  I can remember vividly a time in my life when I didn’t hate myself. I was three years old and had just started the preschool my brother already attended. Riley had been granted golden child status by a deity while he was still doing back-flips in embryonic fluid and, at age four, was the king of the jungle gym set. When I arrived, unkempt and constantly spilling juices down my shirt, I was given great leniencies because I was his brother. I was not aware of all the implications, and certainly lacked the cognitive prowess to suspect a pattern might be starting, The only things that mattered were that the other kids would talk to me and I got one of the good nap mats that didn’t smell like bleached urine. I was invited to birthday parties, my name occasionally on an invitation separate from my brother’s, and received a kiss on the cheek from an older girl with blond curls and a lazy eye. I peaked at three. Puberty was when the obvious differences between my brother and I became apparent.
Riley excelled academically and with his social life, starting a relationship in the sixth grade with Sarah Thompson that would last until after high school graduation, surely a record of some sort. I threw myself obsessively, devotedly, into marijuana and a masturbation habit that would elicit an awkward speech from my father on the turnpike. The problem my parents had with raising me was that I wasn’t ever drowning in the riptides of adolescence.
I had two good friends, never failed any classes, and had the occasional dates with girls with psychological problems. I wasn’t on the path to having a mug shot on America’s Most Wanted, but I was nowhere near Riley’s level. Quite surprisingly, it was discovered when I was fifteen that I had a talent for painting. I had signed up for art because the shop teacher, with seven total fingers, made me slightly nervous.
We were assigned the task of painting a work based upon a family photo of our choice. I had selected one that included the four units of our nuclear, gathered together on the front porch of our house, although it looked like two pictures stuck together. On one side was my mother, smiling broadly under an unfortunate straw hat, her hands on the shoulders of white haired toddler Riley, who managed the trifecta of smiling, not blinking, and looking at the actual camera. Beside this attractive pair stood my father, who at the time of the camera flash appeared to have been inspecting the quality of the roofing. In his arms, swathed in a diaper and terrycloth, is the baby version of myself, a rotund pink creature with its neck at an unusual angle and drool dripping from its mouth.
I’m less aware of its artistic value then its psychological, but Ms. Hoffman asks me to stay after class to discuss my work. I’m prepared for the standard “I know you could do better, if you really tried. Couldn’t you just try a little harder?” speech, with the hollow answer always being “ I will try, I promise.” The fact that I have done something well, to the point of it deserving discussion, is a hard for me to grasp onto immediately.
“ Would you mind if I called Mr. Davis in her to look at it?” She asked, referring to the principal. I’m still trying to figure out if this is some elaborate form of entrapment, but can’t imagine what the purpose of it would be. I give permission because it buys me time to evaluate what is happening. I had never picked up a paint brush before that semester. It seemed highly unlikely that I had some sort of latent talent. I lived in latency. I was familiar with the territory. I had not seen talent lurking about. There must be some mistake. 
