99% of Toms

Somewhere along this winding road of life, I started priding myself in being different. Call it an inherently Fourish quality, but where once my differences with others defeated me — from my demeanor to desires to sexuality — I’ve learned to let them empower me.

My greatest difference with society, the one that far supersedes who I’m attracted to, is this desire to leap — and keep leaping — with a courage most don’t possess. A so-called “courage” that some, many, most might even call foolish.

Gosh, I come alive when someone thinks I’m crazy. Expects me to behave a certain way, the “normal” way, to zig with the rest, as I zag. I kinda crave it, actually.

I don’t much care to be different in my dress, though I am now experimenting with some (conservative) hats and necklaces. Still no tattoos or piercings.

Don’t care to be all that different in my hobbies, sticking with writing and hiking having now drunk the Kool-Aid of CrossFit. No butterfly wing collections yet.

But when it comes to living life — living life fully, pooling beyond the brim — for sure, I want to be different. I want to live differently than 99% of humanity.

When I visited the Grand Canyon five years ago, park rangers told me that 99% of Canyon visitors remain at the top, ooh‘ing and ahh‘ing along the rim. Only 1% venture down into the Canyon and camp out within its craggy borders.

Naturally, I hiked into the depths. All the way to the Canyon floor. The views were glorious, ever shifting with each bend and drop in the path, each step more tantalizing than the last because most of humanity would never trod there, never see such wonders.

The 1%. Living differently. Is there any other way??

There’s a distinction to be made, of course, between epic living and reckless living. I understand that.

I SAID I UNDERSTAND.

And I can’t quite prove this, but I have a sneaking suspicion that I have a superpower in this area. The superpower of distinction: knowing when to roll the dice and leap, and when to wait and play it safe.

Starting with a cross-country move to California nearly a decade ago, I’ve made some bold moves. And while said moves have brought challenges and even failures, I also know every huge decision has made me more the man I am today. The Tom I am today.

I wouldn’t be today’s Tom without any of these here-goes-nothing leaps:

2010. Moving to California. Learning to exchange one discomfort for another, trading out a stale bedroom in my parents’ house for some fresh air out West.

2011. Working for a summer ministry program. Learning to operate in vulnerable community for the first time, serving kids and community members, escaping the vortex of self.

2012. Working at a Christian boys camp. Testing the waters of full-on masculinity, unleashing my own masculinity as an adult, even letting it flourish.

2012. Moving back to California. Again. Trusting God to find new work and new living quarters, and above all, leaning into a new community He’d given me. By far the most I’d ever had to trust Him with the unknown.

2013. Writing my first book of memoirs and officially coming out to the world. Trading out authenticity with never being able to take back “normalcy.”

2014. Hitting the road for 9 months and 26,000+ miles around North America. Meeting many of my readers for the first time as I trusted God to point the way to a new home. Somehow.

2017. Quitting my job to jump full-time into YOB. Despite unpredictable cash flow and still having debt to my name. But with more of an open calendar to do more of what I’ve been put on this planet to do: tell stories. And connect them with others.

2019. And finally, hitting the road. Again. This time for 3 (or longer?) months. Because as much as I’ve criss-crossed this continent, there’s always more. More to embrace externally. And even more internally.

I don’t list all these moments out of pride, but out of necessary remembrance. I need to remember my boldness in times of doubt, weakness, and endless wa/ondering. Times like now.

Here in the tail-end of this #RunningOut road trip, I find myself facing another potential crux in the road, another bold move, a point of no return, faced with the prospect of doing what 99% of humanity would do, or taking the leap. Doing what most would dare not.

For my different-desiring heart, it’s a no-brainer. I want to be different, and different demands that I comply.

But there are also other parts of my heart. Some redeeming, and others very much flawed. Some maturity, some wisdom, some laziness, and a lot of fear.

The longer I’ve wandered this summer, the more I’ve caught myself feeling over it all. The repetitive fill-ups for gas, the occasional sleeping in my car, brushing my teeth over rest area sinks as someone poops behind me.

I wish to be different than 99% of humanity, yes, but lately I’ve pondered a new concept: what about being different than 99% of Toms?

If 99 versions of me would choose to do one thing, do I simply follow along, or do I dare counter with the 1%?

I’ve grown entranced, looking at life this way. I kinda believe in multiverses, or at least in the idea of them, of various versions of ourselves doing similar and dissimilar things from the us’es of this universe, day in and day out, moment in and moment out.

What are these 99 other versions of me generally prone to do because of my place in this world, and what can/should I learn to do that comes unnaturally to me, even if they come more naturally to others?

In other words, can I do something, “bold” or otherwise, simply because it’s good for me? Because it makes me come alive? Even if 99% of humanity agrees?

If 99 versions of me wander, but 1 remains home, remains stable, do I not lean into this different?

If 99 versions of me remain addicted to certain temptations, patterns, and proclivities, but 1 does the brutal work of reorienting, do I not lean into this different?

If 99 versions of me repeat the same mistakes, but 1 finally learns from them, even passes along this wisdom to others, do I not lean into this different?

I’ve long been chided for being different. From childhood into adulthood. I’ve (mostly) learned to take it in stride these days.

I am different. Hell yeah, I am. I wouldn’t have this Tom any other way.

Ah, but what if I could have this Tom another way? A different way? What if I diverged from the paths 99% of all the other Toms would take and follow the 1%? Descending the narrow road into canyons and riding rivers to a faraway sunset that 99 other Toms never dreamt of seeing?

What bold new colors would befall this Tom; what a bold new Tom that would be.