Today I'd like to discuss you.  What makes up you?  While discussing my own life, I want you to think of yours.  In order to do this we all need to be honest with ourselves.  They say that character is what you do when no one is looking.   So you need to think about identifying what you are by being that honest with yourself.    We look in the mirror day after day and while we see ourselves, do we ever really examine who we are?  What made you the way you are.  Do you have as short temper?  Do you raise your voice without realizing it?   Do you eat to forget your sad thoughts?   Are you the type to procrastinate?   Do you let your problems mount up before you begin to attack and resolve them?  Are you a work-aholic?  Are you meticulous or a germa-phobe?   There are countless things that make up who we are, from our personality to our character.   The good and bad things about you must be something you've pondered, been pleased with or even battled during your life.

What made you what you are?  Was it your parents?  Was it your social setting?  Did you grow up with or without brothers or sisters?   Did you have a friends in school or were you picked on?  Did you live in the country, the city or a suburban setting?  

Perhaps most important to question is are you happy with who you are?  Remember my tag line I borrowed from Justin Currie, "Look into the mirror do you recognize someone, is it who you always thought you would become when you were young?"  The day I heard these words I began some serious self examination.  I was married and had just moved into a large home.  I heard those words and took them from the context of the song and I felt a bit sad.  Suddenly I realized.  I'm in my thirties... I'm married to someone that I don't know if she loves me, I have two children I adore, but did I become who I set out to become when I was 12?   Did you think about what you wanted to be as you reached the age of understanding?  I did.  Who didn't have dreams as a teen?  I recalled laying in bed as a twelve and thirteen year old.  I had a bunk bed, but no brother in it.  I can't even remember why I had a bunk now.  It was useless.  At least I could pick where I wanted to sleep without arguing over it.  But that was the type of childhood I had.  I was alone.  And for a good lone time I battled loneliness.  I laid in bed listening to ELO's One Summer Dream.  I looked out the window over the tree tops and thought of a better life somewhere out there under those same stars. 

I aimed to love someone deeply.  And I wanted to be loved just as deeply.  I wanted to become a singer.  I wanted to be a football player.  I wanted to be someone that people would understand as just like them but having made it.  My mother used to tell me I was a miracle baby and that I had a special purpose and like a fool I believed her.  For a long time I believed her.  Somewhere after my 22nd birthday I realized there was nothing special about my life.    But by this time I had honestly beaten back all my demons, hang-ups, insecurities and phobias.  Because during my teens, despite being picked on, I was relentlessly individual and idealistic.  That part of me has never given up.  But I did grow beyond my dreams.  I regretted terribly not going out for the high-school football team.  This was because of my fear, not insecurity of the kids on the team.  Honestly, they were dicks.  I mean mean spirited, hateful pricks that epitomized everything I resented in bad high-school behavior.  I should have shrugged that off and just went out for the team. I know another reason I didn't try out was that I was a bit lazy.  At least in respect to the commitment the team would need.  I know this because somewhere around the age of 13 I wandered into a try out at my high-school for a non-high school football league.  I found a large contingent of kids doing push-ups and leg lifts and so much more.  I just didn't know why they were doing it.  I joined in.  Sounds strange but I just joined in.  Later I found it was a football team try-out.  When we reached the point of actually running plays, I was lost.  I had always played sand lot ball and had a lot to learn which I could. But at the time I was green.  After a week they did cuts and I made the first cut.  But was released at the second cut.  They recommended that Caravel Academy was looking for players but I felt indignant.  I remember clearly thinking... I don't want another team, I tried out for this one.  When I reached high-school I think the concept of all the hard work and the possibility of being cut had an affect on me just as much as the intimidation factor.   I learned during high-school, especially at the end that I was better than most of the kids on the team.  It was years later and I was 18.  My crew stumbled onto a field where most the high-school football team was playing sand lot ball with others.  The opening kick came to me and I heard the yells, "Get Hindsley! Kill him!"  I was never intimidated on the Field and I ran the kick through everyone for a returned touch down.  It was more of the same all day.  Suddenly the kids that gave me shit for years respected me, and I mean that.    In my Senior year and beyond I made many many friends and was invited to parties and more.  It was strange going from the Johnny Silent to someone the guys didn't mind talking to or knowing my opinion.  I was once the guy that dressed well but no one would talk to, to becoming socially acceptable. I didn't drive for popularity but I felt great at parties when everyone was glad I showed up.  Seeing smiles across the room and having some girl call out to me to tell me "something" was like crossing a river in life that I didn't think possible.

But I would have traded social acceptance for the wisdom in knowing I should have played for the football team.  I had always performed with above average, well above average ability.  I endured everything.  I loved knowing I was great, I ate it up.  I was very proud of who I was.  I wanted to become somebody when it came to football.   Now I stood in my basement with music playing from a dusty old player with a friend of mine trying to hang dry wall.  I stood with my screw gun, standing in dust listening to "Look into the mirror do you recognize someone, is it who you always thought you would become when you were young?"  It had a profound impact on me as I suddenly examined my life in the strangest of settings.  My wife was out with her girlfriends (or so she always said) and my children where upstairs playing and meandering back and forth asking how they could help.  This was my life.  Was it everything I hoped to become?  No.  It was far from who I wanted to be. 

I redefined myself in high-school daringly a couple times, but once I had children one thing I couldn't change was being a father.   And up to becoming a father I had chances to get it right.  For instance.  I loved music and still do.  But I wrote so many poems and lyrics as a young man that I was beyond eager to become a singer in a band.  I went for it.  By the time I was 26 I was desperate for it.  At the age of 26 my best friend and I had finally found and auditioned the right guys and we had ourselves a band.  Inside 17 days of meeting we had recorded a song and had it played on local radio.  True excitement.  They night we learned our song would be played we went out in his car and put the windows down telling passers by to turn on the radio.  It was silly but honest.   Our band was a tight bunch of guys.  We had a restaurant we'd always got to after most practices.  We built our own practice studio out of a shed behind my best friend's home.  We practiced three days a week for a year.  We had a couple house party gigs and the local college radio station was big on is.  One DJ interviewed us three times and played one of our house parties live over the air.  I interviewed after at the station too... We eventually played out doing the county fair and many local bars.  I won't go into why we broke up and how, but let me tell you.  The hurt was more serious than any woman can ever do.  I can't begin to explain it.  The withdraw you feel is overwhelming.  So much worth having, so much good, and your future... it's gone.  Keeping five guys on the same vision and goal is not easy.  But I went after my dream. 

And you should know... that taught me to think it was never too late.  I then decided to try out for a semi-pro football team. I was working full time and this was a big deal knowing I could get hurt and cost me my job.  I drove to Philly most days after work.  I bought shoulder pads way to big for me but they were cheap.  I made the team.   We drove to Baltimore and the surrounding areas to play.   One day with no fans around... there are never any fans, I was in a safety position watching a play develop heading around the opposite side.  I had a good angle to view it.   A player goes down in a tackle and our short safety met there half-back in a crush.  When he went to stand up his leg was broken and his foot was turned around backwards.  It was dangling like on a rubber band.  He somehow didn't realize his pain and two guys caught him fast.  "Don't look down!" they yelled.  I remember this vividly to this day.  I see it in my mind and I hear the words.  They carried him to the bench and an ambulance was there soon after to take him away.  At our next practice I turn to our team owner and ask him..."Hey... our team insurance covered his injury right?" He answered calmly, "No.  You guys need your own insurance for that."  I quit the team on the spot.  Why?  At the time it was on principal.  He swore the teams health insurance protected us in games.   Now I learned it was a lie.  I wondered what else was a lie and what risks I was at.  But after I quit I realized so much more.  It wasn't some stepping stone to the pros.   My time and chance to make it for real in football had come and gone in high-school.   I was glad for the experience and decided I needed to grow up.

After this my brother died a tragic death.  Once again I made another change in my life.  Everything about my life came into question.  My brother drove me in life.  He was a genius but he became a drug addict as he was a product of the 70's culture and I no longer looked up to him.  I did however love him and despite him being 10 years older than me, he was all I had.  Now he was gone. 

What was there left for me in life?  I mean goals.   While I became darker (I often quoted Bogart's line from Casablanca: "I'm not fighting for anything in, I'm the only cause I'm interested in") and more serious, I was never wanting to cash it in.   You see, that is what by brother did.  And what he did with his life gave me serious pause.  I knew if I married one day, my wife would never meet him.  If I had children, they'd never know him.  I was sad for a long time. I miss him to this day.  I think of the days and night leading up to his death and I still feel as if I could have done enough to stop him.  I carry that guilt to this day. 

So much made me who I am.  My experiences and challenges.  Those I met, those I did not. 

The one thing I learned in life was that when my son was born I had my most important job ever.  That of a father.  I won't go into details but my first son's mother didn't even let me see him when he was born up to his first month.  The day I held him in my arms I swore I'd never be apart from him.  I mean that.  I'm not writing this for show.  I mean it.  I fought to be his father.  I had to.   And every father or mother that has to fight for time with their child values it beyond anything they have.   There is nothing I've been better at than being a father and a husband.   I've been loyal and dedicated.  I've been strong yet gentle guiding hand for my children.  You can just imagine the wisdom I am imparting on them now.  I even offer it to the little league team I coach.  "If you never quit, you get there."  From the small and large mistakes in my life I hope to help others. 

Now I'm divorced and I should tell you.   One of those dreams when I was laying in my bed at 12 gazing at the starry sky over those tree tops was to find a best friend for life.  My parents have been married now over 50 years.  I could have married a slew of women, some with rich fathers... some that had bodies from heaven, some with promise beyond what I could imagine but as a God fearing man I insisted they be God fearing women or I'd keep looking.    When my brother died I denied my interest and married a woman that didn't believe in God.   I compromised my values.  I compromised.

Now I sit here thinking of all the things in my life that led up to now.  I've learned that idealism is a lost art and that we must all learn to compromise.  The question is how far?  I think of who I am and am I worth something to any woman if I'm to marry again?  That is another story a bit too private to discuss. But I've learned and known for some time now since first hearing Justin Currie's words... "Look into the mirror do you recognize someone, is it who you always thought you would become when you were young?"   I've learned that  I am proud of who I am now. I'm older now knowing that mirror doesn't lie.  I stare at my eyes and think back to when I was a young boy that wanted to find a loving woman for life; to live out my dreams with a large family, to become a football player and singer...   I see myself on the beach at 17watching the sun come up with my friends after staying up all night... I am still that boy inside a man.

So I ask you now.  Look at your own life.  Is it something you can be proud of?  Did you waste it?  Do you have unfinished business? 

If it is not too late... go out there and live your life to its fullest.  You can still become who you wanted to become when you were young.