It's Not Hard to Be Great, Unless You're Not...

I remember when I was 10 or 11.  I played Little League Baseball for the Cubs in LaSalle.  I  had broken my arm during my first year and then my next year I got to play 3rd base.  Actually, I cannot remember if it was next year or the year after.  I was a pretty good 3rd baseman.  My coach had me batting leadoff.  I have no idea what my batting average was, but I always seemed to get my name in the paper and let's be honest, that's what it was all about.
I really thought that I could be a great baseball player.  Then one day, it all stopped.  I couldn't hit or field.  I became indecisive and then it happened.  I became that kid.  The one who played right field for 2 innings and got one at bat.  The one whose parents sometimes dropped him off and came back to pick him up.  The one who the team hoped they never had to depend on. 
What was it?  How could someone go from borderline allstar to worst player on the team?  I couldn't see.  In one summer, between 5th and 6th grade my eyesight went from perfect to perfectly awful.  My parents did what any good parents would do and bought me glasses to correct the problem.  Well, these glasses were the worst I had seen.  They had a brown tint to them, which now reminds me of the smoker's lounge or something similiar.  Even though no one said anything to me, I was sure that they looked at me like I was a dork.  So, I had no choice.  I would rather not see anything than to see perfectly and risk getting picked on.

That's the funny thing about being young and impressionable.  I wanted to do anything to fit in and not get picked on.  It seemed like these glasses took away everything I liked about myself.  That year in Little League, when I could hit anything in sight was probably the last time I was good at anything in competitive sports.  After that, I was the kid who was picked last, made fun of and avoided.  Junior High was the worst for me.  A lot of the people I went to school with I wouldn't even want to talk to now.  High School got a little better.  But, when you're insecure things tend to represent worst case scenarios.  By the time I went to college, I started to come out of my shell a little and the rest is history.