Back in elementary school, I was tasked with choosing a ‘famous’ person who had made a difference in my life. Many students chose presidents. One picked Jackie Kennedy. Another, Marilyn Monroe.

I picked The Greatest.

Saturday morning I entered my living room, turned on CNN and learned that Muhammad Ali had passed away at age 74. I should have seen it coming; I should have been more mentally prepared. I knew these last years were rough. I should have known.

But I didn’t, and I certainly wasn’t ready. I dropped my purse onto the floor, and sipped my coffee while in a slight state of shock.

Ali was the reason I had a heavy bag throughout my youth and teen years. He’s the reason behind so much of who I am today.

Sure, he’s always been known for being pretty, being feisty, confident and of course, the greatest. He’s deserving of all those and more.

The Louisville native won his first Olympic gold medal in 1960. He was 18, and known as Cassius Clay. Before one of his matches at the games in Rome, he made a prediction: that he would win by a knockout in the second round. …His prediction came true. He continued making similar predictions on his matches, often in poem or rhyme form.

In Ali’s 1975 autobiography, he wrote that after returning to his hometown, he attempted to eat at a ‘whites-only’ restaurant, and he threw his Olympic medal into the Ohio river.