Life

  Prologue

                It was a cold, hard winter. John Donelson was traveling down the Holston River with his family on a forty-foot flatboat seeking a home that hadn't been built yet. Over 1,000 miles of river later, he arrived to found the city now known as Nashville, Tennessee. Little did he know, his daughter Rachel would someday marry Andrew Jackson, who would eventually become the seventh President of the United States, beating John Quincy Adams.

A few years before Jackson was President, a young David "Davy" Crockett was pursuing a position in the House of Representatives. A letter of his discussing his opposition to the policies of Adams and his intention to run was published, making him quite favorable to the public. He won that election in 1827 and remained in office until 1835. When he lost that election, he made the famous remark, "I told the people of my district that I would serve them as faithfully as I had done; but if not, they might go to hell, and I would go to Texas," and to Texas he went.

It was early January, 1836, when he had arrived. The current political state of the land was in chaos; the rights of the Texan settlers were being robbed from them. From voting laws to strict curfews, treatment of the Mexican government to Texas was anything but humane. Some historians argue that the Texas Revolution was all about slavery and that Texas was in the wrong, fighting only to keep their slaves, but they lack consideration for the fact that Texas was the only place in Mexico that slavery had been abolished. Mexico did not abolish slavery because it was right to, but rather, because it would limit the power of the Texans compared to themselves. Slavery wasn't abolished in the rest of Mexico until 1837, after the Texas Revolution was already over.

By February 8, Crockett had arrived at the Alamo in San Antonio de Béxar. The Alamo was an old Roman Catholic mission being used as a fort. Although the Alamo had been selected for its strategic location, it was not originally intended for battle. The original intention was to remove all the artillery from the Alamo, but that didn't happen because they lacked the resources to relocate it. There were only 60 troops to arrive between Colonel James Bowie and Commander William B. Travis. The rest of the nearly 200 people stationed there were volunteers, women, and children.

By the late afternoon of the 23rd, approximately 1,500 Mexican troops had arrived in Béxar. When Santa Anna raised a flag to indicate no quarter, Travis ordered cannon fire. By the decision of Bowie, they each sent a representative to discuss an honorable surrender. When word soon came back that any surrender would be unconditional, cannon fire resumed. Over the course of the first week, Mexican artillery had been inching closer and closer to the walls of the fort while maintaining constant fire. Texan forces attempted to match it, reusing many of the Mexican cannonballs. During this part of the siege, Bowie and several others had fallen ill, significantly reducing manpower and putting Travis alone in charge of the garrison.

As soon as word of the siege was out, reinforcements were sent from Gonzales under Colonel James Fannin; however, for reasons that are unknown, the reinforcements never arrived. On March 6, Santa Anna's forces were approaching the building for an assault. Travis supposedly drew a line in the sand with his sword, telling everyone who is willing to die defending the Alamo to stand on his side and those who wish to flee as cowards to stand on the other. Only one man, Moses Rose, chose to run. He was a Frenchman quoted to say, "I came to America to live, not to die."

In the early morning of the 6th, the Mexican army initiated a full-on attack. They were many in number, but with Mexican friendly-fire and Texan cannons full of scrap metal, they suffered great losses. Eventually the Mexican soldiers attempted to place ladders on the face of the mission, and Texans were forced to lean over the wall to stop them. During this part of the battle, Travis was shot and was said to have killed a Mexican officer with his sword just before he died. In the third attack that day, the Mexican army managed to take control of the cannon and made for the barracks and chapel. Just outside, Crockett and a few others, running out time to reload, resorted to using their rifles as clubs. They were all soon killed. When the Mexican Army made it inside the chapel, they quickly killed everyone but six who surrendered, and even they were executed when they were taken outside. Bowie was likely killed in bed.

After every Texan was dead, Mexican troops were still firing, harming and killing some of their own. The brutality shown at the Alamo was catastrophic, inspiring Texans outside of the battle to fight in greater numbers. Using the cry "Remember the Alamo," Texan forces claimed victory at the Battle of San Jacinto on April 21. While Texas did declare its independence on March 2, it didn't earn it until that day in April.

Years later, Jesse James would grow to become one of America's most notorious outlaws, robbing banks and trains with his gang across the Midwest after the Civil War. Their exploits captured the eye of the public, turning James into a folk hero of sorts, celebrated for his audacity and defiance against authority. Jesse James was also known for his love of horses, such as Stonewall, one of his favorites, named after Andrew Jackson. James had a variety of methods for acquiring horses, but there was one particular horse salesman that matters to this story: Levi Shugart. Obviously, Shugart made an impact on the world, but selling horses to Jesse James was the least of it. He is the namesake of Levi James Henson.

The Beginning

                     In April of 2006, in Austin, Texas, I emerged from the darkness. I spent my early childhood living in apartments in Austin. From what I can remember, my dad worked at Walmart and played in a metal band called "Tyndale's Pyre". My mom was briefly employed at H-E-B, but for the majority of my childhood she stayed at home. During the day, my brother and I always did pushups with our dad, and he taught us kickboxing until it worried our mom that we would hurt each other. The three of us would often go on walks in the woods behind our apartment building. Every time, the woods were smaller and there were more trees marked for destruction. Condos and shopping centers were clearly more important to city developers than the beauty of nature. We had fun pretending to blow up new constructions with "bombs" that were sticks and rocks, but it really was sad seeing the pretty parts of my hometown disappear. Time that wasn't spent outside, visiting family, or exercising was spent playing video games or taking advantage of my half-asleep parents who were in the middle of naps. They couldn't tell us no in that state, resulting in some extra game time and the complete disassembly of my bed. Back then, I pronounced my l's and r's as w's. This was an issue for years until my older brother's nightly coaching sessions started paying off. He had me say phrases like "Walruses walking on the railroad". After we were put to bed we told stories, both true and made up. We played alphabet games, where we would strain ourselves to the point of headaches thinking of everything imaginable in a given theme for each letter. We had pun wars, where we went back and forth for as long as we could throwing puns at each other within a certain topic. We played the "why game", where the "whyer" asked "why" no matter what the other person said as they genuinely tried to explain concepts as deeply as possible. We copied each other to the point of annoyance when we'd pick a "copper" (copier). We also built forts, played with stuffed animals, and did pushups. A favorite of mine was watching whatever our parents had on TV after hours through the reflection of picture frames in the hallway. A lot of these activities would be repeated until high school, and more were picked up along the way. I was also a regular sleepwalker, but that problem mysteriously went away when we moved.

As a kid, I was told that I could be whatever I wanted, but I was always encouraged to focus on a STEM career. From an early age I aspired to be a biologist or maybe some kind of doctor. I was sometimes pushed towards marine biology, but I could never get behind it. After reading the second A Series of Unfortunate Events book by Lemony Snicket, I wanted to be a herpetologist. Over the years these aspirations have changed from botany to the army to microbiology to quantum physics to neuroscience to biochemistry, and for a brief period, the President of the United States. It took me a very long time to decide my future.

My education started in preschool. I was very shy and obedient in school despite being very bold and perhaps devious otherwise. At a Halloween party once, I was dressed as Indiana Jones. I WAS Indiana Jones. When another kid stole my brother's sword and wouldn't give it back, I punched him right in the gut and took it from him. At school I was completely different. I spoke to nobody, I never acted out, and I treated the rules like the ten commandments. In the hallways, I was the only kid who actually did the duck pose, with my cheeks puffed out and my hands behind my back. My strict attitude led the teacher to believe that I was abused at home, which was entirely false. My brother and I rarely got in trouble anyway. We were troublemakers, but we weren't bad kids. We didn't usually break many rules. We would just try to find loopholes, or we would cause trouble by simply not knowing better. With that said, our dad would oftentimes crack his belt to intimidate us when we were in trouble, but he never actually hit anybody with it.

          After my second-grade year, we moved from Austin to Lexington, Texas. Lexington was a small town with a population just over 1,000, and it will always be one of my favorite places. The newspaper was full of stories about lawn chair thieves and cows shot by paintball guns. Bulls would always escape from the auction house and run down the roads, wild boars would roam the plains, parents would come through school pickup lines on horses or pulling cattle trailers, and the tornado siren would go off every day at noon. The elementary school also had a nice chess club. Despite the extra drive, I still saw my grandparents in Austin and Johnson City regularly. Once on my maternal grandparents' property, I shook hands with Willie Nelson. In late 2015, my younger sister was born. Not long after her birth, my parents were separated, and my dad was staying with his parents, where we ended up spending a whole lot more time. Unfortunately, before my sister was four months old, our mother passed away in a car accident. Only a few months after this tragic event, she started speaking full sentences. It was very out of the blue, because she wasn't even saying very many single words by this point. Around this time, our dad started dating my now stepmom.

          That summer we moved to Kyle, Texas, and my soon to be stepmom moved in with us. In Kyle, we routinely hiked at local parks and went on walks in the neighborhood. The entire time we lived in Kyle, my brother and I would stay up way later than we should have reading books. I don't know how many kids get in trouble for reading, but I was one of them. My school was visible from the house, making transportation very easy except for when a pitbull was loose in the road. Being in walking distance of the school made it easier for me to join clubs, so I ran for SGA President that year. The teachers gave us a strict rule not to give anything out to anybody: no pins, no shirts, no treats, no necklaces, etc. The girl who ended up winning threw out a bunch of free necklaces after her speech. I guess it wasn't so strict after all. Nevertheless, my peers did choose me as class representative, so I still attended all SGA meetings and acted as a messenger to classes about upcoming events. That summer of 2017, my family went on a trip to Knoxville, Tennessee, to witness the total solar eclipse. My dad proposed to my stepmom on this trip, and she said yes. When we returned, it was just after a bunch of hurricanes. The plain city streets of Texas smelled and were covered in trash. It was not a welcoming experience. We all wished we were still in Tennessee, but life went on for another year in Texas.

          Before school started, I went to band tryouts because my brother was in band. I was given a form in the hallway outside of the band room in which I was supposed to select three instruments that I would like to try. My first choice was baritone because that's what my brother played, my second choice was tuba because it seemed like the next best thing, and then I didn't know what to choose. I asked my brother what I should pick, and he said, "I don't know, maybe trumpet," so trumpet I wrote. I then proceeded into the band room to meet Mr. Benny J. Sayger, my future band director. He presented me with a baritone but told me first to buzz with just my lips. I tried it, then he took off the mouthpiece and had me buzz directly into it. When I struggled to get a sound, he pulled out a trumpet instead. He had me again buzz without a mouthpiece, then with. I was able to produce a sound on the trumpet mouthpiece, so he put the full instrument together, and I produced another sound. He then sent us to the next room to purchase a trumpet. My dad set up a payment plan and we went on our way. All instruments were set to arrive just after school had started. 

          In 6th grade I was in both choir and band. I was in band because of my brother, and I decided to do choir because it felt related. Outside of my music classes, I didn't care much about academics that year. I still did all of my work just to stay busy, but I didn't care enough to turn any of it in. I would stuff completed homework assignments into my backpack and throw them away when I got home. Eight missing math homework assignments later, I was signed up for a detention. I went and talked to my math teacher as soon as I heard. He said it was such a shame and that I seemed like I had more potential than anyone in the class. I got all of the missing homework from him and finished all of it but one sheet before the end of the day. The detention collection crew came to take me away when choir class was almost over, and I told the principal. The principal let me go home even though I was already signed up for the late bus. From that point on, I resumed actually trying in school, and in that math class, I was often regarded as the "math god." My teacher ended up asking me to switch to advanced classes for 7th grade.

          As far as transportation went for school, my brother and I rode the bus for the first half of the year until the bus program was cancelled due to a lack of funding. After that, we started walking. Walking 1.2 miles isn't bad for the average kid, but considering that we were each in band and were expected to take our instruments home every day, it was a different story. My practice habits suffered when the buses stopped running, but I still played well. Band for 6th graders was divided by instrument, meaning that I was in a class of 11 other beginner trumpet players drowning my sound out. I never played loud because I never had to, and nobody suspected that I was particularly talented even though I showed off at home all the time, knowing that I had more ability than the guy everyone thought was the best. It didn't help my reputation that I got my instrument last either. It was ordered at the same time as everyone else's, but it was delivered to the wrong box. It took Mr. Sayger 2 weeks to realize that my trumpet was in fact in the instrument closet after all.

          By the end of the school year, we had saved enough money to move to Tennessee, so that summer my parents drove up to East Tennessee and purchased a home. When they got back, we packed everything up to move and said our goodbyes. It was a long, hard journey to Tennessee, but it was such a relief to finally make it. We also got an extra long summer because Tennessee schools start later. It was then that I elected to run over a mile every single day of good weather. I quickly got into good shape, and it didn't hurt that I still did pushups on a daily basis. I also started more serious kickboxing training. That school year I was immediately recognized as the best trumpet player and the smartest student in my class, but also the quietest person. Part of it was shyness, part of it was intentional mystery. I also started studying Italian. Early that year we made a trip to Texas for my dad and stepmom's wedding. All throughout the seventh and eighth grades, I practiced trumpet almost every day in my garage. I placed 5th chair in the regional Junior Clinic in 8th grade and received multiple superior ratings at solo and ensemble.

          In March 2020, the end of my 8th grade year, the COVID-19 pandemic had arisen, throwing the world into chaos and giving me more free time than I could ever ask for. My family caught COVID a few times, and every single time I have had natural immunity, not even testing positive as a carrier. That and my introversion made me thrive. I completed all work, even though it was optional, I engaged in side projects, and I tested higher on IQ tests than ever. I enrolled in several free certified Harvard courses, such as Contract Law, Prerequisite to Law School, Biochemistry, Rhetoric, Neurology, and more. I also advanced on my studies into the Italian language and spread to other languages such as Latin, Spanish, German, and French. I also taught myself how to juggle and to solve a Rubik's cube. I have always been a fast learner, but I rarely get the time and motivation to put it into practice. The only thing I was missing while I was away was trumpet practice. I only so much as touched my trumpet when I was given digital playing assignments. I would complete the assignment and put it away until I got another. I did, however, start playing more guitar and keyboard than usual. One of the greatest outcomes of quarantine was that my dad, my brother, and I started a daily pushup contest. We started by doing around a hundred pushups a day, but I gradually increased to 300, then 400, then 500, and for months I did 500 until my brother started increasing, too. We each increased by 100 every day until we got to 1000, and we each did 1000 pushups every single day for six months.

                This carried over to when we started going to school in person again, which is when I joined Jazz Band. The complexity and style of jazz music awakened a piece of me and gave me a passion for creating music. I went from almost never practicing to practicing for at least three hours every single day. I kept that habit all summer long and was ready to go when band camp came along. Sophomore year I worked up The Carnival of Venice, a difficult concerto consisting of an intro, a theme, and four variations. This virtuosic feat will forever define the moment that I outmatched my peers. That year also marks the beginning of my highest practice streak of 1072 days. Every year starting sophomore year, I made Jazz Clinic and Senior Clinic. I didn't need these clinics to stay motivated or learn skills, but they were still good experiences. In the middle of my junior year my dad and stepmom had a daughter. At the end of the summer before my senior year, I got a job at Pal's Sudden Service, a local fast food place focused on consistent accuracy and speed in products and engaging customer service that delights customers and makes them want to come back. When I hear horror stories about other fast food places, it's all disgusting health violations. At Pal's, our horror stories are maybe the power going out or a car breaking down in the drive through. It's never our fault. Senior year, I auditioned for the music departments of both East Tennessee State University and Middle Tennessee State University, both of which I was gladly accepted to. That year I got my first paid gig playing the national anthem for a homeschool graduation. High school made me love music, but my favorite class was Precalculus by far. I was one of five people in my class to pass its state challenge test. It had been a while since I felt challenged by academic classes. After my graduation, I chose to enroll in East Tennessee State University as a major in music performance.

          I strongly considered auditioning for a Marine Band position straight out of high school. I even met with a recruiter. I had all the paperwork ready, I had audition music ready, but I wasn't sure that I was ready to jump straight in. After many long talks with the recruiter and some deep thinking about my future, I started considering enlisting for the Marine Corps Reserve and skipping the music part altogether. After basic training, I would only be gone for about one whole month and one weekend out of all the other months every year. It would pay for my school and set up a dream to later join the Marine Band and use that to pay for medical school and retire to become a doctor. I was almost set, but on the phone call that decided my fate, I chose to stay out of the military and go to college first.

            In my first semester at ETSU, I marched in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. I also got into my first and hopefully last relationship and have never been happier. Throughout the semester, I studied with Dr. Brett Long and worked hard to get rid of some bad habits in the fundamentals of my trumpet technique. The progress I made as a musician was tremendous, to say the least. I greatly enjoyed my time in every ensemble, but I began questioning my choice to be a music major. I kept asking myself WHY I wanted to be a music major and why I might want to do something else. For months all I could come up with was that I chose music because I'm good at it and that's what I felt like everyone expected of me. Before high school, I didn't even listen to music. It had never been important to me until then. I wanted to do something that felt like it mattered. And I didn't want my passion for music to be killed by lack of freedom. I was always playing other people's music that other people told me to play. It was still fun, but it wasn't what I envisioned; it wasn't my dream. My dream was leading a jazz combo in clubs like in the 20's to the 60's, which isn't a very feasible way to make a living in today's world. My plan B was medicine. I wanted to be a neurologist and maybe play gigs on weekends to keep my music alive. I kept picking books on medicine from the library, studying medicine and biochemistry online, and neurology is the branch of medicine that had caught my eye the most. I didn't tell very many people about this, as it felt sensitive and important, and I still wasn't completely sure that that's what I wanted to do. I decided to stay a music major for one more semester to see if I still felt the same way. In my second semester, my drive to change majors did not falter, but rather, it grew much, much stronger. I still had fun with music, but I had horrible burnout. My practice habits suffered to the point of occasionally having to sightread my etudes in lessons. I would go a whole week without practice and I would still somehow get so many compliments in lessons and studio class about my progress, which didn't help much. It was the fourth lesson that semester that I decided to tell Dr. Long I wanted to change my major. It seemed to weigh on him at first, but he took it well and asked me to donate to the trumpets when I'm a "rich doctor". I still kept this news a secret from everyone else until the end of the year. By that point, I was officially a biology major with a music minor.

          In the present, I still work at Pal's Sudden Service, I am in a very happy relationship, and I am on track to finish undergrad as a biology major and go to med school. Soon I will be taking a class to become a CNA, where I will do good for the world all while gaining healthcare experience I'll need for my future.

To be continued...