High School Writing: “They Call Me a Knucklehead” by Larry Lee Martinez

1st PLACE HIGH SCHOOL

They Call Me a Knucklehead

My name is Larry,
But most days
It comes with a sigh.
Why can’t you be more like them?
My older siblings,
The examples,
The success stories,
The ones whose names
Never need explaining.
I’m the loud one.
The outgoing one.
The knucklehead.
The one teachers think
Isn’t paying attention
Because I laugh too loud,
Talk too much,
Take up too much space.
They don’t always see
That I understand.
I just don’t always show it.
I’m smart.
I know that now,
But for a long time
I hid it,
Because being the funny one
Felt safer
Than being compared
And coming up short.
At home,
Comparisons hit harder than insults.
Why aren’t your grades like theirs?
Why don’t you focus like them?
Why don’t you act your age?
What they didn’t ask was
Why I became this version of myself.

Being loud was armor,
Being outgoing was survival,
Being helpful was my way of saying,
“I matter too,”
Even if no one noticed.
I learned strength
by showing up as myself
in rooms that expected someone else.
By helping classmates
Even when I was told
to worry about my own work.
By laughing
When quitting felt easier.
Resilience didn’t look like perfection for me.
It looked like trying again
after being dismissed.
Like choosing not to believe
that being different
meant being less.
There were nights
I wondered
If I were just the mistake
In a family full of success.
If being the knucklehead
was all I would ever be.
But courage showed up quietly
The day I stopped apologizing
For my personality.
The day I realized
Being loud doesn’t mean being lost.
That intelligence doesn’t disappear
Just because it isn’t displayed
The same way.
I don’t rise by becoming my siblings.
I rise by becoming Larry.
The kid who helps without being asked.
The guy who fills rooms with energy.
The one who knows more than he lets on.
The one still learning

That strength can be noisy,
Resilience can laugh,
And courage can look like
Refusing to shrink.
Maybe I’m not like them.
But I’m still standing.
Still growing.
Still here.
And that counts for something.

12th Grade, Ánimo Watts
Guiding Teacher: Yvonne