My drawing ended up crumpled in the garage trash, and I learned the first of many painful lessons about where I stood in the family hierarchy. The pattern repeated endlessly throughout my childhood. When I was ten, I won the regional wrestling tournament in my weight class after months of brutal training.
I’d dominated kids who outweighed me by twenty pounds, and I came home dragging a trophy nearly as big as I was, my face split in a grin that hurt my cheeks. My father looked at it, looked at me, and said with absolutely no warmth: “Good job. Don’t let it go to your head.”
That was it.
No celebration. No pride in his voice. Just a warning not to think too highly of myself.
But when Connor made JV basketball as a sophomore—which literally half the school accomplished—they threw him a celebration dinner at a steakhouse, complete with a cake and presents. I sat at that table, fourteen years old, watching them fawn over mediocrity while my actual achievement gathered dust in my bedroom. Connor figured out early that he could get away with anything.
