Christopher Dubhlainn O'Donoghue ❨ᴛᴇᴀᴄʜᴇʀ❩

[[deleted user]]

If there's one thing that Christopher O'Donoghue is passionate about, it's reading. But history comes right after that . . . unless he's hungry, that is. (In which case food comes next.) But yes, he's a history buff (yeah, buff - look at those strong, sensual arms). And he's damn proud of it. Because why wouldn't he be? History, to him, is everything. Everything that has been, everything that is - and someday all the will bes will be history. He doesn't believe in studying history so that you don't repeat your mistakes; he believes in studying history because look at this world around you - history is how it got to this point. Look at all the terrible things people have done wrong, and know why they're wrong, but look at the beauty, look at the innovation, look at the technology, look at the progress - look how far we've come. Of course, there will always be a long way to go still. Always. But still, look back. Just look. And learn.

This is something he's always wanted to share with people: the way every time he learns something new in history he needs to know everything there is to know about it, the way when he's explaining it to people his voice breaks with emotion a little bit and he gesticulates a lot more, the way he sometimes cries when watching the History channel. That is what he wants to share. Just... learning. If he could make someone feel that way, about history or about some other subject, then... well, then everything would be worth it.

Although it may seem like it would be more helpful to be studying to be, say, a science teacher, Chris' studies shouldn't be overlooked. And, well, Chris has always been smart. Not brilliant, mind you, but considering he had a 4.1 cumulative GPA in high school, he's not doing too bad for himself. But what he has learned from history is valuable: patterns, strategies, how to work with people. He might not know the process of cellular respiration or the velocity of a chicken thrown off the tip of the Eiffel Tower, but he's a leader. He knows what it takes, he knows what to avoid. And of course he's not perfect . . . but he certainly tries to be.

You see, Chris has a hero complex. He knows he has what it takes to be the leader of the group . . . so he's going to take that role. And, well, if you're also the leader type, there's going to be some problems. Because Chris is stubborn as hell and isn't going to be backing down, thank you very much. It's not that he doesn't respect other people - he does. But he's less than willing to give up control, and, well, he just wants to be needed, okay? And maybe that's his biggest weakness: that he would go to great lengths to feel needed. If you don't need him, he will integrate himself into your life until you do. He needs to feel needed, otherwise he finds himself to be quite useless. And, as far as he's concerned, he's far too good to be useless.

Christopher ("seriously... just call me Chris") Dubhlainn ("what? no it's not Dublin spelled wrong... it's pronounced dove-lin. it's Irish. because, you know, I'm Irish?") O'Donoghue was - as his accent makes clear - born in Ireland. There isn't, however, much that Chris remembers of his birth country - probably because his parents moved the family 'across the pond' to America when conflicts arose between the Catholics and Protestants. It was safer, and John and Mary O'Donoghue didn't want their children growing up in that environment.

For some people, religious freedom in America means the ability to wear their hijab in public, or the ability to worship their multiple gods, or worship no gods. To John and Mary O'Donoghue, it meant that whether they were Catholic or Protestant didn't matter to anyone but themselves, and it meant that their children - Christopher, Daniel, Isaiah, Elijah, and Rachel - could live a life in which they wouldn't have to face the religious conflicts that they had to endure.

At age five, Chris was a normal, American kindergartener . . . for the most part, that is. There was one teeny weeny big difference: he didn't sound like the other kids. He spoke differently, and the kids made fun of him for it. This, he came to realize, would not cease until high school. In junior high he took his first real history class . . . and he fell in love for the first time.

To Chris - who had loved to read since he'd learned how - history was the world's greatest storybook, ever. Learning about it, everything fell into place. Things were connected. Where there was an effect, there was first a cause. And things that confused him before didn't anymore. This continued on into high school. And the teasing stopped . . . but different problems arose.

By 'problems,' Chris means that he realized that other guys are hella sexy. And so are girls. And to a boy whose parents were devout, let's-read-Leviticus Christians, it was a hard thing to accept. He never told John and Mary, of course; because they'd flip their shit if their son was gay and heaven forbid bisexuality exist. So, yeah, no, it remained Chris' little secret.

And although he had some girlfriends and he may have fucked a guy now and then, Christopher O'Donoghue remained true to his first love: history. (And yes, Chris considers history to be his 'One and Only.') And when he went to study history in Pennsylvania, his parents were fully supportive. They didn't, of course, know about Stephen, but then again, Chris had been careful to not post anything on Facebook.

Nearly a semester into college, Chris realized something: he had no idea what he was going to do with his history degree once he graduated. And after several emails exchanged with his high school AP European History teacher, he realized what his vocation was - to teach. Because it was more, he'd realized, than just teaching people enough to know how to pass an AP test, or enough to get them into the college of their choice. It was about understanding, how every nation of the world is connected, about how sometimes people give and don't take and that's not okay, but that doesn't mean all people are still bad, and sometimes people repeat mistakes but sometimes they also learned from them, and this is the world you live in, and isn't it just so beautiful?

It is certainly beautiful to Christopher Dubhlainn O'Donoghue.