By Derrell Connor Special To Channel 3000

About a week ago, I accepted an invitation from Christine Toal from the Dane County Juvenile Detention School Program to come speak to some of the young people there.

That?s a no-brainer for me. Anytime someone thinks enough of you to invite you to come talk and to interact with young people, you jump at the chance. My only concern was sharing my life experiences and describing how I ended up on the radio and writing columns, because, according to Christine, I am a role model for children. This is a new experience for me; I have never thought of myself in that way before, outside of raising my own kids. I wasn?t sure if I would be comfortable talking and presenting myself in that way. My other concern was the audience?high school teenagers. Will I be able to connect with them? Will they see me as someone that they can?t relate to? Will they even listen to anything that I have to say?

When I walked into the room at the detention school, there were about fifteen young people waiting for me. Some were African-American, some white, some Latino, and almost all males. I could tell by the looks on some of their faces that this was the last place that they wanted to be? listening to some blowhard telling them how wonderful he or she is and how successful their life turned out to be. I could certainly understand that, having been a teenager at one time myself. So while I did share a little about my life and how I got into radio and writing, I also wanted them to know that I wasn?t here to preach to them. I was once where they were: hurt, distrusting of authority, scared, feeling like you have nothing to offer to the world, hopelessness, hanging with the wrong crowd, no father figure or mentors, and either feeling like, or have been told over and over by people that you loved and trusted, you?re no good. I wanted them to know and understand that a lot of people have been in the same situations that they found themselves in today. Many have been dealt a bad hand in life, but it?s how you deal with it, overcome and triumph over it that counts.

After I was done sharing my story, I opened it up for any questions they wanted to ask. And boy, did they ask! We discussed everything from school to the Super Bowl to hip-hop to talk radio and politics. At one point, I was asked a question that really made me think and brought perspective to my visit. Did I think that their lives were over because they were spending time in the Juvenile Detention Center?

As I pondered over that question, I realized that we are all just a bad mistake away from finding ourselves in a situation where we could be behind bars. Most of us live our lives trying to do our best to minimize the amount and the types of mistakes that we make. But we also have to understand that most of them aren?t fatal. With every mistake that we make, there?s always a lesson that we can learn and take from it. In fact, it can often make us a better person because of it. So I told them to take what they?ve learned and when they get out, use those lessons to avoid making the same mistakes. Because in the end, you can?t allow the past to define who you are. It?s never too late to turn your life around.

So thank you Christine for the invite. I look forward to my next visit.