Acknowledgments
There are so many people who have dedicated time and energy toward improving my life, over the last 15 years in particular but especially over the 35 I’ve lived.
First and foremost are my parents, Ross and Jean, who have always made my brother and me feel loved and cherished. I feel grateful that I ended up with so many of their best qualities.
Then there’s my brother Nicholas, who is truly my favorite person on the planet. My cousin Angie, who is hands-down the best roommate an aspiring writer could ever ask for. Also a fairly harsh critic, and a part-time therapist.
My lifelong friends -- Mike, Dave, Guy, Luis, Money, Jake, Joey, and Tyler. They have been my friends since elementary school and they have helped to shape me into the man I am today. All of their families have also played a large part in that.
Haley, Janice, and Alyssa, who have been my best girl friends for the last several years and have always given me such great perspective into the minds of the opposite sex when I was in need. The Conti and Nagy families, who have always empowered me to attempt great things in life without fear. Lastly, the people who helped with this project directly, John and Zac, who edited it and designed the cover, respectively.
In truth, so many people make stories like this possible. I love people, and I need people to invigorate me on a daily basis. Surely, I will forget a person that deserves to be mentioned. Over the last decade, so many amazing people came into my life. A few left earlier than I hoped, but I never forget the impact people make on my life.
I have a heart full of gratitude, appreciation, and, most of all, love, for each and every one of you.
One
Do you ever know when it will be the worst year in your life?
It was February 2009 and my mom had gone back to Michigan to celebrate her 50th birthday there with her brothers, sisters, and other family and friends. The party was on Valentine’s Day, because it was a Saturday, and I was in Tempe.
Late in the afternoon I was on my way to pick up my brother, Nicholas, at Grand Canyon University in Phoenix. I was still hung over from the night before and had also spent the afternoon drinking.
I made it one mile from the apartment before I rear-ended somebody. I had also almost rear-ended somebody else, just before the actual accident. It might have even been the same person, I don’t even really know. I smashed into the back of a car as I tried to pass them and ended up out in the intersection of Rural Road and Rio Salado Parkway in Tempe. That didn’t seem like the place to stop, though. So I continued north on Rural looking for the next chance to pull off onto a side road.
Unfortunately, that’s the Salt River bridge, which was about a quarter-mile away. When I tried to turn right, the car didn’t do so effectively because of the first accident, so I went turning into oncoming traffic before swerving left onto the sidewalk. I came to a stop by slamming into a fire hydrant and knocking it down.
I sat there for a moment then panicked. My first action was to pour out the beer I was hiding in an iced-tea can in the center console. A very destroy-the-evidence move. As if that was going to save me from all the carnage I had just caused over the last quarter-mile. I got out of the car and just sat on a wall. I waited for the police to show up.
I was trying to compose myself as a lady approached me with an aggressive combination of “Are you okay?” and “What the fuck were you doing?” The only thing I remember her asking was if I had been drinking. I said no. Shortly after that the cops showed up.
I would be arrested, then pass out in the back of the cop car, and then booked. For the entire evening, all I could think about was how was I going to tell my mother.
It came with a level of anxiety I had never experienced before.
She had lost her sister because of somebody like me, and her ex-husband had accumulated three DUIs, which no doubt affected her child support. This is the one mistake I should never have made. I was convinced she would rather be told I was suspected of shooting somebody rather than be told this information. I expected the absolute worst. Like, she might never talk to me again. Finally, about 24 hours after the accidents occurred, I grew the balls to call her.
Did I mention this would be the worst year in my life? And it had only started.
Two
My name is Stephen Polando. It is pronounced “Stefan” because “ph” always makes an “ef” sound, as I learned using Hooked on Phonics as a child. The only time “ph” ever makes a “vee” sound is when people misspell their own kids’ names in hopes of just making up some phonetic rules that do not exist. This leaves people like me to be called “Steven” every day. It is a laughable and vastly underrated social injustice.
I am 6-foot-4 and weigh an imposing 160 pounds. I have olive skin, brown hair that I brush back to the left, and waves in the front. I slouch a little so I’m rarely a full 6-4. People have told me way more than a few times that I look like James Franco. Perhaps because I squint. I know this because people also used to say I looked like Josh Hartnett, and that squint is something all three of us have in common.
The most important thing to know about me as a person is that I desperately want to make the people around me laugh. Like Robin Williams, I find the laughter of others to be a drug, and I need it. The second most important thing is that I am exceptionally kind, and I want to help people in need, as badly as I want to make them laugh.
I was born in Detroit, Michigan at 5:58 a.m. March 14, 1985, in the same hospital that Harry Houdini had died in 59 years earlier. Most of my extended family still resides in the suburbs of Detroit. Some have scattered around the country. We spent a few years in the rural town of Urbana, Ohio, during which my parents had my brother, Nicholas -- three years, six months, and six days after my birth. He doesn’t remember Ohio at all.
Our family ended up in Chandler, Arizona. The nation’s forty-eighth state has been his only real home. Nicholas is about 5-foot-10 with light brown hair and green eyes, which he is very proud of. He is shorter than me, and also a bit stockier than me, but, then again, that’s not really saying much because, who isn’t? He’s about 180 pounds with round John Lennon-like glasses. He also has a mustache, so he kind of looks like a walrus. He is a few shades whiter than I am. People rarely think we are brothers. They also consistently think he is older. He prefers Nicholas, but people shorten it to Nick anyway because nobody likes him. Just kidding, he’s actually the best character in this story.
At the time we moved to Chandler, there were about 70,000 residents. It’s a city southeast of Phoenix that was created in 1912, founded by a veterinarian by the name of Dr. A.J. Chandler. Chandler High School has iconic pillars in front and one could easily argue that, despite being one of the oldest, it is the most beautiful high school in the state. I graduated from Chandler High in 2003.
Today, Chandler has about 270,000 residents. So I got to see a small city get built up around our family as we settled in. I grew up at 1413 North Bullmoose Drive. It was a humble one-story, three-bedroom home, with a palm tree on each side of the driveway and an island of grass in the center of the front yard. We were the fourth house on a street of eight houses that looked at a large park at the center of our neighborhood. The park shared space with our elementary school. The view from our home was South Mountain to the west. It was truly picturesque and my mother often mentioned never moving from this house.
Make no mistake, Arizona is the sunset capital of the world. In large part, that’s because it gets more than 300 days of sunshine per year. With so many sunsets, you’re bound to have the best odds. It’s just simple probability.
My mom was born Jean Dembowski, the fourth of six children, in Redford, Michigan, which is about 15 miles outside Detroit. She is 5-foot-3 with light brown hair. She looks just a little bit different from all her brothers and sisters but in a picture they are all very clearly related. Her closest sister, Jan, was killed by a drunk driver on March 4, 1983, almost exactly two years before I was born. She was 21 years old. The driver was an ex-boyfriend of hers,