The last week or so has been rough for me, and my mind has been wandering a lot. I find sometimes when you’re going through things, it helps to think back to times of previous triumph, so today I’d like to share this odd, but weirdly inspiring, story from when I was ten. When I was a kid, I was extremely shy. I really didn’t have much to do with the other kids in my class. However, I made good grades, probably the best in my class at one point in time, so naturally, kids wanted to team up with me on projects. I also think some were just intrigued by my quiet, mysterious, somewhat spooky way. So, although I didn’t really have friends, per se, I had what would probably be described today as frenemies. Two such girls were a pair of BFFs named Tara and Amanda. Amanda was someone I had known since kindergarten. She usually tended to drift more toward the “friend” side, until she met Tara, a girl who moved to our school district in fourth grade and had clearly modeled her entire persona...