright pink, i wasn’t sure if it was him trying to push out more.. or sheer embarrasment that he was peeing his pants. The front of his shorts began to turn dark as more and more came out.. soon a puddle was at his feet and both me and jason were on the ground holding our stomachs, bursting out with laughter. He soon finished and ran upstairs to the bathroom. Me and jason remained on the floor holding our stomachs… “he peed his pants.. he peed his freakin pants.” jason kept repeating in-between gasps for air while still laughing. It seemed like we spent an eternity on the floor laughing.. soon the corners of my mouth hurt and my abs felt like i had just done a 5 hour ab workout. By the time we finished skye had “dried off” and come back down stairs to collect. “where is my 5 bucks?” he asked.. jason began to laugh again. he burried his face into his hands trying to hold himself back from laughing. “ok.. i have your 5 bucks.. but how about i double it.. i’ll give you 10 bucks to poop your pants!” jason looked up from his hands to see skye’s reaction. “what a freakin genius..” i thought.. in my mind i bowed to jason for his artistic ability.  Jason looked at me and then looked back at skye, he went on “come on.. 10 bucks, that means you can go to the slides today AND tomorrow.” This time skye wasn’t in deep thought, he just simply said, “ok.” he took his place back in the duct tape circle, which if you remember was still wet with pee.  Neither me nor jason laughed at this.. we thought he had something up his sleeve to get us back. So we just kind of sat back and observed to see what he was going to do. Pretty soon Skye began to push, me and jason looked at each other.. “ya right”, we thought. we sat with our arms crossed not believing his actions. Skye’s eyes got really wide.. “dude.. i did it.. ” he said.  Me and jason looked at each other and looked back at skye in disbelief. “prove it.” jason said, still sitting with arms folded. skye ran upstairs to the bathroom. He quickly returned and stood on top of the stairs. underwear in hand. I grabbed jason’s shoulder and pointed to the chocolate covered underwear… Only.. it wasn’t chocolate. i  grabbed my stomach and fell to the floor. my mouth and gut were so sore it was hard for me to laugh.. but it was even harder to stop laughing. Skye went back in the bathroom and we heard the shower turn on.. we laughed harder.  By the time the shower turned off we were downstairs doing our everyday routine.. laying on the couch. Skye came down stairs dressed in nothing but a huge shirt that he got from my dad’s drawer.. it covered his entire body. “where’s my money?” skye asked.. “you really think i’m going to pay your bitch ass!?!” jason said as he laid there. “pay or i’ll call mom and tell her what you made me do.” Jason sat up.. “oh really, ya think so huh?” he said. He ran over to the stairs where skye was sitting and he grabbed him. “tycen come help me.” jason said as skye began to struggle. i obeyed the order and ran to the stairs and grabbed skye’s legs to calm them from kicking. “just for being a little bitch ass, you’re going outside.. naked” jason’s words cut through skye as we began to haul him up the stairs.. “nooooooo” skye screamed. we opened the front door and stripped the shirt from his body, pushed him outside and locked the door. “ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.” Skye began to ring the doorbell as if we were going to answer. “ding, ding, ding, ding.”  soon it stopped. i ran to the front window to see my little brother face down in the grass.. butt naked. I could hear his voice mumbling “guys please open the door.. guys!” I motioned for jason and he came to the window.. and yes once again we found ourselves laughing histerically. i looked up just in time to see his naked body sprint past the window to the side of the house. I knew what he was doing but i was too tired from laughing to stop him.. just as i expected he came in from the garage door. “you guys are ass holes!’ he screamed as he ran upstairs to his room to cloth his naked body. After our laughing died down we again returned to the downstairs to watch our video’s. about an hour past before skye decided he wasn’t too embarrassed to come face us… he crept slowly down the stairs. “jason.. seriously.. i need that money. eric will be here any minute.” jason looked at me with that smirk.. the same smirk he’d looked at me with 10,000 times before. “i’ll give you 20 bucks if you let me shave your head.” now.. normally that wouldn’t be such a good deal. 20 dollars to shave a kids head.. kids have their head shaved all the time.. but not skye.. his hair fell way past his eyes almost to his lips.. since no other boy in my family had hair like that..it was my moms pride and joy..  This time skye really went into a deep thinking mode. He knew what my mom would say if we touched his hair. “hmmm… ok” he agreed. within a second, jason had already darted upstairs, grabbed the clippers and a stool and came back into the kitchen.. ready for skye to sit down.. yes.. he shaved his head.. and just for kicks he left a nike sign in the back of skyes head and colored it red with a marker… it was done.. finished.. skye’s day from hell finished with really stinky shorts and a shaved head. about an hour later kyle called and cancelled the trip to the waterslides.. and about 2 hours after that my mom returned home from work.. yes she freaked but oddly enough nothing got broken and no one got grounded. That wonderful day took place exactly 6 years ago.. and to this day.. skye still hasn’t seen a penny of his 20 dollars.. but we don’t care.. we are his older brothers.. besides.. that little bitch didn’t deserve shit.

I had a friend get a ticket the other night.. sorry if i go on a rant here..

Cops.. Ever since i was a little kid i wanted to be a police officer. I wanted to catch bad guys, drive a cool car with lights on top and carry a gun. I wanted to make the streets a safer place and make a difference in the community, but by the time i was ten i realized that cops don’t do shit. They were just the kid in elementry that ate paste, licked the bus windows and had to hide under the jungle gym during recess in fear of getting his ass kicked. In Jr high they were the kids getting their ears flipped by the jock sitting behind them in math class. They would show up to school wearing gym shorts with knee high socks and sandals (yes dad thats a bad thing) by high school they were the kids who didn’t know you but would find it there business to tell the teacher that you weren’t late because your locker was jammed like you told her.. but instead he announces that he saw you talking to a girl. They ran for class officer but never made it and would sit in their rooms by their self at night trying to memorize the entire cd of milli vanilli. They get their ass hole degree or whatever they do to be a cop and now they think they own the city. They run red lights when they aren’t in an emergency, they speed, don’t stop for stop signs and turn the wrong way down one way streets. I’m sorry but if you have that much power to do whatever you want then maybe you should start cracking down on drugs, alcohol abuse, partner and child abuse and violence. spend less time sitting on your fat dunkin donut eatin ass and get up and actually make a difference.. please just for once make our tax money go to something worth while. Quit using our money for buying officers SUV’s that they don’t need. Why would a cop need an SUV? i guess a lot of cops do arrest a family of 7.. or after a hard day of fighting crime he stops by home depot to do some shopping.. i guess he could use that SUV do to the many high speed chases that end up off roading in the mountains… come on guys give me a break.. quit slicking your hair back, take off the black sun glasses when its cloudy and when you go to the gym try to mix in something other than chest and biceps.. you’re not cool. You have been chosen to represent your city. you have a resposibility to take care of the good people surrounding your area and to make the communtity safe so that the parents of that town don’t worry about their children going out late at night. You are supposed to look and act like a professional.. treating people with respect and curtisy. This is an important job, so be humble enough to accept your responsibilities as an officer. As for now all cops are a bunch of bush league assholes that have bottled up anger from their childhood and decide to take it out on poor college students who can’t afford tickets. If you have childhood issues.. thats your problem.. but go out and do your job.. there are drugs circulating the streets and children and wifes being abused day after day.. yet you’re worried about how fast people go down the hill on mill lane. Maybe one day you’ll do your job going out to find the killers the drug dealers and anyone else who wishes to harm the community… until then i guess you’ll keep giving out 100 dollar tickets for bull shit reasons.. grow up ya glorified hall monitor.. sorry for going 4 over.