I thought this story was worth sharing, and whether it is read by none or one or twenty five, I’m glad I wrote it down, and I’m glad my brother read DFTBA from a bumper sticker on the highway. I hope someone smiles at the words on this page, before they are swallowed by the deluge of love and care sent by people all over the world with stories just like my own.
To be up front about it, your videos saved my relationship with my brother, Donovan.
He was my absolute best friend growing up, the person that everyone else had to live up to in order to be even considered a decent person.
He was my hero.
He’s three years older than me, and he was a protector as I went through the struggles that “high potential” kids have which aren’t always understood by those in authority positions.
All my teachers wanted to move me up a grade, which ruined the friendships I had cherished as ten-year-olds do. Fast forward six years, and my brother and I grew apart pretty quickly.
I was president of a couple of clubs at school and he was off to Vanderbilt that fall. We stopped telling each other everything, and I didn’t know what to do to keep talking.
We were driving to visit our grandmother who lived an hour away, and it was getting late.
We were keeping each other awake, blaring music and singing at the top of our lungs.
It was one of the best memories I had with him, and then it got better.
As a car passed us on the highway, my brother (pointing, reading a bumper sticker) yelled, “DFTBA!” And looked at me expectantly. I thought he was crazy, and he just kept repeating,
“Don’t forget to be awesome!...Vlogbrothers...John... Hank...none of this rings a bell?”
When I still didn’t understand, he just told me to go on YouTube on my phone and search “John Green pennies” because he couldn’t remember any specific title.
That was it.
Three minutes and fifty seven seconds, and I was hooked. We sat in my grandma’s living room until past 2:30 that morning watching any video that came up.
The most popular, related to the current one playing, and all of Hank’s songs. Since that day, we would run into each other’s room and talk about the videos for hours.
I also have a (totally healthy) obsession with Jane Austen, and watching all the Pemberly Digital projects with him has been second only to reading them in the first place.
We have read John’s novels together, and cried for hours.
This Christmas, my brother made a donation in my name for the P4A and it was the most amazing thing anyone could have ever done for me.
Without ever watching a video, our parents soon picked up on who we were speaking about when ‘John and Hank’ were mentioned, which is astonishing when they can’t even remember the names of our closest friends. I could list off one hundred other things about being a Nerdfighter, but most importantly is saying thank you.
Thank you for doing this and putting yourself out there which is so difficult to do.
Thank you for leaving your children something to be proud of when so many are left with nothing.
Thank you for turning Nerdfighters into Nerdfighters by decreasing world-suck.
And thank you to your wives and families who support you as you change lives on a daily basis.
Thank you for inspiring me personally, and showing me how easy it is to be passionate about writing and words. I thought this story was worth sharing, and whether it is read by none or one or twenty five, I’m glad I wrote it down, and I’m glad my brother read DFTBA from a bumper sticker on the highway.
I hope someone smiles at the words on this page, before they are swallowed by the deluge of love and care sent by people all over the world with stories just like my own.
Many good wishes and blessings.
-Kate Elizabeth