 Now, Ariana Snellia-Bragus, going to count on Country Bushel. She's going to read from the actual worthy true diary of art's comedian, Sherman the Lightning. This is one of my favorite books. It's a story of a boy fighting to overcome everyone's expectations for him. It's a sad story. There's drinking, death, bullying, abuse, racism, and poverty. It's a happy story. There's love, victory, courage, and forgiveness. But it's also an important story. It's about hope, determination, friendship, and family. And yes, it has swearing, and sex, and violence, and lots more of all of that, because it's honest, and it's human. And because of all this, it's really powerful. And I'm thrilled that my son, who is this year a ninth grader at Bozeman High School, is being assigned to read the actual true diary of a part-time comedian. I'm so thrilled. I'm really sad that other teams are denied this choice. Tonight, I'll be reading from a chapter later in the book. My dad's best friend, Eugene, was shot in the face in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven in Spokane, way drunk. Eugene was shot and killed by one of his good friends, Bobby, who was too drunk to even remember pulling the trigger. The police think Eugene and Bobby fought over the last drink in a bottle of wine. When Bobby was sober enough to realize what he'd done, he could only call Eugene's name over and over, as if that would somehow bring him back. A few weeks later in jail, Bobby hung himself with a bed sheet. We didn't even have enough time to forgive him. He punished himself for his sins. My father went on a legendary drinking binge. My mother went to church every single day. It was all booze and God, booze and God, booze and God. We lost my grandmother and Eugene. How much loss were we supposed to endure? I felt helpless and stupid. I needed books. I wanted books. I drew, and I drew, and I drew cartoons. I was mad at God. I was mad at Jesus. They were mocking me, so I mocked them. There's a cartoon, I mock his full of them. Jesus' partip and laughing in purpose in harmony were miraculous. I hoped I could find more cartoons that would help me, and I hoped I could find stories that would help me. So I looked up the word grief in the dictionary. I wanted to find out everything I wrote about grief. I wanted to know why my family had been given so much to grieve about, and then I discovered the answer. Webster's Dictionary. Grief, now, when you feel so helpless and stupid that you think nothing will ever be right again, and your macaroni and cheese taste like sawdust, and you can't even jerk off because it seems like too much trouble. Okay, so it was Gordy who showed me a book written by the guy who knew the answer. It was Euripides, this Greek writer from the fifth century BC, a way old dude. In one of his plays, Medea says, what greater grief than the loss of one's native land? I read that and thought, well, of course, man, we Indians have lost everything. We lost our native land, we lost our languages, we lost our songs and dances, we lost each other. We only know how to lose and be lost. But it's more than that, too. I mean, the thing is, Medea was so distraught by the world and felt so betrayed, she murdered her own kids. She thought the world was that joyless. And after Eugene's funeral, I agreed with her. I could have easily killed myself, killed my mother and father, killed the birds, killed the trees, and killed the oxygen in the air. More than anything, I wanted to kill God. I was joyless. I mean, I can't even tell you how I found the strength to get up every morning. And yet, every morning, I did get up and go to sleep.