On Having Arrived at the Age of 18

In less than one earth month from now I, Matt Pfahl, will finally arrive at the once unreachable age of 18. People say, “Time flies when you’re having fun.” Well, it is my belief that time is completely oblivious to whether or not you’re having any fun–it’s going to keep on flying, with or without your consent. I never thought I’d be one of those, “really big kids” and quite frankly I am not so sure that I want to be. When I look back on my accomplishments I am struck with pride that goes hand in hand with the regret I feel for not accomplishing certain things I could have. When I look forward to college and what lies beyond, I am filled with childish excitement and the fear of the unknown.

Throughout my life, I’ve had a few notable accomplishments, but by no means enough to brag about. The first accomplishment I can think of is my becoming well read in grade school, and staying well read through high school. My love of reading started before I began school, but it was enhanced a hundred fold when I first stepped foot in the school library. My reaction was similar to how a child would react to stepping foot in a candy store. I read as much as I could through grade school, diving into all sorts of series including Goosebump books by R.L. Stine. They were by far my favorite because I always loved the twists that would come at the end. I now have at least seventy Goosebump books on my bookshelf, and recently I have found myself picking them up at random and remembering the stories just by seeing the pictures on the covers. My favorite author during high school is, without a doubt, Stephen King, and I own almost all of his books as well. I think that being well read has helped me understand the world around me better, if not the people. I’ve had some more official accomplishments as well, they include Environthon, soccer, and Future Business Leaders Of America (FBLA). The team I am on for Environthon has gone to the state competition the last two years in a row, and we are hoping for a third. After playing varsity soccer for four years, we finally got to states, and I have to admit that winning the District Championship was one of the best feelings I have ever had. And I cried my eyes out that night when I got home with my District II Championship medal strung around my neck. Also, this year, my team and I won the right to go to the state competition for FBLA. I definitely did not expect this to happen, but I am looking forward to spending three days in Seven Springs.

If I had the option of going back in time and changing experiences I’ve had in my life, I would quickly rebuff the offer, but if I had the chance to go back in time and tell myself to not be so lazy, I would have to accept it wholeheartedly. There are many things in my life at which I wish I would have tried harder. In particular, I wish I would have tried harder to do well in school, not because I could have gotten accepted to a better college, but because I feel bad for not giving my all. I can honestly count on one hand the times I’ve actually studied for tests, and I would need hundreds of hands to count the times I’ve thrown things together the night before they were due. Alas, I cannot go back in time, so I will tell myself right now–stop being so lazy.

College is getting more and more real with every day that passes, and while I welcome it with open arms, the arms are shaking slightly, maybe even trembling, with fear. I have so much I want to accomplish in college–I am so eager to learn and experience change, but I am afraid to death that I will fail. By my next birthday, I want to be getting good grades in college na dbe learning more than I have ever learned in my entire life. Also, I want to put the brakes on the whole “flying time” thing as well–clip those time wings right off of it.

I was sitting at my desk, enjoying the ambient silence of the unoccupied office. The morning is my favorite time of the day at work, mostly because without distraction you can get a lot of work done before the day really even begins. This morning in particular I was just reading up on the latest gutwrenching news and browsing the Web since I didn’t really have any work to do. In the middle of an article calling for the criminalization of the act of smoking at public bus stops I began to hear a noise coming from the other side of the office. If it was only an hour later I wouldn’t have heard anything besides the dutiful clicking of keys and tapping of mice of the plastic variety, but in that empty silence the noise traveled through the open conference door, down the hallway, and landed right on my desk. Like an envelope that has your name actually hand written instead of machine made, visible through a clear plastic window, it gathered my full attention. My gaze shifted from the thousand pixel collage of journalistic excellence and started to trace the sound through the air, aided by sound waves being processed at light speed within my head, finally settling on the open door at the end of the dimly lit hallway.

It sounded like someone was slowly running their hand across the papers on the desk in the conference room, flattening all of the nervous creases created by fidgeting fingers during yesterday’s late meeting. If my desk wasn’t the closest to the conference room I would have never heard the sound that now had me out of my chair and walking down the dimly lit and lonely hallway. My eyes were not adjusting well, and at first, as I stood in the doorway to the room, all I could make out was the outline of the chairs against the sunlit blinds. All at once I saw the papers scattered across the long black table in the center of the room. They seemed to jump out at me against their dark surroundings, one after another, as my eyes scanned the length of the table.

What at first I thought to be the space between the papers turned out to be the figure of a lethal cobra spanning the entire length of the table and even spilling onto the floor for good measure and posterity. I felt the world moving on beneath my feet and as I struggled to maintain my balance I inadvertently struck my hand against the glass pane of the door. In my head it sounded like I had stuck my hand through a thousand energetic wind chimes, and either way, it was enough to draw the attention of the snake. Its head raised from beneath a page filled with inedible pies and bars, and for a moment it wore this page like a crown of glory from a culture it couldn’t understand until it stood at its full height.

Without conscious effort I met its legendary eyes. These eyes, I reminded myself, were capable of extraordinary evil. One glance was all it took to doom womankind to a sentence of servitude for thousands of years. I could not release the gaze, and I felt compelled, hopelessly so, to stare back into those gemstones of primal understanding. My head felt as light as a feather, and my thoughts became clearer and clearer, until I could only think in white hot flashes of clarity.

I knew then what I must do.

to be continued…

It is now the end of June, and despite being such a badass in my last post, I’m probably due for a reality check. I figured that we would have our office by now(for the Cognition Media business venture), but we are currently running a gauntlet of bureaucratic red tape and runarounds.  Being in such a fledging company, I expected to have to suckle from the hands of local, friendly, motherly businesses and entreprenuers and investors, etc.  I didn’t expect being written off, ignored, and treated like sub-human slaves of the business community.  I am probably not over-reacting, but I’d just like to see one single person or business in this community actually follow through with what they are saying publicly. I feel disenchanted with the whole mess, and I’m convinced it isn’t going to change. Speaking of change, I have no money and have been forced into a life of manual labor.  Four years of school only to be subjected to back-breaking labor. One word…great.

That was an introduction to me telling you about how myself and two cool cats from school(Joey and Kristen) won third place in a business plan competition(http://www.greatvalleyalliance.com/).  Which basically means that we get to start our business(http://www.cognition-media.com) with a lot of financial support including 3,000$ in cash and 13.5k$ in in-kind services.  Our flagship product, Minerva, is an educational content management system that is extremely scalable and kickass.  I think it’s really going to change how high schools are managed online.

That’s what its really all about, rocking the change, not to mention banking it.

Ka-ching.