For most of my life, I have been other people. A thirteen year old girl who commits suicide for her star-crossed lover in Verona, a hungry little girl in a flowing red cape who skips through the forest looking for her grandmother’s house, a peasant girl who falls in love with a beast in an enchanted world. As an actor, I did my growing up by listening to and learning from the lessons I taught onstage. From Wendy Darling, I learned how important my curiosity is. From Belle, I learned the vitality in forgiveness. From Little Red Riding Hood, I acquired caution towards the dark sides in humanity. And from Juliet, I learned of raw, unrestrained passion- the kind that can only be felt, not mimicked. With every character I developed- every song, dance, and teary-eyed monologue- I held what their stories gave to me with the highest regard, heeding to the mistakes they made and taking joy in their victories. Day in and day out, I went from costume to costume, script to script. I spent thirty hours in the theatre a week changing my voice, my face, my clothes, and my persona into someone else's. Soon, I began to realize that by spending all my time morphing into different people, I had neglected myself. By the time I turned fourteen, I was a shell, the hollow framework of a girl who could write you three paragraphs on Shakespeare’s subtle use of sonnet in Act 1 Scene 5 of Romeo and Juliet in ten minutes but didn’t know her own favorite color. I got lost in a sea of the same black leggings every girl in my hometown wore year round, and started drowning somewhere pounds deep in foundation I was too afraid to take off at night because I wasn’t sure who the girl under it was anymore.

Frustrated, I started to fill my time with any and every life experience I could, from finding punk shows in LA garages to taking spontaneous mountain road trips with my friends. I jumped at every opportunity to climb buildings, write, and redecorate my room until it finally felt like a home. I bought a camera, and lugged it around in an acid-washed denim nineties backpack across the state, and then past that. I spent hours and hours finding music that I decided shaped me, I started drawing, I threw out every pair of black leggings I had and replaced them with piles of thrift shop denim. Eventually, I took a pound or two off of the makeup I plastered onto my face day after day. And somehow, I landed here, no longer the shoddy outline of half of a person, but a woman- sure in what I believe in, and sure of what I don’t. Somewhere in between music festivals and day trips to Chinatown, I found the other side of who I am supposed to be. I realized I hate EDM, I’m funny when I’m nervous, and I make great quesadillas. I know I love Childish Gambino, I still get scared of the dark, and I cry really easily over those sad dog commercials with “In the Arms of an Angel” in the background. I adore my light pink high-tops, I could sit around in my room with a cute coffee mug and a Pablo Neruda poem for hours, and now I can say (with full confidence)-my favorite color is yellow.