My name is Tom. I am a former foster kid that was raised in West Chicago, and Joliet Illinois, and later finished school in Western NY. I had the unique experience and opportunity to be raised in a City atmosphere as well as going into foster care in the rural parts of Western NY.

It’s interesting to go through the gauntlet of constantly moving and having to adjust to going from a densely packed Chicago to rural America but it offered me experiences no one else my age was getting, particularly in America. America for all it’s “melting pot” history has quickly become silos full of people who believe they know better and everyone else is wrong.

I think the truth of this reality is that we’ve all been grinding for so long that we don’t have time to look up. We can’t look up for help, for growth, for opportunity. We don’t have the time, we don’t have the money, we don’t have the energy left at the end of the day to look up or forward to much of anything.

But what if we could change that? Particularly in rural America where experiences are few and far between and often quite uninspired. In the 1950s a guy by the last name Disney took a leap and bought some rural land in California and built a dream land for his daughters and generations of kids and families to come. These parks still exist, but typically they’re entrenched in a densely packed city, due in large part to their growth. Their affordability is through the roof and for the average rural American specifically these parks are largely out of reach.

What if, and imagine with me, we built affordable but EXCITING experiences where we’re at? What if we used the same tactics we’ve used to get by and survive to push towards a brighter future? Using tiny home building techniques, set building ideas, and the good old fashioned imagination of our local builders, doers, and creators we could create experiences in small spaces that are ever changing and entertaining.

Whether it be a sleepy village, a halloween town, a Christmas time paradise, why aren’t we offering these experiences? Well for one, affordability, how do we answer the question of what’s worth spending money on? I for one think young families and children would tell you that they yearn for these experiences but cannot afford them. This includes entry fees, travelling to parks like this (time), and the cost once you’re there in the park. It’s a daunting task to get to other places and enjoy but if it’s in your town easily half of those constraints drop drastically allowing a small family to go from spending thousands to hundreds. But how can we band as community leaders and make these things available to the every day citizen up to the richest and make it an experience that they both equally enjoy.

I see this as a matter of extending ourselves where the extension leads to unlocking community moments. These moments show children that art, music, architecture, and many other jobs allow people to dream, build, and create. They allow parents to look around and feel like life is more than just paying bills and working until we’re spent. They remind us that wonder is not just for vacations, but for every day.

When we create these pockets of imagination in rural America, we do more than entertain we plant seeds. Seeds that say to a kid in a small town, your story matters just as much as someone who lives in Orlando, New York, or Los Angeles. Seeds that remind adults that innovation doesn’t have to live only in Silicon Valley or corporate boardrooms it can live right down the street, in the hands of a welder, a teacher, or a retired carpenter with an idea.

The beauty of rural spaces is that they are raw canvases. Empty lots, old barns, forgotten storefronts they are waiting to be re-envisioned. With the right spark of imagination, they can become a Halloween village one month and a Christmas wonderland the next. They can host live theater, light shows, artisan markets, or entire story-driven experiences that immerse families in something new without the burden of travel or debt.

This isn’t about competing with Disney or Universal. It’s about reclaiming what those places first stood for: joy, play, togetherness, and the belief that imagination has power. If we can re-center that belief where it’s needed most in rural towns across America we don’t just build experiences, we build resilience, belonging, and hope.

So the question isn’t can we do this? It’s will we? Will we as communities choose to come together, pool our skills, and invest in experiences that make our children proud of where they live? Will we choose to create moments worth remembering instead of waiting for someone else to deliver them to us?

I believe the answer is yes. And if even a handful of us begin, others will follow. Because at the end of the day, people don’t just remember places they remember how a place made them feel. And if we can make people feel wonder, excitement, and belonging right where they are, then we’ve already begun to change the future of rural America.

So follow me as I humbly build my own version of this experience in Varnville, SC. If you’d like to be a part I’d love to chat.

So I felt the need to write this because it’s something I myself have had a great deal of issue coming to grips with.

While it’s true no one is going to up and forget Mark Zuckerberg, some of us remember Tom from Myspace… But who is he? What has he done lately? My point is no matter how big the impact we make in our circle or even on the world eventually we have to do something else.

My moments have been great (within my realm) and a little background on me is necessary I believe to fully shine light on the importance of the title.

In 2013 I created a football league called World Minor League Football. In one year we had garnered attention from the entire semi pro landscape. We had teams ranging from Canada to Arizona and everywhere from there East to the North. In total I believe we reached 16 teams. I remember having an early talk about having a championship game in an NFL stadium and the flack I got for that want. Fast forward to the end of that season we ended up renting Cowboys stadium for our championship game. I was ecstatic, so were a great deal of people in my circle, we did something no one in that genre had done, and no one had even dreamed before me of doing in a year.

So that was an awesome experience but admittedly I got bored and minor league football is a scary landscape ie players bringing guns to games, fighting refs, and a bunch of other less than savory things. So in 2014 after our uber successful season I decided to shut down the league and move into sportswear. In 2015 my former business partner and I started DNA Performance Sportswear.

Coming off of the league championship my personal visibility was at a fever pitch in the market of semi pro and minor league football so we took advantage. Our first two years were awesome and we utilized every chance we had until a quarter of the way through 2016 my co-founder went rogue and all but buried the business. (another story for another day)

Growth in DNA has slowed quite a bit as I fix all that was broken and I find that I still have my extremely loyal followers and friends but all that shine from WMLF has dropped to a very very dim sliver.

I am small time to say the most, I have topped out at a 40k month a few times and I do some small time mentoring and helping with young entrepreneurs trying to find their footing. But how does this work on a bigger platform?

Look at the guy I mentioned above Tom Anderson of Myspace. He has mentioned he loves being retired… He will for the time being forever be known as our first friend on Myspace. Tom has dabbled in a few things including photography but if asked any 20 something will more than likely be completely clueless as to who he is and what Myspace was.

My main point here as stated above is it’s not what you’ve done, it’s what you’re doing. VERY few of us will ever make the impact of a Martin Luther King Jr., Mark Zuckerberg, or an Oprah Winfrey in our lifetime and it’s time we realize that. So below I have put together three steps to stay semi relevant while you are going through your day to day.

1. NETWORK!: Meet people in the field or fields you are trying to stay relevant in. They say you die twice, once the day your heart stops beating, the second time is the last time someone speaks your name. I believe firmly that you can die that second time WAY before the first time so stay connecting and mingling with those you aspire to be, to beat, or to do business with.
2. Stay visible: No matter how often you feel like starting something new, keeping something going, or keeping something growing NEVER disappear from the places people know to find you. (There are a few cases in which disappearing WITH a warning helps your brand but that’s for another time as well) Stay up to date with your circle and customers on social media, via text, email, anything you can because the first moment they don’t see you is the first moment they start forgetting about you.
3. Start conversations/Show who you really are- Engage! Many times you can gain followers, keep followers, and even connect with other influencers by getting your mind onto paper or onto a screen. Medium is very obviously one way to connect with old, new, and prospective people through stories and opinions. You can utilize things like Instagram, Facebook, and even Snapchat to let people see a different perspective or side of you.

The above are just some straight forward options to keep yourself and those around you connected and continuously connecting. There are a plethora of options to bundle with those above but I will leave you guys to your own thoughts on connecting the dots with those.

Don’t rely on what you’ve done or who you were, be WHO YOU ARE and DO THINGS!

I’d love to hear your thoughts, give me a clap and a follow if you are inclined to do so. Stay doing, stay connecting.