Reeves Reflection: I was NICE and WHOLESOME when they met me

 Reeves Reflection:  I was NICE and WHOLESOME when they met me

When I was in college (or at least my freshman year), I was a happy go-lucky, goofy, loud, socially awkward, country kid from Arkansas.   I didn’t know much about anything but I was carefree.

Then, I met THOSE GUYS!!   

The first phase of my corruption started with Frank.  Frank is from Queens, NYC.  He was a bassist.  He liked Iron Maiden and Rush which resulted in my exposure to hard rock and an appreciation of Bass Guitarists.  He introduced me to a Crazy Italian named Caesar (who is an entirely DIFFERENT story!  I still remember his mother telling me I was too skinny and feeding me enough breakfast foods to feed a small nation.).   Frank brought me to his parent’s place in the Queensbridge Projects (the First time I had EVER stayed in the projects).  

The second phase of my corruption was with Mark.   Mark is from Manhattan, NYC.  A basketball player and the FIRST person to introduce me to the almighty ‘BRO CODE’.  I SWEAR he should have gone to Law School because ANYTHING relating to the “BRO CODE” he would check me on if I did something REMOTELY wrong.  OH and he was an atheist so conversations with me (a country boy born and raised in the AMEZion church) were ALWAYS ruthless.   He NEVER accepted an answer ‘just because’.

The final phase of my corruption was with Butch (St. Croix) and Sylvan (Aruba).   The number of times they would pull me to the side to let me know my game was ‘Raggedy’ became a right of passage.  After a while, I just started watching what the two of them did and then duplicated it.   

It’s amazing what happens when you have people who come into your life and force you to grow in ways you didn’t think was possible.   I’m sure my growth would have occurred but it would not have been NEARLY as fun.