[Instrumental music]
I was born with cerebral palsy and
diagnosed at 18 months,
that was back in 1978.
Spent the first four months of my life
in an incubator at Kosair in
Louisville, had a 40% chance of
making it and here I am.
My mom was, if you've ever seen the movie
"Forrest Gump", my mom was kind of, my mom
was kind of like Forrest's mom, you know. She
wanted me to have the same opportunities
that everybody else was going to have,
and just because I was born a little
different didn't mean that I didn't
deserve the same opportunities. So I was
mainstreamed into school in the first
grade, went all the way from the 1st
grade through 12th grade no special ed
classes, you know. They would pull me
out on occasion to do PT and OT therapy
that kind of thing on a weekly basis;
taught me how to, basically one of the
therapist would pull me out and got me
hooked on video games because that
helped my hand-eye coordination, so. And
then the other therapists got me into
playing cards because shuffling cards
helped with your hand-eye coordination.
So video games and gambling, who knew that those
two things would really, you know, benefit
me, so yeah. And graduated with a, with a,
you know, regular diploma just like
everybody else in my class. It's a big
accomplishment anytime anybody graduates
from any kind of school, but to have a
disability on top of that. I mean it's
just, you know, it's one of those big
things, you know. It's like when I first
got mainstreamed in school, they awe this
is, you know, this was I mean in the
'80s you didn't hear of this stuff. So it was
all in the paper, you know, and in 1988
that, you know, all this was kind of, you
know, still still in the forefront; they
were like all Easter Seals, which is down
in Evansville that provides therapy
services they're like we need to pull
this guy because we need him to be our
child representative. So I was child rep
for them back in '88, got to
meet Don Mattingly and got my picture
taken with him.
And the telethon back then was 37 hours
long and, you know, I was on TV for a long
time, you know. So, you know, and I still
get services from them to this day.
I've been living independently since 2006
in Evansville. I'm currently living with
my fiancé; we're getting married next
year. She is she's able body, and she's a
she's a drug dealer.
I'm kidding, she's a, she's a pharmacy
tech. So I love pulling that joke on people,
they're like what? I'm like no she, she actually she
when I first met her she, was a CNA so
that, you know, that helped out because
she kinda already knew the ins and outs
and stuff, you know. And, you know, we joke
around about that a lot, but then she
decided well, you know, that's, that's
tough work, you know. If you know what
those people do day in and day out, it's
tough work, you know. So she's like I want
out of there so she decided to do the
cashier thing at Walmart for a little bit. And
then the pharmacy tech job opened up, and
she was like well I want to know more
about the medications that you take and
what it does.
I went to a comedy club
back in 2005 when they started the Funny
Bone back in Evansville and was able to
see a comedian by the name of Chris Fonseca if you know who that is.
He has cerebral palsy, and he's been in
the comedy scene for probably 30 years.
He's performed on David Letterman. He's
been on some big shows and so, you know.
I kind of thought about it and didn't
really do anything with it, then years
later Josh Blue, if you ever heard of him, he
also has cerebral palsy won Last Comic
Standing I believe 2005-2006, you know.
Saw him, met with him, got my picture
taken. And then my friend is like, "Hey I got
these free tickets to this comedy club
in town you need to go check it out." So I
went and checked it out. I had an open mic so
I thought yeah I'll get up there and
I'll do some stuff. And you know, if it's
good, it's good. If it's not, it's not. You
know the old adage, if you don't try, you
don't know kind of thing. So I got up
there and started doing some stuff and
noticed that I was pretty quick on my
feet. I guess you would say mentally not physically of course, but
mentally, as you know, quick on my feet.
And I was kind of good at it. So a friend
of mine, actually he wasn't a friend of
mine at the time, but saw me, you know,
doing the stuff. And he had a start up
comedy business so he's been booking me
on shows and stuff like that. So anytime,
anytime there's a new venue that we've
got that we're really wanting to promote and
get, he throws me in there to MC the show
to kind of test the waters. To see okay
what kind of crowd do we have here. And
we've actually been able to book regular
shows at Legends Bar and Grill in French
Lick. So I basically perform all around
southern Indiana. I've been to Bloomington.
I've done some stuff in Fort Wayne.
Just because I have a disability doesn't mean
I can't be funny, you know. And the
preconceived notions that people have
about disabilities,
those are hilarious.They really are and
people need to realize that what they
say no matter how stupid it might be
it's hilarious to me. And if you say it to
me, guess what? I might use it on stage so
be careful. Kid you not, this happened to me
at the place I work at. Guy comes in and
said, "Wow, you didn't sound handicap over the phone."
I mean, you know, who says that to somebody?
So my response was, "Wow, you didn't sound
short either. You trying out for the new
'Hobbit' movie? You know, he's like five foot
tall. And you know what? He thought it was
so funny, he's bought thousands of
dollars of equipment from us since then.
So I found out the tricks of the trade.
If you can make them laugh, they're going
to open their wallet and they're going to spend money
with you because, you know, if you can get
them to like you, they'll trust you. Which
means if they trust you, they'll believe
in your product and they'll buy from you.
[Instrumental music]
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