He realized the NBA wasn't likely to start knocking down the door of a "toothpick" so he turned to art.
"One day I was this big basketball guy and next day I was this nerdy arts (kid)," said Doc Waller of his transition in high school. "I just realized, wow, the arts are pretty cool. And then I can get girls if I do really cool poetry."
But Waller, 28, does admit he's fond of grabbing a wrench and using it to completely restructure his life.
"I do that a lot," Waller said. "I need something that'll throw a big screwdriver into my process. I need something that'll shake up whatever I'm doing right now."
But for the last few years Waller's life has been consumed by one immutable goal -- the formation of the Layman Group.
The Layman Group is a non-profit arts organization that began last fall, but finally opened its office on the top floor of Behind the Glass.
One of Waller's purposes for the group is to provide a way for local artists, who don't like that they sometimes have to move to larger cities to pursue their work, to stay in Auburn.
Waller said another purpose for the group is to bring the arts to people who might not otherwise take the opportunity to experience them. "I want truck drivers and construction workers to be able to have something artistic about their day and not have to be completely tunnel vision on their work," Waller said.
Waller, on the other hand, appears to have experimented with almost every kind of art there is. Waller wrote poetry in high school, did theater while serving in the Air Force, performed West African Dance after he was discharged and has performed spoken word poetry at the Gnu's Room. Of his career, Waller said he is particularly proud he achieved "working actor" status in New York City. All the sacrifices were worth it, Waller said, when he pulled out his first pay check to pay for a coffee on Chambers Street in Manhattan. He said he's willing to make sacrifices because he needs art.
"Just like coffee, if I don't have a lot of art, if I don't have a lot of expression, I can get headaches," Waller said.
So, Waller will continue to express himself.
"There was a point where I realized I can't do anything else," Waller said. "Not that I don't have the ability to do anything else, but if I don't do this, I'm just going to be a very depressed person." And Waller is trying to bring what he so obviously loves into the lives of Auburn's residents.
But Waller stressed that the organization is not for him. It's for Auburn. "I'm very proud of the
Layman Group," Waller said. "This is a very, very big, significant achievement for the city."
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