“I’ll have a good opportunity to talk. But then I change my mind and just decide not to say anything. But then I’ll think back like, I should have said that or he should have taken the opportunity to actually talk to that person.” said sophomore Jacob Harper. 

Times of regret take over Harper as he keeps thinking back on the scenario and what seems to be a missed opportunity to socialize. One day, all of the anxiety and fear were faced.

During baseball practice, Harper is seen talking to an individual while looking down instead of making eye contact. His friend Noah Martinez (10) suggests that he should talk to people with more confidence by meeting eyes with the other person next time. He decides to take the advice and is determined to be more social with the next opposing team they face. It would be less difficult to achieve since, being strangers, they would be unaware of Harper’s usual personality. He took the initiative to strike up a conversation that ended well for the most part. Since that day, he had put in effort into becoming more of a confident and social person at school. He believes that this moment has truly changed his life for the better.

Harper has an undying love for his ultimate role model, Batman, because of his realistic characteristics. Other superheroes were either born or given powers, but Batman built his status and knowledge through pure merit. He also holds ethical morals that other superheroes do not such as never eliminating villains regardless of their unforgiving status.

“Everyone can be Batman. He inspires me to do better for myself like paying attention at school since he’s super smart.” said Harper. 

Through the aspirations that he has from Batman, he has found various ways to individualize himself such as wearing a fedora. One day while hanging out with his friends, he found a white hat outside of a 7/11. He decided to wear it as a joke and ended up getting compliments from his friends.

“I wanted to stand out more. I didn’t want to be part of the group. I wanted to stand out as my own. Fedora – I saw it as kind of an opportunity.” Harper said. Every day from that moment, he decided to wear the hat to school to stand out from the crowd since he got comments from others that the hat suited him quite well.

Even with the confidence that Harper has developed, he still sometimes has difficulty overcoming situations that make him feel belittled. A recent example is when he offered to help his dad at a baseball practice, however, his dad declined in front of high school graduates and college students leaving him feeling embarrassed and emotional.

Regardless of his sometimes unfortunate situations, he is still determined to improve his social skills even today. Harper, who once felt anxious to socialize with others, overcame his fear with the help of his friends and the superhero he admires.