I wanted to start off this post by thanking everyone for their amazing support over the past week! Getting a blog and podcast up and running is something I’ve wanted to do for a while now, and I’m very excited for what’s to come.
Something I’ve wanted to share with you all is where the blog name Against All Odds comes from. I did not choose this name by accident, it has a deep connection to my childhood, and has gone on to unintentionally foreshadow the circumstances I have faced with many of the things that I have accomplished.
In 1st grade, my teacher Mrs. Livingston, gave an assignment to all of the parents of the students in her class: Create a unique item that represents your child. My parents created a book titled Against All Odds. Handwritten and illustrated by both of them, the book talks about myself growing up with a passion and love for NASCAR and Jeff Gordon, and my dream to become a professional NASCAR driver when I grow up. Shake and bake!.
The one thing that every race car driver needs, fictional or non-fictional, is a driver’s license and a car. In the book, my parents predicted that I would be driving my dream car by 2012: A yellow 2012 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, remember those? This was the same model car that Jeff Gordon drove for the majority of his career (I wanted to drive the closest thing to his race car even on the street).
The book concludes with me signing a contract with Hendrick Motorsports, driving the #27 car, and AGAINST ALL ODDS, becoming a NASCAR Champion.
The path to getting behind the wheel of a car that my parents dreamt of for me in this book may now be considered a pure work of fiction, but to them, they weren’t writing a comic book or a children’s fiction novel, they were indeed writing what they believed could be possible for me. I’ve had this book for around 17 years, and only recently did I realize that not once in the book did they mention that I have Cerebral Palsy. They never put my disability in front of anything that I set out to accomplish, fiction or not. They have certainly instilled me with the same mindset, that I, or anyone for that matter, can accomplish anything we put our minds to, no matter the odds.
In the real 2012, I did get behind the wheel of a car for the very first time, but not before overcoming what I thought of back then as insurmountable odds to legally be allowed to drive a car. What I went through to get my drivers license however, involved numerous bumps in the road that could have never saw coming (no pun intended). For my first podcast episode, I am going to discuss the journey that was AGAINST ALL ODDS, obtaining my drivers licence. First podcast episode coming very soon. Stay tuned.