There have been 8,204,530,048 people on this planet since Monday, February 10th. 2025. In the USA, there are 346,558,426. In Maryland, there are more than six million. The student body of FCPS is nearly 183,000. If you were one in a million, there are 8,000 exactly like you.

So starting off saying that I am anything special would be an inaccurate way to begin. So how about we start with the unspectacular details?

I am human, American born, and the oldest of six kids. I’ve spent all my life in one county. I like animals, books, and chocolate. 

We don’t know each other, but you might know someone like me. That someone might even be you

When I was younger, like most people at some point between the ages of nine and nineteen, I forgot how to laugh over arbitrary problems, which had managed to turn into life draining calamity. I don’t particularly know why we have such awful phases, as I have very little praise for the time, but I can say for sure that there is a relief when you come out of it.

I really do love to laugh, despite what my seventh-grade self thought. It’s how I deal with just about everything from tragedy to crack-headed joke, to awkward silence. One of the side effects of such a habit is an incredibly dark sense of humor.  

My mother and I share this, bouncing off jokes about deceased relatives with reckless abandon while wondering if anyone is questioning what the “dead baby Cards Against Humanity Card” is supposed to mean.

I learned my humor, I think, because of my talent (perhaps we share it) of anxiety. When any sort of problem is inflicted upon my home, I could easily begin thinking up the worst thing that could happen. It took me a great deal of time to take control over my spiralling, which to be perfectly honest, I didn’t really do. When someone is ill, or overly stressed, I get busy. When I was little, my mother was constantly overworked, and my biological father brought nothing but more stress to the household, so this really came in handy.

Just recently, my dad commented that I was weirdly productive when he and my Mom were stressed. I never move with more purpose, or cheerfulness than when I feel as if my world is burning. 

As I rush to keep myself distracted cleaning, organizing, and bossing (much to my little siblings’ displeasure), I end up feeling productive, and excited. This isn’t so bad, I tell myself. If only everyone else thought the same thing.

And that’s how I found my love for laughter. When I was at my highest, I could act an optimistic fool, and get a laugh out of the others feeling down. Seeing them cheer up, even just a bit, is one of the best gifts anyone could ever give me, and I didnt realize it until now. My weird, volume-control-challenged self can be used for good, bringing smiles to others as best as I can.

When I was little, I really despised all the bad things that happened. All I could see were those miserable things, and it made me hate so much, barely seeing a point in anything if the world was so terrible, but as I grew up, and realized what I could do for people, I realized I was terribly lucky. I haven’t suffered all that much in life, and anytime I do, I am able to move past it quickly, only learning from the bad situation. 

My little brother recently made a comment, while watching beautiful sunbeams in the car. “You can’t really see how pretty they are when you are in them, can you?

I guess blessings are like that too, and the main difference between a good life, and a bad one is whether or not you try to see how good things really are.