New Year's Special: One Life To Write One, Two Years To Repeat

New Year's Special: One Life To Write One, Two Years To Repeat

As I explained in my installment "How This All Started," my original plan for my book "The Greattastic Adventures: Miracle Child" was to write about my time getting ready to go to college, and some of my college experiences, as someone with autism, but I would write the chapters shortly after the event depicted happened. The problem was that I didn't know what to write about because I didn't know what was necessary for the climax because the climax hadn't happened yet! So the solution was to start a blog (and eventually a podcast) to replace the college/adult timeline and write THREE books about my childhood experiences!

I did run into one more problem. I knew I didn't want to just write about my autism journey; I also wanted to talk about my grief journey. I realized when I was working on the master outline including my grief journey in the same binding, would cause a constant struggle between both stories. So I decided to write a spin-off book that follows my grief journey with S.M. (and a few others, including Elizabeth, who died ten years ago tonight) and how I accepted it all! The two best parts, all of the proceeds go to Sam's Fans, and I planned not to tell S.M.'s family until Thread of Hope in October 2022. For context, I've been writing this book since 2018!

I ended up telling S.M.'s mom, Nikki, in September 2022 instead since I'd kept this secret for four years, and quite honestly, I couldn't do it anymore. So it is with great joy that I announce that my new book, Once In a Lifetime: A Song For Sam, will be coming out this March for her birthday!

Now the person who edits my books, Amy, is actually a family friend I know through my "sisters." The system we developed for editing my books is I send her the rough draft; she leaves comments/suggestions on the Google Doc, and I go through and accept them. Then we do that whole process a second time. Her daughter got married the weekend after Thanksgiving, so Amy couldn't go through Once In a Lifetime the second time until the weekend of December 10th.

When I published my first book, I also learned that self-publishing is stressful, and I don't handle that kind of stress well! With that plus Amy not being able to read the book earlier, but me still wanting to hit the deadline of S.M.'s birthday week…I am about to become a very horrible human! To alleviate some of the stress, until the book is formatted, I will not be posting anything to Rules for a Greattastic Life. I'm hoping to start season 6 in Mid-February which I think is realistic. If something changes, I will let you know.

Mat Kearney is S.M.'s favorite artist. I'm telling you, this man wrote the soundtrack to her life. I don't mean she listened to him all the time (though she did that); most of his songs have lyrics that seemed to be catered to her story. For example, one of the lyrics in his song "In the Middle" is, "Twenty-five here I am with freshman LPs one life to write one, two years to repeat."

That makes me happy because that line is the best way to describe this situation. I'm 25, it took my whole life to write Miracle Child, and now two years later, I'm publishing Once In A Lifetime: A Song For Sam!

I hope you have a Greattastic 2023!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Before I go, I want to congratulate my friend Jane, who got married earlier today (New Year's Eve)! I can't wait to see what's in store for you next!

Christmas Special: Night Before Christmas (Greattastic Edition)

 Christmas Special: Night Before Christmas (Greattastic Edition)

Twas two days before Christmas when all through my town, the temperature dropped, and snow floated down. Ryan had come home from Chicago, you see, to spend the holiday with my family and me! We played tons of games, and good times were had, but none were outside cuz the weather was bad.

On the day before Christmas, we mapped out our day to try to keep stresses far, far away! We cleaned up a bit cuz "Santa was coming" and headed to church at 5:30 something. We sang Christmas carols all throughout Mass, and everyone there was dressed with some class. We couldn't stop singing as Dad drove us home; we're a very musical family, don't you know?

He parked the car, and we dashed through the snow, for my brothers, and I knew exactly where to go! With me on piano and Josh on his drum, Ryan and Luke grabbed their guitars and started to strum. We played "White Christmas," and I'll tell you this, with a bit of practice, man, it was bliss!

When dinner was ready, we went and said grace, and when we had finished, we filled up our plates. We ate and told stories, and like Christmases past, we hoped that this holiday season would last.

I'm telling you this for one simple reason; in fact, it's at the heart of this holiday season. Love those around you and enjoy their company, cuz to be happy, that's really all you need! For if we choose to love and to be kind, we will all indeed lead Greattastic Lives! Before I go, I just need to say Rules for a Greattastic Life will Return on New Year's Eve day!

Season 5 Blog 30 (Finale) True Confidence

 True Confidence

Back in mid-October, I got a text from my ex-girlfriend Gabby, in which she asked me if I wanted to meet up. I told her I would think about it, but quite honestly I forgot. On Thanksgiving night, after dinner, Gabby texted me again to check back in.

As you might know, I broke up with Gabby on my family vacation last summer. I'm not going to go into detail about the circumstances of our breakup, but basically, neither of us were emotionally ready for a relationship, and it had to happen over vacation because the situation was not good for either of our mental healths. When I first mentioned our break up, it was at the very end of the installment I made about that family vacation. Narratively speaking, the breakup came out of nowhere, because I wasn't going to write an installment every time I questioned the relationship. Thinking back on it now, in a way that was art imitating life. While there were a few fights leading up to it, I was trying to put the breakup off, so when I admitted to myself that it had to happen and did it, I think it blindsided her. All this to say, I felt like I owed her a meet-up.

Last Saturday, December 3, we decided to get coffee at Crimson Cup, but she said that there was a location closer to the middle of both of us. She gave me the address and when I pulled up, I was slightly freaked out because it was effectively a warehouse. We got out of our cars and we tried to get in, but the doors were locked.

“Excuse me,” a man said, “who are you looking for?”

“Just trying to get coffee!” I replied.

“Oh sorry!” he said, “This is the Innovation Lab… It's not a coffee shop.”

For a little more context, I found out later that Crimson Cup is really interested in helping people start up their own coffee shops, so they have this lab to teach people how to make professional coffee and make a business plan. “Ah,” Gabby said as the man walked away, “Silver Oak College is a couple minutes away, do you just want to walk around there?”

My first girlfriend Caroline and I had a very on-again-off-again relationship. And while she is the only ex I have ever officially gotten back together with, I would be lying if I told you that I hadn’t thought about getting back together with some of the others shortly after the break ups. I bring this up because as Gabby and I were walking around the campus, nothing happened because I think I’m finally confident with myself when I’m on my own!

Season 5 Thanksgiving Special: Lost In Tradition

 Season 5 Thanksgiving Special: Lost In Tradition

OCALICONLINE accidentally worked out perfectly for me schedule-wise because the conference happened a week before Thanksgiving, and I only had to work Monday and Tuesday the week of the holiday. This meant that when I drove up to New Story the day before the conference, I only had three school days before break.

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, at 7:30 p.m., I picked Noah up at his house and we went to dinner at Applebee's (or “A-pplib-ees” as Noah calls it). While we were there, they started playing Christmas music. Usually, I'm very anti-Christmas music before Thanksgiving, but last year my phone stopped working shortly before Christmas, and I didn't get to listen to my Christmas playlist as much as I'd wanted, so I was here for the early music.

After I dropped Noah off at home, I went to my parents' house, but before I went inside I realized that everyone was at my childhood neighbor’s house. I ran in and saw, Megan and Rachel, their parents Stephen and Robin, our friends Tim and Kristin, and Ryan who was back from Chicago. After hanging out for a little bit, my brothers and I drove to the airport and picked up, our grandpa, Pop-pop, and our aunt and uncle, Eva and Zach.

The next day, we went out to lunch at a place downtown called The North Market, and that night I showed Pop-pop, Eva, Zach, and Dad the recording of my OCALICONLINE session (which I only have access to for a short amount of time). On Thanksgiving Day at 1:30, people started showing up. First Mom’s parents/step-parents (Nimba, Papa, Grandpa, and Nana) got here. Then my cousins’ family, the Mitreys (Aunt Melissa, Uncle Andy, Alex/his girlfriend Emma, Maci, Nicholas, and Ellie) arrived, followed very closely by, Aunt Cyndi, her fiance, Jeremy and her kids Kaitlyn and Cameron, and eventually my cousin Austin.

After my family dinner, I went over to my “sister’s” parents' house to see, August, Arden, Kid, Marshall, Barbara, Rich, and a Priest friend that they had over. To my surprise, they were also homing a puppy named Jr. who was in training to be a seeing-eye dog over the holiday. After I hung out with them for about an hour, I returned to my parents’ house and we started playing a game called Catch Phrase (if you don't know what that is look it up and buy it it's amazing!)

Finally, on Friday night, Megan, Rachel, Stephen, and Robin, came over to make cookies, and visit with Pop-pop, Eva, Zach, and Austin, and my parents' best friends from college, Ron and Anita came too!

I'm not gonna lie, I struggled to write this installment… but I think I know why. I think the most Thanksgiving-y Thanksgiving I've experienced since I was a little kid, was Thanksgiving 2020 because Austin came and made my family actually laugh for the first time since the pandemic hit. What I’m saying is usually I'm very good at living in the moment, but on Thanksgiving and other Holidays, I tend to get lost in family traditions… I don't want to speak for everyone, but until someone fights me on it I'm going to say that most people would agree with me. So I'm making a resolution, for Christmas, and all future holidays to make an extra effort to live in the moment!

Hope you all had a Grattastic Thanksgiving!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 29: OCALICONLINE- Only One Place I Can Go

 OCALICONLINE- Only One Place I Can Go

Last Monday, November 14th, after school I walked around the building, saying goodbye to my coworkers and telling them I would not see them till next Monday (two days after the posting of this installment). One of my co-workers Savannah, who you, the audience, all know as the bride in “A Wedding In Wooster,” was helping out in the after-school program, and she asked, “Wait, why aren't you going to be here for the rest of the week?”

OCALICONLINE was happening from Tuesday to Friday. As a brief refresher, OCALICON is an annual conference with speakers to promote awareness about students with autism and low-incidence disabilities, and this year it's online. My public speaking mentor, and family friend Dr. Brooks, along with Noah's soccer coach Katie and I, were doing a presentation called “Using Contact-Based Interventions to Create Inclusive Learning Spaces.” I didn't blame Savannah for forgetting because the presentation for OCALICONLINE had to be pre-recorded. So at the end of September, I had to take a half-day to record it, and on top of that in October I took another half day to do a separate public speaking event in Dr. Brooks’ class.

While I was excited, since I've been working to get to OCALICON since the summer of 2019, I was slightly disappointed that it was an online event. “Like yeah,” I said to Savannah, “this is going to look great on my resume, and I'm still going to be able to network, but if it was in person I would have gotten to stay in this Swanky Hotel downtown and…you know me, I'm way too social for virtual!”

Savannah laughed and said, “Mitch, you're already off, don't just stay at home…go to a coffee shop and attend. Treat yourself!”

“Savannah, You're a genius!” I exclaimed.

On Tuesday at 11:45 a.m. I went to Crimson Cup Coffee, got a frozen hot chocolate, and waited 15 minutes until the conference kicked off. The conference started with the three keynote speakers, Haben Girma (the first Deafblind person to graduate from Harvard Law), Judy Heumann (who has been a disability advocate her entire life after contracting polio and becoming wheelchair-bound at age two), and Temple Grandin (an American scientist who has Autism and is most famous for her work on animal behavior and for the humane treatment of animals going to slaughter). As I watched I thought to myself, someday I'm going to be a keynote speaker!

I spent Tuesday through Thursday, going to presentations, getting people's emails for later networking, and learning a lot about advocacy and what other people are doing. Then on Friday morning, at 8:45 our session started. It began with Dr. Brooks explaining the class she teaches at OSU to incoming gen ed teachers on what inclusion is. She gave some stats about how many special needs kids are in the gen ed system, and how she knows me. I then took over and gave a condensed version, of the presentation I give in her class, which is basically a bunch of stories about my experiences in school. And finally, Katie took over and talked about her and Dr. Brooks’ findings about the impact of my presentation.

Basically, each time before I would speak in Dr. Brooks’ class, the students would fill out a survey, and they would fill out the same one afterward. I'm not even going to try to touch on the statistics, mostly because I’m the least academic out of the three of us, and I couldn't do it justice in that format, but in extremely dumbed-down terms, having someone on the spectrum explain their story, put a face to Autism and positively impacted these incoming teacher’s understanding of why inclusion is critical to their role as teachers. The recording ended with Dr. Brooks saying, “Hope everyone has a great day…or a Greattastic day as Mitch would say!”

“You beat me to the punch.” Recording me chimed in. As the session ended, I smiled because I knew that there's only one place I can go from here- Up.

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 28: What's The Verdict?

What's The Verdict?

After work on Saturday, April 30th, 2022, Arden drove to August’s apartment. When she drove up she saw an older woman wearing a yellow sun hat and yellow pants sitting in the garden watering plants. August came out to meet her and after they hugged the two walked inside. As they passed, the older woman yelled, “Hi Arden!”

Back in February, I saw August and Kid waiting in the circle when she had come to town. We hung out as much as we could, but August, Ben, and I all needed to get to bed since we all had a big day coming up. Despite the fact that we didn't really do anything, August inspired me to once again make a surprise trip up to Colorado. I didn't want to go anywhere for the upcoming spring break because when I went to Colorado over spring break 2020 the world ended so there was just a little too much PTSD. However, I had only used one PTO day for my cousin Paige's wedding, so I had a few to kill.

Kid had a project for her photography class due on Easter Monday 2022, so on Holy Saturday she and I had a photoshoot. When we got back to her house to upload the photos to her computer Kid was texting someone very excitedly. I asked her what was going on and she replied, “Arden is moving to Cincinnati!” I immediately called Arden and she said that she was still “trying to get her ducks in a row,” but so her roommate Taylor could plan, she needed to know in two weeks. Coincidentally two weeks was when August and I had planned for me to go up to Colorado and surprise Arden and Ben.

I flew in on Thursday, April 28th, 2022. That night I met August’s roommate, Gill, and we surprised Ben, though it was not as epic as we had hoped. Now, August and Gill lived in Arvada, which is an hour away from Fort Collins, where Arden and Taylor lived. Arden was working for a group of hospitals that she would rotate between. She worked at one on that Saturday that was very close to Arvada.

On Saturday morning, August and I got coffee and did some work that we had to do. When we had finished, we rushed to the thrift store and bought a yellow sun hat, and yellow maternity pants. When we got back to the apartment I threw on one of August’s shirts, the sun hat, and the pants, and eagerly waited in the garden for Arden to arrive.

“Hi Arden!” I yelled as they passed. The look on Arden’s face when she realized that I was the older woman was priceless… It looked like she was malfunctioning. We spent the night, hanging out, talking to Gill, and then we all watched a movie. When we were getting ready for bed I asked Arden, “So…what's the verdict? Are you moving to Cincinnati?”

In typical Arden fashion, she replied, “Well… It's still a little unclear, but that's the hope!”

On Friday, November 4, 2022, I drove to Cincinnati to celebrate Arden finally moving back to Ohio! As I pulled into town it was hard not to laugh at myself. As you may remember, Arden moved to Colorado at the very beginning of this series, and I spent the entirety of Season 1 having an existential crisis because she and my other “sisters” were moving away. While that whole situation was important because it forced me to grow, I think it’s hilarious that I spent so much time stressing out about it when now 3 of the 4 now live back in Ohio! The moral of the story here is don’t stress out because, in the end, everything works out the way it is supposed to!

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 27: The Portal (Part 1)

 The Portal

In the first season finale of this series, I helped my “sister” Arden make a surprise trip back from Colorado for Christmas. From that point on, these surprises became a regular occurrence in our friend group, The Greattastic Adventurers, even becoming the main story arc of season two. In November of 2021, August followed in Arden’s Footsteps and moved to Colorado. By the end of January 2022, I knew that August’s (now ex) boyfriend, Ben, would be moving out to Colorado too, and it just so happened that he moved there on the same day that I ended up moving into my apartment. Finally, “the circle” as it is lovingly called is a cul-de-sac that is right outside my parents' house.

Originally I had planned to move out of my parents' house about a week before it ended up happening because the bureaucracy of getting approved delayed my plans. Two days before I moved into my apartment, Mom, Luke, Shane, and I, went to the store, bought a few things for my room, and then went to the apartment to open my mattress and let it air out. Coincidentally while we were there, August texted me and asked for my address and if I had moved in yet. I said no and explained the updated plan.

The following day August called me. At first, our conversation was normal but I could tell that she was a little out of breath. “Are you okay?” I asked.

“Yeah…” she said, “I’m in the Rockies, and it's so cold I'm pretty sure I'm going to die!” I laugh at the dramatic way she said it and that egged her on. She kept getting more and more dramatic until she eventually exclaimed, “Oh my gosh, what’s that?!” After a brief pause, she continued, “Mitchie! Go outside! I see a portal that opens to the circle!”

All I wanted to do was go to bed because I knew that moving out was going to be a big ordeal. As a result, this was a very rare occasion in which I was not in the mood for shenanigans. After she tried to prompt me for a little bit, the phone crackled and she hung up. I texted her to see if she was okay and she just continued to prompt me to go to the circle.

After about five minutes, Kid texted me. The text basically said that she was doing homework, but August was harassing her saying to send me out to the circle to see “a portal of some sort.” As soon as I read the word “portal” in Kid’s text, it all clicked. August was in town, to drive with Ben to Colorado and she had asked me for my address, hoping that I had moved in, so she could surprise me at my new place. Since I had not she had to come up with a half-baked slightly lamer plan.

“August, I know you're in town!” I said after she pick up the phone.

“No, I'm not, I'm in Rocky Mountain National Park!” she replied.

“Fine!” I said, “Send me a picture!”

She sent me one and it was indeed of her at Rocky Mountain National Park. However, being the genius that I am, I saved the photo to my camera roll, and it was time-stamped for 2:30 pm the day before!

“Oh…I didn't know you could do that…” August said as I ran out of my parents' house to meet her.

To Be Continued…

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 26: Maintaining The Empire

 Maintaining The Empire

My goal for Season 3 was to build an “Empire Of Friends.” This was originally my goal In Season 2, but Season 2 ended with Covid hitting America. Since Covid was still a major thing in Season 3, I was not able to achieve my goal, at least in the way I originally intended. In the season finale, I came to the realization, that I already had this “Empire Of Friends.”

Last month, Marshall, Kid, Granny, and I, went to see Hamilton. In the installment I wrote about that event (Wait For It), I mentioned how, my friend Greg, originally introduced me to the musical. Well, as I was writing the paragraph about Greg, I suddenly realized, that I had not seen him since his, and Temi's wedding, in June of 2021.

Okay, I say, “suddenly realized,” but that might be a slight exaggeration. See, at the wedding, I reconnected, with Greg's sister, Melody, and she has since introduced me to her boyfriend, Rob, and so I either hang out with one or both of them, from time to time. This is to say that Greg has come up in casual conversation before, and so I’ve been aware of how long it's been since I saw him… But when I was writing about him in this particular instance, it just hit me. I mean this is a guy who I love as a “brother” in the same way that I love the Andersons as my “sisters” and I haven't seen him since June of last year let alone talked to him…there's something wrong here!

As I was kind of freaking out about this, I had to tell myself a lot has changed for me since the wedding. I’ve gone through two breakups, started my job at New Story, and quit my job at Kroger. I've moved into an apartment and got a roommate…and all the drama that goes along with that. Greg has been pretty busy too. I read on Facebook that he graduated from Cornell in the spring and that he and Tami have since moved to Nashville so she can go to law school!

Our busy schedules have not been the only issue. Object permanence is the ability to know that something still exists when you're not looking at it. I don’t struggle with this ability more than the average person, except when it comes to texting. I will get a text and see it and think, I will reply in a few minutes, and then I’ll put my phone away and completely forget about it.

Last Tuesday, November 1st, was the night that Greg and I had scheduled our phone call for. We talked for about an hour and a half and caught up on each other's lives. During our conversation, Greg told me about how over the pandemic, to stay in contact, he and his Cornell friends, started playing games online together, and he asked me if I wanted to start joining them. I said yes so that we can continue to stay in contact.

I have a ton of friends. Honestly, it’s more friends than I thought was possible, back when I first got my autism diagnosis. But this situation taught me that I need to put more effort into maintaining “The Empire Friends.” Like yeah, my “sisters,” Marshall, Noah, Anna, and my family know that I suck at texting, and communicating when I'm not literally standing right next to them…but, I think I need to start reaching out more to everyone else!

Have a Greattastic Day and be safe

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Before I end this installment, I just wanted to say congratulations to Noah for making it onto the first-ever blind soccer men’s national team! Never doubted you for a second man!!!

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 25: This One Goes Out To You

 This One Goes Out To You

Thirteen years ago, on October 15th, my best friend, Samantha McCarthy (S.M.), passed away. In her honor, S.M.'s mom, Nikki, founded "Sam's Fans," which supports music and art therapy for sick kids in Ohio hospitals. A friend of Nikki's, Miranda, owns a fashion boutique called "Thread," and every year, Thread hosts a fashion show, "Thread of Hope" (TOH), benefiting Sam's fans. TOH is the biggest night of the year for both Thread and Sam's Fans, planning for the next year starting a week after the event. Last year's TOH was branded as “the rainbow after the storm” since it was the first normal event after Covid happened. While planning this year's, they were faced with the choice to stay the same or go bigger than before. They chose the latter and branded this year's as “Be Bold!”

Last Thursday, October 27th, 2022 at 7:00, I entered the Exchange at Bridge Park, where TOH is held and I began to mingle. Before the major events of the night begin I managed to talk to, Nikki, her husband Dan, two of their kids, her mom Patti, her sister Abby, a few more members of the family, as well as, Mandy, and Allie, some of Nikki's friends, and Sam's Fans social media director Avery. As I was walking around the venue, I saw someone from behind, who I thought I recognized. There's no way, I thought to myself, he doesn't even live in Ohio anymore, and I've never met him at any Sam’s Fans events before this!

The event started and Nikki and Miranda got on stage. They started to talk and explained they chose “Be Bold” as the branding because it's what the kids Sam's Fans helps need to do every day. When they had finished, they kicked off the live auction, which they'd never had before, by introducing a professional Auctioneer named Jay. Sidebar- I had no idea that auctioneers said the numbers that fast in real life, and I thought it was really funny!

When the auction ended, Nikki returned to the stage alone. With all eyes on her, she told S.M.’s story. She talked about S.M’s diagnosis and her time in the hospital. She talked about her shots and blood draws, how terrible she felt, how she lost her hair, and how she inevitably died. Then Nikki started talking about, S.M.’s personal music therapy story. Specifically, she talked about a song, called “On & On” by Mat Kearney, that S.M. and her music therapist, Brian, recorded a cover of as a gift for Mother's Day. Nikki then explained that Brian was there with another music therapist named Alexa, who is funded by Sam's Fans and they had a song for us. “I'm going to say to you,” Nikki said as she introduced the pair, “what Sam said to me In my special recording ‘This one goes out to you!’”

Brian and Alexa introduced themselves and I chuckled to myself because I was right about Brian being there. Brian told us that he had asked Nikki, what she would want the theme song of the night to be, and she chose “Kind & Generous” by Natalie Merchant. There was one more surprise. Something that music therapists do when they record songs, is they sometimes record the heartbeat of a patient and use it as the beat that the music is played to. Well for this performance, Alexa had gotten the recording of Nikki's heartbeat. After they turned on the recording, Brian and Alexa started playing the song.

I've believed in music therapy, since I joined Sam's Fans, shortly before my junior year of high school. But I've never seen it…not like this, at least. As a writer, I hate to admit this, but sometimes, the English language (and I'm assuming any language, for that matter), fails to completely capture the things we experience as human beings. I cannot describe to you, in perfect detail what it was like to experience this…but I think it might have been one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.

Have a Greattastic Day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

After Brian and Alexa finished playing, the fashion show started, and after that people started dispersing. I ran around and eventually found Dan. “Hey, Dan!” I said.

“Hey, Mitchell! What's up?” He replied.

“Has Nikki talked to you yet?” I asked.

“Yes, she has!” He exclaimed knowingly.

“Okay,” I continued, “So I want to run a few things over with you guys as a family… So I will be reaching out sometime next month to try to get some things worked out.”

“Sounds good to me.” He said.

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 24: Candlelight

 Candlelight

I realize that I have not talked about my brother Ryan’s band Cousin Simple since they played Jingle Jam with AJR and there is a reason for that. Other than a Valentine's Day show, which I couldn't find time to write about because it happened right when I moved into the apartment, they haven't played shows that are really their own in town. They played a couple of Music Festivals this summer, and while it was fun to see them, it didn't feel like a Cousin Simple show… It felt like Cousin Simple playing at a Music Festival. To be fair I have the same feeling about Jingle Jam, but that was bigger because they played with AJR!

As of Jingle Jam, Cousin Simple consisted of Will/Harsh (Frontman), Mitch (Bassist), obviously Ryan (Lead guitarist), Will’s cousin’s husband Fuad (Rhythm guitarist), and Dave (Drummer). At the beginning of the summer, the band knew that Fuad would be moving out of state for dental school. Around the same time, Luke and Josh’s Band Box seats played for Luke’s graduation party. As Ryan watched them play, he realized that Luke had what it takes and decided to ask him to take over for Fuad.

On October 8th, Cousin Simple played at the A&R bar as the headlining band. After spending the beginning of the show with friends and family, I moved to the front of the crowd to watch the band. The Kabuki drop (which is basically a fancy drop curtain) was set up on stage. A few minutes before Cousin Simple performed, Luke and Josh’s bandmates, Freddie and Max, found me. Shortly thereafter, Josh and his girlfriend Sophia ran in the front doors after going to Sophia's homecoming dance. When we were all together, a friend of the band, Timmy, got in front of the Kabuki drop and hyped everyone up. “Premiering at the A&R Music Bar,” Timmy, exclaimed, “the new music video for Cousin Simple‘s ‘Candlelight’!”

Timmy walked behind the curtain and as soon as he did, this video started playing on it, with Timmy introducing the band in the video which everyone kind of chuckled at. When the music video was over, the curtain dropped and Cousin Simple played live with that energy we all love. It was really nice to be at a Cousin Simple show in the middle of all the action again! The highlight of the night was when Harsh did a stage dive at me, Josh, Sophia, Freddie, and Max, but none of us were ready, so he ended up crushing all of us and I got it on video.

You can listen to Cousin Simple‘s new song “Candlelight” wherever you find your music, and be sure to check out the video on YouTube!

Have a Greattastic day and be safe

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 23: Wait For It

 Wait For It

It was Christmas break 2016, and my friend Greg had returned from Cornell University for the holiday. I spent so much time with my family and my “sisters” that the only time we could really hang out was in the middle of the night. Now Greg is almost solely responsible for unlocking my inner nerd! One night, we were playing video games over that break, when Greg put on the Hamilton soundtrack. I hated Hamilton at first because I'm a storyteller and I love hearing stories, but there's just so much amazing music that it was hard for me to focus on the actual story. But after like 5 listens I finally started to like it.

At the end of 2019, Marshall became my best friend. While we had known each other for a little bit over a year and a half at that point, this was when we started developing a relationship, outside of my “sisters.” At the beginning of 2020, Marshall and I created a document, called “The list of greattastic things.” Basically, we just wanted a list of adventures that we could go on. While we were creating the list, Marshall said, “Hey, my granny has season tickets at the Ohio theater. We can ask her what Broadway shows are coming up and see if we can get tickets.” A few days later Marshall sent me a picture of the list, and sure enough, Hamilton was coming in October 2020…

It was obviously pushed back, but it finally happened last Monday, October 3rd! Marshall got into town around 5:30, and he, Kid, and I picked up Granny and got to the theater around 7. The whole entire time Marshall and I were just freaking out ‘cuz yeah, seeing Wicked over the summer was cool and we were able to watch Hamilton on Disney plus, but we were finally able to see it in person 2 years after we originally planned to…and as a bonus it was opening night!

We dropped Granny and Kid off and went to find parking. As we were walking out of the parking garage Marshall and I decided to go grab one shot each at a nearby restaurant before we rejoined Granny and Kid. When we got our shots, Marshall raised his and said, “Here’s to not throwing away our ‘shot’!”

I laughed at the reference, and then replied, “No! Here's to waiting for it!”

Have a Greattastic day and be safe

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 22: Unhinged

 Unhinged

When they were in town for my birthday a little over a month ago, my “sisters” and I came up with a plan for me to improve my physical and mental health called The Mitchell Project. The goals are 1. Work out 4-5 times per week. 2. Listen to podcasts. 3. Set intentions/daily affirmations. 4. Experiment with style. 5. BE INTENTIONAL! 6. Time management/Limit screen time. Since this season is about me finding out who I am, my plan was to focus more on the mental health stuff until after New Year's, however, I would still work out to stay healthy. I, unfortunately, ran into some issues.

I have to get to work by 8 and with all the other things that I have to do after work, the only time that I can go to the gym is 5 a.m. I wish I could tell you that after the events of “War Of The Roommates” things got better at my apartment…but that would be a lie. I'm not going to go into too many details because we still haven't really fixed anything, but basically, it's just very stressful and so I've been staying at my parents' house again. That obviously sucks for a lot of reasons, but what is important for this installment is that when I’m not at my apartment I don’t have the motivation to get up that early and work out!

It's okay, I thought to myself, I will just go work out after school and schedule my writing time for after that. The problem is after wrangling children for eight hours straight and working out I was just too drained to do anything else. This led to me having some internalized guilt about not doing enough and on top of that the week of September 19th, was just a particularly hard one at the school. These two things came together and caused a very interesting thing to happen. I’ve known that I have autism for 12 years now, yet in all that time I have never felt as Autistic as I did that week! I don't know something in me just snapped and I was overstimulated all the time.

“Where have you been?” Kid asked when I went to her parent's house last Saturday, September 24th.

“Well, I've just been super stressed and I'm feeling super over-stimulated right now!” I replied.

“Why?” she asked. I explained exactly what was going on. “Mitchie,” Kid explained, “You're trying to work on yourself. I know you know that results won't happen right away…but assuming that changing your lifestyle quickly is also unrealistic. You need to ease into it.”

After we talked a little more, we came up with a workout plan and a new plan for implementing The Mitchell Project. Basically in October, I'm only going to be working out on Saturday and Sunday, to start getting myself in shape. I will be spending the weekdays implementing a schedule and working on the mental health stuff and then in November we will re-evaluate and see the best path forward.

Life can be super stressful. Work, personal relationship drama, and one's own insecurities can all get in the way of reaching a goal. But that's why you have accountability partners! They can help you when you feel like quitting when you feel stressed, or even when you're feeling a bit unhinged!

Have a Greattastic Day and Be Safe

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 21: Sam's Fans Returns And So Do I

  Sam's Fans Returns And So Do I

As you might recall growing up my best friend was a girl named Samantha McCarthy, but I call her S.M. Unfortunately, she had a disease called Fanconi Anemia and she died on October 15, 2009, after a year or so in and out of the hospital. While she was in the hospital, the only thing that really kept her going was music therapy. So in 2014, her mom Nikki started a nonprofit that supports music and art therapy in Ohio hospitals, called Sam’s Fans.

The Hills market is a local grocery store that has two locations. I’ve never been to the downtown location, but the location I have been to has an outside patio with a little bar on it. Each Wednesday (I think… don’t quote me on how often it happens) that Hills market location has a charity happy hour benefiting a different nonprofit each time, and every September Sam’s Fans gets a night. The event goes from 6-8.

Last Wednesday, September 21, was the night of the charity happy hour. I got off work at 4:00, went to the store to get a few things, got to my apartment and I changed out of my long pants into shorts. After that, I wrote a little bit and finished getting ready.

I got to the Hills market at 6:10-ish. Nikki, her best friend since high school, Mandy, their friend and colleague, Allie, and Averi, the Sam's Fans social media director, were behind the bar serving. “Hey, Mitchell!” Nikki said when she saw me. I greeted her and the others and reached into my pocket to grab my wallet, but it wasn’t there!

I panic padded myself down and I still didn’t feel it. I knew that I had had it at Kroger, so I guessed that it had to be at my apartment. I ran back to my car, and raced back home! After looking everywhere else, I ran to my room and saw the pants that I had been wearing earlier in my laundry basket. I laughed at myself and reached into its pocket and sure enough, there was my wallet.

When I returned to the Hills market I realized that I hadn’t told anyone what was going on, so from everyone else’s perspective, I just vanished causing a slightly dramatic return. While I only had about an hour left of the event when I got back, I realized that my return to Sam's Fans in this installment is exactly what I’m doing in this series as a whole. 

I am very aware I haven’t talked about S.M./Sam’s Fans as much as I did back in Season 1 and 2. My plan was that I would have a guest blogger/podcaster each year on her birthday. I also had a plan for how I was going to depict Sam’s Fans from the beginning of this series all the way to a big event that is happening next March! While covid caused complications for both of these plans, this big event is still happening. In preparation, I am marking this installment as a return to form for my writings about Sam’s Fans!

Have a Greattastic day and be safe!

J. Mitchie Ulibarri

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 20: A Wedding In Wooster

A Wedding In Wooster 

On the same day in 2019 that I was interviewed for the after-school program at New Story (formally known as Haugland Learning Center), in another office someone else was being interviewed, let’s call her Savannah. Savannah was originally hired as a teacher support (the same job that I have in the present day). Basically, she ran around the school and made sure that all the kids and teachers had what they needed. I’m pretty sure I saw her leaving the school a couple of times, and she remembers seeing me at a hockey game that all staff attended, but other than that we had no real interaction.

When Covid hit, Savannah was promoted to teacher and she taught online until we returned to in-person for the summer school program before the 2021-2022 school year. It was at this point that Savannah and I finally met each other for the first time.

Savannah is incredibly empathetic. She’s literally always there when you need her! In fact, Savannah, along with our coworker Lucy, and her girlfriend (who also used to work with us) Clo, helped me through some personal stuff that was going on last year. She is also an amazing teacher. For the sake of student privacy, I can’t really give any examples but every student that works with her loves her.

Very early on in our friendship, I learned that Savannah was engaged. While the wedding was about a year away at that time, she had gotten engaged in 2020. Despite the pandemic interfering with the wedding, I assumed that she had at least solidified the guest list.

One day in March of this year, I was sitting in Savannah’s room after school.  “Hey,” she asked, “would you like to come to my wedding?”

“Of course!” I said completely shocked. Soon after this Savannah would also invite Clo and Lucy and the three of us decided to carpool. Last Saturday, September 10th, I drove to Clo and Lucy’s apartment at 10 a.m. After they finished getting ready, we packed up my car and I drove to Wooster, Ohio, which is about an hour and a half away from Columbus.

The wedding was outside of a greenhouse and the reception was inside. The wedding party processed in and when it was just Savannah and her soon-to-be husband Liam standing in front of everyone, his dad who was officiating, started talking about their impressive 10-year-long relationship! When they got to their vows… I was very glad that I was wearing sunglasses because on the outside I could look completely composed, but I may or may not have cried a little bit.

The reception was really fun! Clo, Lucy, and I mingled with Savannah and Liam‘s friends and family, and we all decided that we should lightly harass the bride and groom later to host a group hang out. While it was an amazing night, it was a little weird for me. This was the first wedding that I’ve been to that I wasn’t in or wasn’t a family member's. I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy not having responsibilities, but every once in a while I would panic because I felt like I should be doing something other than partying. After I would have a little panic, I would feel a bit socially awkward and out of place for a second.

It’s going to sound really backward, but my socially awkward moments made me feel more secure. Savannah has known me for a year now and so she knows how weird I can get sometimes. So when I would feel out of place I understood that I was wrong since I knew that she knew that it could happen and she invited me anyway!

Congratulations Savannah and Liam! wishing you luck on your Greattastic Life together! 

J. Mitchie Ulibarri 

 

Season 5 Who Am I? Blog 19: Mitchmas (25): The Mitchell Project (Part 2)

 Mitchmas (25): The Mitchell Project (Part 2)

My 25th birthday was just last week and for a long time, my birthday has been referred to as Mitchmas! The weekend that Lauren’s other guy was in town, was the week before Mitchmas. That same weekend, My “sisters” started their week-long family vacation. Since Mitchmas fell on a Friday and their vacation ended that same day, my “sisters”, (minus Kid) Marshall, James, and I planned to go out after my family dinner.

After I drove home from work, I drove to Noah’s apartment (which is about a block away from mine and Shane’s) and we waited for Lori to arrive. Once she did, we hung out for a while, and then we left to meet my family for dinner at Buca di Beppo. When we arrived I learned that my childhood neighbors Stephen, Robin, and their daughter Megan were coming too!

After dinner we went to my parent’s house, the girls, Marshall and James showed up, I opened presents and we had some cake. By the time we had actually gone out, it was around 11:30. We went to a bar called Julep first. After a few drinks, we decided to go to a club called Seesaw that August has been suggesting since 2019. On the walk there Arden asked me, “Hey Mitchie, what happened with Lauren?”

I started to catch her up on what she had missed, but I didn’t have time to finish before we got to Seesaw and it was way too loud to finish the story inside. When we left at 2 AM I continued the story and finished when we got to the car. At some point during the drive back to our parents’ houses, I said, “Well, back to the dating apps!”

The girls openly objected, but because it was so late and we were all kind of tired, they knew that we weren’t gonna get anywhere that night. As I depicted in “The Greattastic Adventurers: Miracle Child” my “sisters” and I spent a lot of time-fighting in our childhood. In the book, I only imply that there was a resolution to the main fight of the story. The way we resolved the issue was by making a contract that we all had to sign.

The day after Mitchmas, Marshall and I went to my “sister's” parent’s house. When we got there my “sisters” decided to defend their reasoning on why I shouldn’t go back on to dating apps. They looked up, “what happens to the male body after turning 25!” The girls were poking at my ego… Not to be cruel, but to prove a point.

I tend to base my self-worth on the people around me. Basically, when people are around I’m the most confident person in the room, but when it’s just me, I tend to focus on all the negative things about me. While my goal for the season is to figure out who I am, the point that the girls were making was that I’ve been looking for it in all the wrong places. From the very beginning of this season, I threw myself into a relationship with Gabby in an attempt to find out who I am based on that relationship and after that ended I tried to do the same with Lauren.

After thinking about it a little more I realized that the girls weren’t wrong. I asked them what I should do. We decided that I should start working on myself and they would be my accountability partners. Kid sat down, and in beautiful calligraphy wrote up a contract/list of things that I should work on during my 25th year. The list reads as follows:

The Mitchell Project

1. Work out 4-5 days per week

2. Listen to podcasts

3. Set intentions/daily affirmations

4. Experiment with style

5. BE INTENTIONAL!!

6. Time management/limit screen time

Have a Greattastic day and be safe 

J. Mitchie Ulibarri