He stood out to me before we became friends.
His all white hair and a matching goatee contrasted well with his dark complexion - you could spot him easily in a crowded room.
He was quick to laugh, knew everyone, and introduced himself to newcomers. He was the ultimate volunteer dad when our oldest was in elementary school, leading songs at assemblies and raising funds for a new electric piano.
He had a habit of throwing his arm around your shoulders to take selfies on his phone with everyone he saw - and people felt more included than annoyed by this gesture. It was universally accepted with affection in the context of his personality.
But none of those memorable attributes particularly caught my eye.
It was an assembly for the PTA Reflections contest where I first observed his subtle genius. His daughter, a couple of years older than mine, had won an award in almost every category in the contest (photography, dance, music composition, filmmaking, material arts, etc.). She required a cardboard box to carry all of her medals and trophies.
The next closest award winner had an order of magnitude fewer pieces of flair. She had swept her age group entirely.
After the requisite selfie, I asked him what his secret was. He glanced around conspiratorially and then whispered in my ear, "She starts early and enters every single category. In photography, she's competing with 30 kids. In dance, maybe 3 kids enter. Ditto for music composition and film. Just enter everything and play the percentages - persistence will carry the day."
I grew up nurturing an identity as an artist. Sure, I was a science kid, but I also devoured books in the local library's Reading Olympics every summer, wrote poetry as part of a local youth program, and parlayed skills from drama classes at the recreation center into small roles in high school musicals and membership in multiple singing groups.
On occasion I brag to my wife that she married the high school recipient of the prestigious Bank of America Vocal Achievement Award.
Unimpressed, she replies, "I'm guessing it was for most improved."
But I digress. He had figured out how to transform his child into someone who bought into the notion that she was an artist.
I wanted my kids to foster artistic identities, to think of themselves as possessing creative impulses and the ability to successfully express them through art. The following summer, my daughter and I began weekly daddy dates where we set goals to create entries for every category in the following year's competition.
We submitted her entries when school began the next fall, and then forgot about them until the awards assembly. Just as the wizard had predicted, persistence carried the day. My daughter placed well enough to be called up on stage by the principal for all but one category.
The year after that, my daughter spent even more time on every entry, and encouraged my son (who would be starting elementary school the next fall) to do the same. Each kid swept their age group, photos from that day showing trophies under arms and multiple medals around necks.
It was not about the recognition (how do you compete in a one player game?), although that obviously made them feel good. It was about developing identities as artists that they might carry with them into adulthood.
The wizard taught me how to raise kids who see themselves as creative beings. That's magic.