Storytellers: Through the Trees
(coming soon)
Seeing Green vs. Seeing Red
People see the world in green or red. I believe this to be a universal truth, it’ll just take me a few hundred words to explain.
There are, of course, exceptions to this rule. And, of course, compromises. Sometimes people have the ability to see green one day and red the next. Some can see the world through both green and red lenses at the same time (hello, it’s me), resulting in a muddy brown.
The easiest example I can provide of this conundrum is the story of how my yard almost cost — then eventually saved — my literal life.
I love trees, just not in my yard.
That was a big motivation for my wife and I building a house in Northeast, Ohio. Before covid, my wife and I lived in an awesome ranch four miles from the place we call home now. If location is the first priority, we nailed that decision a while ago.
My second priority was the yard. I grew up in a house with three enormous maple trees, so every fall, there was a minimum of two weekends dedicated to leaves. The house my wife and I lived in prior to our forever home had four maple trees. It’s like some (actual heroic) villain knew I was coming 80 years ago, and they planted seeds that would pop up in my nightmares like Freddy Krueger the moment I started having back problems in my 30s.
I love trees, really. I just hate leaves… when I’m responsible for picking them up. Or… there might be some legitimate hate for trees when they’re falling on my literal bedroom.
All I’ve ever wanted was a nice, rectangular yard with fresh, green grass. That’s what the home we were building would definitely have. So my wife and I went to work finding the right lot, then the right builder, then the right model, then the right time. And as Covid was raging its way through society, we quietly built our dream.
The only problem was our builder didn’t handle the yard or any landscaping. That was all on me.
When we found the money to install our yard (grass costs nearly five figures, unless you find the right grass man), we were so excited. The contractors spent two days leveling the yard, getting all the rocks off the property, laying topsoil and seed, and finally, putting the protective hay down so hungry birds didn’t loot our yard.
And then 10 minutes after our grass experts left, God showed up. We’d had an unusually dry summer, but an intense September rain began and my wife and I momentarily celebrated the fact that we wouldn’t have to water that night.
But then the rain started coming down harder. Then harder still. Then… destructively still.
Ten minutes of rainfall washed away thousands of dollars and hours of work.
This is what seeing red looks like.
The landscaper came back out and over-seeded the areas hit the hardest, but the damage was already done. The level and even topsoil had been disrupted by the heavy rainfall, and when the grass came in, it was patchy and uneven.
A literal act of God. Looking out at my yard, I still see red, even though the green has come through.
Over the ensuing three years, I fought two battles. The first was with my yard. Oh holy hell was it a pain to get this stretch of grass looking respectable. And the second battle was with my… weight.
Since I was a teenager, I’ve struggled with my weight. It started with an unhealthy relationship with food. Emotional regulation wasn’t a hot topic in my house growing up, so food was always how I gave myself comfort. And with the stresses of adulthood, fatherhood, home ownership and bad yard-ership, I needed a lot of comfort.
That’s what led to me gaining 40 pounds over three years.
In the summer of 2024, my wife, kids and I went on a vacation to Edisto Beach, which morphed into a five-day vacation in Charlotte thanks to literal tornados and a hurricane. The vacation got washed out very similarly to my yard, but I was secretly grateful. No sunshine meant no need for me to be in a swimsuit at 275 pounds.
But it was in that week of sadness that I decided to make a change. My life was remarkably perfect — there’s the stunning wife and two beautiful kids, a home that I love, and relatively good health, outside of what doctors would describe, “a little bit of a weight problem.”
So I went to work on that, very quietly. And I used the one thing that was out of alignment in my life to address my weight.
The yard.
In our previous house, we had a riding mower and a garage/shed big enough to accommodate a riding mower. Our new house had neither, so I was left with a push mower with self-propelled functionality,
That suited me just fine. I didn’t want or need a gym membership to lose the weight. All I needed was that trusty push mower. I started small by letting off the self-propel feature for two lines of my third-of-an-acre yard. By the end of that second line/strip, I thought my heart was gonna beat/explode its way out of my chest.
It was a humiliating demonstration for a guy who, 12 years prior, was running a marathon at a sub-nine-minute pace.
275 pounds and unhappy vs. 215 pounds and happy
It’s hard to say I was seeing any shade of color in that moment, but it certainly wasn’t green.
But I kept at it, because that’s what weight loss requires. I slowly started making better food choices. Instead of sneaking Wendy’s in between meals or ordering Taco Bell after a few too many drinks, I started eating at home. Or at least, I started substituting those bad decisions with better ones.
And the next time I mowed the yard, I was able to get three lines down before collapsing.
It went on like that for 14 months. The lines got easier, and so did the eating. By the time fall of 2025 rolled around, I had lost the 40 pounds I had gained in our new house, plus 20 extra pounds on top of that.
Losing 60 pounds in 14 months was not easy, especially when I kept my “weight loss goals” a secret from everyone, my wife included. I didn’t need the added pressure of people watching my progress — I prefer to let the results speak for themselves, and they have.
These days, I’m not anxiously stepping on the scale hoping to see a lower number. I still check my weight — every morning in fact — but now it’s with determination, not hope. I want to know the number every morning as a status update:
How did I do yesterday?
How do I want to do today?
Both questions are free of judgement and matter-of-fact. It’s seeing green and red at the same time.
And that, in effect, is how my yard saved my life. I know it’s a bit of a stretch, but I can only describe the tightness in my chest when I watched that rain wash away all the hard work in our yard that September evening. My family’s ugly history with heart issues and blood pressure manifested as ugly as possible in that moment, and it scared me straight.
In the end, it all worked out. I used that yard to push myself (and a 100-pound mower) around, and the result was a healthier husband and dad who’s going to be around a lot longer because he’s taking care of himself.
Oh and that yard… That’s turning itself around as well 😏
Small Bucket: OSU-PSU, Brian Kelly’s Family
Something my former employer Eleven Warriors does well is everything.
The ownership and writers that comprise the Eleven Warriors staff work their tails off to provide the best free coverage of all things Ohio State and college athletics. Dan Hope, in particular, is a guy whose off button is as real as Ryan Day’s Michigan problem. I know it exists. I’ve seen Dan take a break. Once. It was pretty cool when it happened over half a decade ago. I promise I’m complimenting Hope’s work ethic and not lamenting Ohio State’s four-game losing streak to Michigan.
Anyway, Eleven Warriors stretches every muscle of the digital experience — articles, longform, graphics, video, podcasts, events — you name it. It’s hard to pay for any subscription when the standard is putting out content for free every week.
They say the sincerest form of flattery is imitation, so here we are. Eleven Warriors starts every morning with something called the “Skull Session,” which is an aggregation of notable stories with commentary from the likes of Kevin Harrish, a ghost named D.J. Byrnes, and currently, Chase Brown.
With that said, welcome to Sonda Green’s (once-a-week) version of the Skull Session. A small bucket is something you can get before a round of golf — if you want to get a little warmup in. Most courses have a driving range, and a small bucket is a literal small bucket filled with golf balls that you get to hit aimlessly into an open field to warm up for a golf round.
This post isn’t a warmup for anything in particular. You’ll just see “Small Bucket” posts moving forward, because sometimes it just feels good to get a bucket full of balls you don’t care about, just to take shot after shot. Sometimes degenerates will drive 30 minutes to a good range for the sole purpose of a small bucket (hi, it’s me).
With that said, let’s dive in.
Ohio State was supposed to host a playoff matchup for the second time this season, but neither Texas or Penn State held up their end of the bargain. That doesn’t change the enormity of the matchup for some. The Nittany Lions have found tremendous ways to spoil otherwise remarkable Ohio State seasons over the last three decades. The 2005 and 2016 matchups are painful memories, but seeing the 2008 catastrophe firsthand from the A-Deck was… a different kind of hurt. Especially since 21-year-old David had enough to drink that he thought a Buckeye necklace was the play that night.
Look at this kid, thinking Terrelle Pryor was just gonna tuck his head and get the yards OSU needed in the fourth.
The Buckeyes are favored by three touchdowns this weekend. Here’s to hoping Ohio State has better luck than the next subject.
Will someone think of this man’s FAyMuILY
It’s not a good year to coach Lions, Tigers or… yeah just those two.
It’s not normal for two of the sports’ top jobs to open up in the middle of the season, but that’s where LSU and Penn State find themselves before Halloween. Both programs came into the year with playoff aspirations, with the Nittany Lions ranked No. 2 and the Tigers No. 9. Those two teams, collectively, are 1-7 in their previous eight games.
That’s a hard reality for the Lions and Tigers, oh my. It’s particularly tough for Penn State, which is only 10 months and a couple plays removed from competing for a national title.
James Franklin and Brian Kelly had earned the right to finish their seasons, but the schools they worked for are looking at Curt Cignetti with as much zeal as I possessed when I saw that cursed Buckeye necklace in 2008.
What’s left after these two institutions recklessly fired their head coaches — a pair of dangerously unpredictable teams. There’s a reason the Big Ten and SEC behemoths came into the season with such lofty expectations. There’s a load of motivated talent dressing up in purple and gold and blue and white this weekend.
That blue and white talent comes to Columbus Saturday with plenty to gain, nothing to lose, and unpredictability on their side. A lot of people thought Illinois or Wisconsin were Ohio State’s trap game, but the one kicking off this weekend has a better chance of souring Ohio State’s run.
Anyway, you guys remember when Brian Kelly, Boston native, faked a southern accent three business minutes after spurning Notre Dame for purple-er pastures.
I sure do. And on second thought, maybe it is okay to fire coaches midseason.
Hello, World
I want to play golf at Ohio State.
As far as aspirations go, that’s the first one I can ever remember having. I was a little kid, probably around the age of that handsome seven-year old in the picture at the top of this post.
I wasn’t a big kid like my two older brothers and younger step brother, and I didn’t have the natural elegance and grace of my younger sister. Even now, I’m painfully half an inch away from six-foot status. That absolutely does not bother me, by the way. Tremendously unbothered by that. I also didn’t grow my hair out and spike it a little bit… so that I could consciously lie and say I was six foot on an important government identification.
That would be insane.
But that’s the funny thing about aspirations. They make you do funny things. Sure I want to be six foot, but I’ve accepted that I am not (and I have an updated drivers licence to back it up). I didn’t play golf at Ohio State either, but I found a way to be involved with that great university in a way I never could have fathomed.
I’d like to tell you that story.
I primarily grew up in a house without a father, but in his absence were two of the best older brothers a young kid could ask for — as well as a mother who had the best of intentions and an even better heart. In a lot of ways, my dad was and remains the strongest man I know.
But without a father in my physical house, I looked for role models. That’s why it was tough for a kid like me to make sense of the John Cooper era at Ohio State.
Football was a part of my life the exact same way it is for most kids growing up in Ohio. Every spare moment after school, my brothers and I played football with our neighborhood friends. When we couldn’t play outside, we played an indoor version called “Regimbal football.” Our poor mother only had to pull one child out of the literal active fireplace in our living room (still sorry about that, Mike).
Football was so commonplace in our neighborhood, the Akron Beacon Journal sent a reporter and photographer out to cover our shenanigans. True story.
I certainly wanted to be a football player as talented as my brothers, or dare I say, those Scarlet and Gray Buckeyes — but my genetic makeup left me at a disadvantage. I was definitely the runt of the Regimbal litter, so as much as I wanted to make it happen, football was not something I excelled at.
Golf was, though.
Golf was always the great equalizer for me. It didn’t matter how big or strong my brothers were — when a golf club was in our hands, it became a game of finesse. And finesse is something I’ve always possessed.
So while my brothers went on to be the stars of our school football and basketball teams, I remained in the yard, mapping out golf course designs in our less-than-half-acre yard. All the while, I still loved Ohio State and watched every team I could: football, basketball… golf.
That last one is a bit of a stretch. I didn’t get to watch the Ohio State golf team because the Big Ten Network was just a gleam in Jim Delany’s eye back in the 90s. But I did get to watch the second greatest golfer of all time right down the road.
You probably know that guy by his name, “Tiger.” Tiger Woods made the local country club gem, Firestone, his personal playground during my childhood. When Akron’s finest was a stop on the PGA Tour, a young David Regimbal could be found prowling the ropes alongside Tiger wearing an oversized “I am Tiger Woods” Nike t-shirt.
Eight times. Tiger victoriously strolled through my backyard eight times. Over the years he collected five more victories in Columbus at… Jack’s place. Most people don’t appreciate that nearly 16 percent of Tiger’s victories came in the Buckeye state.
But even then, I knew Tiger was chasing the greatness Jack Nicklaus had already achieved. And in my book, he needs 70 total tour victories ~ outside of this great state ~ to truly be the greatest.
Just one win away.
Jack vs Tiger is not a debate for me… until it is.
The fact that Jack Nicklaus attended the college I idolized made him an easy role model. He had everything a kid like me could ask for. He had the best job in the world, he wore the right colors, and his playground (Columbus, Ohio) is the one I wanted to play in.
Here’s where I’ll fast forward to my college decision. It was an easy one: Ohio State. This was in 2005, of course, when the admissions office was asleep at the wheel. One tour and I was sold, but life has a way of laughing in your face when you’re on the brink of getting everything you want.
I mentioned my mother. She made cancer her bitch. Unfortunately that was around the time I was making my college decision, and I didn’t want to move away during such a critical time. It all worked out though. I worked in an authentic Italian kitchen and learned the basics, while completing one staggeringly amazing semester at Kent State.
That’s where my academic career ended and my literal one started. I got a corporate job doing sales and spent time with my family. My oldest brother Matt took me to my first ever Ohio State football game during the 2006 season. Either my brother or God knew I needed it. He picked the perfect game, too. Minnesota. The Buckeyes shut the Gophers out in a memorable matchup. Some of you may still remember the sound of that hit Ray Small took. I remember watching his soul leave his body from the C-deck.
Another reason that game was notable, however, is because Jack Nicklaus was there to dot the “i” at halftime. Like I said, either my brother or God knew I needed that.
My sales career wasn’t taking off the way I had hoped, and the owner at that company pushed me to find something different. I always enjoyed writing, so I started begging any website that would listen to let me intern. I got my first byline at a site called Bucks Insider, and that gave me a foot in the door with The Cleveland Fan.
I was off and running then. Over the following decade I secured bylines on several SB Nation sites before Bleacher Report recruited me to be its lead Ohio State football writer. All of that was cool, but the crown jewel of my writing career will always be the work I did (and the time I spent) with Eleven Warriors. In fact, it’s Ramzy’s fault you’re reading this post, actually. His writing has always inspired me.
The amount of cooooooking Eleven Warriors allowed me to do 😮💨
But by the time I hung up the ole’ writing pen… er… keyboard in 2021, I was left with… a career I never could have fathomed as a college dropout.
That brings us to current day. Today I am the founder and acting intern of Sonda Green LLC, a business that was started in a month like some kind of black/gold/green fever dream.
That’s the funny thing about aspirations. They don’t really die. They can fade. They can morph. Most often, they just hibernate. But unlike a bear, they don’t shrink — they grow.
For the first 18 years of my life, I wanted to golf at Ohio State. The following 18 years, I golfed and “went to” Ohio State… just in a different way than I imagined initially.
And so now I’m asking myself what I want the next 18 years of my life to look like. Some day I want to retire, but that’s probably… 18 years away. Today’s aspiration has to be something that propels me to that reality.
Some day I’ll be green. That’s why I’m always going to post on Sundays moving forward.
The day for closers.
The day for…
Sonda (Sunday) Green.
So what is Sonda Green? It’s a question a lot of people have asked me. And that’s one of the few questions I can answer with confidence right now.
Sonda Green is the home for my tired but somehow reinvigorated aspirations. I didn’t want it to see the light of day for quite some time, but a violent and unexpected push away from the career I built put it in the spotlight.
Sonda Green is my two primary passions, food and golf, wrapped into one chaotic package.
So I guess… Hello, world. My name is David, and I’m a 5’11.5” product designer who loves to golf and cook. And I personally don’t care what your passions are — I can just guarantee that if you invite me into your kitchen, the two of us will find a way to cook up something pretty special.