INTRO
the name of my talk is who i am and why i'm here.

for a man of my mature years, defining oneself can be a little tricky.

so, i'm going to solve this by starting with my birth and ending at this very moment right here.

that may seem an ambitious goal to achieve in six minutes but i'd guess that for many in the room, standing in front of an audience and told to entertain them for six minutes will feel like a lifetime, so it's actually rather fitting.

BULLETED LIFE
to begin.

my name is troy lane dearmitt.

i was born and adopted in lancaster pa.

when i was six, my parents poured their combined wealth on a twin bed in a one room space they occupied. the family fortune on this day came to 23 dollars and some change.

a few months later, my family left the state of pennsylvania in the dark of the night, my father, after fitting as many of the family possessions in the car as he could, rolled it down the hill past the landlord's house to escape detection.

we drove west along the canadian border until hitting the rocky mountains where he turned left.

the money ran out in fort collins colorado. this is where we'd spend the next twelve years. (the story goes, if gas was cheaper in cheynne wy, that is where i would have grown up, but my dad, ever the stickler for a good price at the pump, even to this day, didn't like what he was seeing in cheyenne and thought he could pull another sixty miles from the tank).

aside from puberty wreaking havoc with my hair, the twelve years i spent in colorado were quiet and uneventful which worked well for my demeanor.

when i was 18 my mother started a second career as an std woman for the cdc. translated this means a sexually transmitted diseases woman for the centers for disease control. and yes, your assumption is right, there is not an 18 year old boy on this planet that wants his mom working, publicly at least, in venereal disease, but i'd need another six minutes to get into the neurosis this brought on, but to give you a taste, i'll add the picture that i was usually the only boy in my college class who when pulling his book out of his bookbag would have five condoms spill into the aisle.

six months after arriving in st. louis i was thunder bolted by a st. louis girl. for those that might not know what getting thunder-bolted means, it means after seeing a person, the next thought to come from your mind's printer contain the words 'that is the girl i am going to marry'. and yes, this is like the greatest, most important, most valuable piece of knowledge a young man can ever receive. there is only one exception to this informational windfall and that is when the girl you were thunderbolted by did not get the same message, which was the case here. thus, i got to spend the next eight years convincing here i was the man she should marry (she had many suitors) which in time she did.

as our relationship solidified i assumed between st. louis and colorado we'd be living in colorado. but it is very true what they say about st. louis girls white-knuckling their zip codes because here we are some twenty years later.

and that is how i came to be in st louis.

WHY I'M HERE
next, as promised, let me share how i've come to be specifically in this room.

everyone i've mentioned this toastmasters affiliation with, who knows me, has expressed surprise.

the reason for this is for the past twenty years, every job i've had has included or been solely about public speaking.

so people who have seen me talk or work wonder why i'd join such an organization.

the reason is i have a secret.

the secret is before every speaking engagement i've ever done, a war has been waged in my mind.

a war full of shouting and intimidation.

this war was waged before i gave my first talk twenty years ago.

this war was waged last week when i guest lectured in a class of graduate students.

this war will be waged again this friday when i give an hour long talk to 100 law students.

and yes, this war was waged before this talk today.

the good news is in the last twenty years i have never lost this war. i've never avoided a speaking opportunity and every time i said i'd speak, i spoke.

but the smartest among us say that the true victory is not in winning the battle—the true victory is avoiding the war.

that is my personal goal—to not have the war.

and that is why i have come to be in this room today.

and that is who i am and that is why i'm here.