I finally made it back home by midnight. I was glad my back-to-back weekends to New York were over. The money I made would allow me to cut back and be a high school student. I only had a couple of shoots coming up. There was one with Ford and Adrienne. I also was going to England for spring break and doing a shoot for Range Sports. That one should be fun.
Chapter 11 – Doing vs. Wanting
Monday February 3
I HAD BEEN FEELING off all day Monday. I think the reality of life in New York finally sank in. That life had nothing to do with how I lived or wanted to live. The drugs and violence were not a part of my existence. The twins had been hurt. They came close to something truly awful happening. When I got home from school, I called Tami, and when she got onto the video chat she could tell something was wrong.
“Is it your mom?” she asked.
“No, actually she’s coming home tomorrow.”
“That’s great news. I bet you can’t wait.”
“It’s really good news,” I said. “I need to bounce something off of you.”
“Sure, what is it?”
“I’m thinking about quitting modeling.”
“Why, what happened?”
I told her about the weekend. She just listened.
“Do you know what really made me think of this? I think it’s changing me. I was pushing all weekend to make more money. I worked the party Friday night with that one goal in mind. Then I pushed to do more jobs on Sunday. I made more in one weekend than my parents make in a year. When I first started this, it wasn’t about making big bucks. It was about getting a part-time job that would help the family out.
“Now I’m jetting around, working like crazy to get noticed. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had a ton of fun, and have met some amazing people. However, this business grinds people up and spits them out. I saw more drugs being used this weekend than I’ve seen in all my life. And believe me, this time last year, I saw a lot of drugs, but it was mostly pot. There were people doing stuff that I have no idea what they were doing. The sad part was that it was right out in the open, and nobody cared.
“I’m scared that I’ll lose what makes me, me. Tell me, when did I ever care what I wore or what my hair looked like?”
Tami shook her head.
“I hear you, but I also know you. What you’ve never realized is that you attract this craziness. You’re never going to be normal. People are always going to know who you are and be attracted to you. You have to accept that. That’s just a part of being you.
“What’s not a part of you is the whole New York fashion lifestyle. You’re a Midwestern small-town boy at heart. I know you like working with Mr. Hill. I also know you’ve become good friends with Sandy and Devin Range. I think you just got sucked into the New York scene,” Tami consoled me.
“What should I do?”
“You’re such a ‘stupid boy,’” she scolded me. “Stop going to New York. Slow down. Focus on high school and playing sports. Hell, take some real girls out. Quit chasing models. Come visit me and run rampant through the female population here at Wesleyan. I don’t know. Quit taking everything so seriously. Pull out your goals and reread them. You’re a smart boy, figure it out.”
I smirked.
“I might have to change the goal of being financially comfortable. Being rich might be nice.”
“I’m going to tell you a secret, David: I know what makes you different from other people. I’ve watched you since we first met. You’re a ‘doer,’ not a ‘wanter.’ Okay, ‘wanter’ is probably not a real word.
“Most people want things. You ask them and they’ll tell you that they want to be successful, happy, secure, and more. But they don’t do what’s needed to make those wants happen.”
I gave her a confused look.
“Let me see if I can help you understand. Let’s talk football since you’re a dumb jock,” she said, winking at me. “You’re a freshman who never played a down of football before the year started. We all found out that you were good after your first JV game. Are you with me so far?”
“Yes.”
“On a lark, you become the backup quarterback. You take the scout team and run up and down the field on the number one defense. Then Magic got hurt while you were getting your butts handed to you. You come in and almost win the game. That same weekend, you go to Kentucky and impress them enough that they offer you a scholarship. Do you know how many freshmen they’ve offered? One.”
I didn’t know that.
“Then they bring in a coach to help you. This all falls into the lucky or unbelievable realm, to this point. However, this is where you excel. You bore down and did the work needed. No one else on that team put in more effort than you did. You figured out what had to be done and you did it. No one can take that away from you. No one else was getting up early to run drills. During school hours, you were doing strength, conditioning, and still getting straight ‘A’s. You were going to practice with everyone else, playing the games, and on weekends working out and getting more conditioning and practice in.
“You put your life on hold. You were doing what others wanted to do. You do that in every aspect of your life. You don’t just want. You figure it out and you do it. You’ve always been that way. Remember when you wanted me to play Little League with you? I wanted to, but I let things stop me. I gave you a bullshit excuse that I didn’t want to be the only girl. Moreover, I told you that girls didn’t play Little League. You made it happen. You got Eve to agree to play. Then you worked the system to get us in.”
“But my dad helped.”
“Don’t you get it? I never said you have to do it all alone. You find the right people and let them do their job. You went to your dad and told him what needed to be done. Your dad’s a doer, too. He took your vision and made it happen. The key is it would never have happened without you doing.
“You did the same with the team you put together for recruiting. You realized you needed help,” Tami said.
I rolled my eyes at her.
“Look at me!” That caught my attention.
“I’m not joking around here. Do you know when you’ll be truly unstoppable? That’ll happen when you make a conscious decision to share your vision with a team of like-minded people. When you take all of us wanters and show us how to be doers.”
She took a deep breath.
“So, should you stop modeling? Absolutely not,” she told me. “Accept that you’ll do things others just wish they could. Accept that you can do anything you set your mind to. Accept that you’re special. Quit being a whiny-ass and accept that what happened this weekend was not your fault. You weren’t even there, for God’s sake.
“I commend you for recognizing that New York isn’t your kind of town. Nevertheless, don’t condemn the whole town because the fashion industry has some problems. You made some good friends in Adrienne and Tyler. They have your back. Find a way to make it work. I know you can.
“Something else you need to do is take another look at your goals. Don’t put limitations on what you can accomplish. That is what people that want do to justify why they aren’t doing. I want you to be filthy rich. Someday I’m marrying you. I think I could have expensive tastes. So get cracking. You don’t want to lose me to some rich plastic surgeon.”
“Well, as long as it’s for you, I think I could be rich.”
“See, you just need the proper motivation. Now I’m done yelling at you. I want some scoop.”
“Come on, you know everything. What scoop could I have?”
I was such a retard. My brother told me to keep my mouth shut.