To me, honor is finding the right balance through life. For example, it is good to be confident, but not so confident as to be arrogant. It is good to have pride in who you are and what you've done, but too much pride will blind you from the truth. It is good to be humble, but not so humble as to be meek.

When this balance is in practice, you and those around you will have more exceptional days than marginal days; more exceptional days lead to more exceptional months and years. I'm looking to bring this to our state government.

My parents left Erie, PA when they were 18 when my dad entered the Navy. They only had $500 and a suitcase to start their life together. Within a few years, they had their first two children.

My parents dove head first into the American Dream, and they raised me to take risks and do the same. Today, my mother is a professor with a PhD and my father is an engineer for the defense industry. Their courage is my foundation, and I would not be half the man I am now without them.

In the weeks after September 11th, 2001, I was still in basic training. Training was understandably intensified at that time, and I was exhausted and felt alone. I approached by senior drill instructor and I told him that I did not belive I was cut out to be a Marine. His scornful expression softened, showing the only humanity I had seen at that point and would ever see again. He asked me the most important question of my life, “Do you have heart?” I knew I had more than most, and I replied in the afirmative. He ended the brief conversation by saying, “Outstanding! Now get the [explitive] out of my face, pig!”

I want to represent you because I know I have the heart for it. I know I can be “The Man in the Arena” as Theodore Roosevelt spoke of,

“ It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs , who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

• Born 1983, Virginia

• Moved to Shrewsbury, MA in 1990

• Joined Marines Sept 5, 2001

• 2008 Earned Bachelors of Science in Business Management from Arizona State

• 2011 Earned Masters in Business Administration