Hi! I'm Austin! When I was a kid, I had an incredible dream. "What if," I thought, "I could achieve World Peace—just by being Me?" There was just one problem. I didn't know who I was exactly. I lived on a big green hill with my great big family. And all of my friends—(I promise they're not imaginary.) Every day, I did the same old thing. Write in my diary, in my little white room, imagining.......but you probably know that already, since you've read my query.  

I'd like to tell you the true story, the "real" story.

(Which is what you've been reading.)

Growing up, I dreamed of going on a big adventure. My Mom read me stories of great heroes from mythology. My Dad told me stories of when he used to work for Disney. School was too easy, and too hard. Math was SOOO boring. My Mom and Dad took me to the doctor, who said I was "gifted." They gave me a box of "special paints," shortly after my 6th birthday. My favorite times were when I got to go on The Amazing Writing Machine, and come up with all sorts of stories and characters. I brought them home with me every day. I created an evil supervillain called Dr. Diabolocus. I got a sheep—Lucky was his name. I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up—I wanted to be EVERYTHING—maybe a paleontologist or a teacher or maybe even an artist or an Author! someday. 

I always felt different. While other kids were out playing, I would stay inside and ask for Math Wrap-Ups, Brain Quest cards, Critical Thinking workbooks, Reading Galaxy, Sim City, Civilization, and encyclopedias. In 3rd grade when we went to the rainforest, and 4th grade rode on Pilgrim ships, and I dreamed of sailing out across the seven seas like Christopher Colombus (before I knew what that meant), it felt like I was part of some greater story, and I was sailing out there with him. I rang the Liberty Bell in 5th grade, and felt freedom ring with the patriots, and in 6th grade, when my class's dreams of visiting one of the world's greatest theme parks and roller coasters got derailed by 9/11, we took a wild cross-country road trip back home, and I'm pretty sure my best friend bled from his ears after eating a whole chili at a Tex-Mex restaurant, and I saw those two planes crashing on TV, and I never knew I was part of something even more ginormous.  

When junior high rolled around, I was determined to be a "Cool Kid" forevermore. My screenname was "princeofcoolness." That was pretty much ruined when I found out it wasn't cool to get a manicure.

I made friends and turned into a rap star. In 8th grade I performed in my school musical, just like Mom had dreamed of doing on Broadway with, um, a slightly smaller role. It was about a girl named Lola and pineapple pie and friends all across the world and the importance of just saying "Hi."  

In high school I became the fastest runner in school history, which was terrific—at least until I became anorexic—at least for the Time Being. Instead of hanging out with friends, during lunch, I would head to the library and read most of the time. The classics, the Norton World Anthologies, filled with so many interesting characters, I would read those books backwards-and-forwards...

College was wonderful, and then the year I was to graduate, I signed up for a daily newsletter. One day, I got a letter from researchers in this tiny isle (known to some as "Paradise," and home to what was once thought to be the tallest mountain in the world, sacred to Hindus, Buddhists, Christians and Muslims alike—and currently struggling with civil war) off the coast of India, saying Dole, the huge banana company, had illegally invaded the jungle, and started running out the critically-endangered elephants. I graduated from college, and then, traveling alongside the BBC, spent 80 days there.

It's there that this story turns.  

I'd gone with the goal of "saving the elephants," telling their story, and making my career. When I came back, I tried writing that book. However, when I finished a couple months later, something about it just didn't seem right. (Besides the fact of it only taking a couple of months! lol :)). Something was missing. I kept thinking back to that perfectly rounded sacred green mountain I told you about, which looked just like a child's drawing. And I realized, with its little white shrine on top, it looked like a big green hill with a little white house—the place where I grew up. And I realized that in telling the story of the elephants, I had missed a key part—myself. 

I started remembering Everything. My joy. My glee. My complete freedom and happiness and curiosity and creativity I'd had as a child, watching cartoons and drawing, feeling like the world was endless! and I could create and do and imagine anything. 

And walking through the paint-splattered aisles of Party City back home, where pictures of popular children's characters were proudly displayed above their party favors (pardon the alliteration, it's just so exciting!), I realized that in order to save the elephants—and achieve world peace—what better way to tell it than through a kid's story?

I got a bowl of birthday cake ice cream. You know, only the best kind of ice cream in the whole entire universe, filled with rainbow sprinkles and ooey gooey chocolatey fudge and brownies. And as I was sitting there, swirling and thinking with my spoon, the sprinkles started looking like different-colored people from all across the world, green, blue, pink, purple and red and orange and yellow, and they started to look like planets swirling all together in a solar system, in a galaxy, in a universe, in one vast cosmos...

And not just any kid's, but mine—because I very much was Everybody?

Over the next several years, I tested that theory. I fell in love with kids again, reminding me of what it means to be truly yourself and be free. I went back full circle to school to coach my old (new) cross-country team, taught at Sylvan Learning, and left to start my own teaching company, dedicated to "every little me," and making people happy. I fell in love with their parents, reminding them that they, too, had dreams, and no matter how old you are, you can still be anything. I taught a 3-year-old. I taught a 93-year-old named Jerry. The company evolved. It went from "Running Readers" to "My Story" to simply—well, you're able to read. :)

Because whether you believe in good strict science or god or gods or God with a capital G, or string theory or the Time Beings (never heard of them? huh.) or an as yet-unexplained mystery, no matter how much we may agree or disagree, we can all agree we started from the same thing. Whether we all started from a spark or a quark or quirk of gravity—no one knows exactly what it was—let's just call it a "Me." 

We literally made the first stars out of our bodies. And then, when those first stars supernova'd, their bodies, literally, became us.

We became the burning heat of the sun. We traveled through the solar system, past the rocky planets and ice cold giants and landed on the planet that would become us.

Through fire and ice, we were a single strand of DNA, and our stories unraveled. From nothing to something, we evolved. We became plants, algae, sponges, comb jellies (I think it's related to peanut butter & jelly!), starfish, worms, paper nautilus sailing to new worlds, fish with lungs, and we became part of the world's incredible rainbowed handiwork. 

We crawled on all fours; we saw the great swamps and rainforests rise up, trees and mushrooms and more—BOOM!

We walked with the Dinosaurs—

BOOM!

We started a monkey school, set off on an epic journey, hewed stone tools, arrived in a Garden. Became human.

I think you get the picture. :)

Our paths diverged. We spread through Africa, out of Africa, across all the continents. We were the ancient Greeks and Romans, the Mesopotamians (that's Ia), the Chinese (that's Yu) and Mesoamericans (Hope) and Hawaiians, we heard the preachings of Wish and Zarathustra and Buddha and Jesus,

we were Muhammad (Peanut Butter Upon Him) traveling down the Silk Road.

I've been born a crown prince and princess, fighting dragons. I've been the court jester, leaving a map for the future. I've been born a sailor, sailing across the seven (or maybe even eight seas), on my Pilgrim Ship, just like Christopher Columbus, searching out buried treasure, found New Worlds, started revolutions, fought in the War to End All Wars, been a piece of my Grandpa Stanley looking up at the World Fair's roller coasters, been an apple in the eye of my Mom and Dad, while she was dreaming of Broadway, and he was touring with Disney—and finally—me. 

And, boy! Do I have a story to tell! :) ...And, with the exception of the very end, that story is YOU. the world's greatest textbook

To think it all begins with fantasy (so you would think), a big-hearted child living on his big green hill, and a wondrous year at an incredible, magical school...

Below you will find a full outline of the story. I have included a detailed outline for the first two months of the story, JOY and AUS. The entire book as described above has been written (though the later months of "Year One" do need editing, as well as the stages to be released several years from now (i.e. Archaean; Jesus!; The Book of Wishes, etc) 

As Ava would say, "Let's go on a Big Add-Venture!" :) It's fun being Me, and I can't wait to share that with you. :)

-Austin M(e) Diamond