For most of my life, kids I have met must assume I have everything. I make friends easily, naturally excel at sports and earn good grades. When I entered High School, most of the other 9th grade students were nervously and understandably trying to adjust. However, I already felt confident. Having begun playing hockey when […]
Sometimes things require extra effort for me…or at least that’s what I have told myself. And I must admit this is something I’ve always been a little bitter about. When I was younger, I couldn’t help but wonder why other kids on my sports team seem to have an easier time than I did? It […]
Check out RBC Flaunt It Award finalist Marica James incredible video titled Gray ! “In life everyone has internal struggles and occasionally it seems like things are only two-sided – that an outcome can only go one of two ways. There’s a good and a bad, a winner and a loser, progressing and regressing, and often we […]
Sometimes I felt like the anniversary of Pearl Harbor was like a second birthday, and a terrible one at that. You know those birthdays that you know you should be happy, but your mom made you invite all of your seventeen annoying baby cousins? And you’re dreading it because you know you’ll be spending your […]
“This piece represents the hardships that I have endured in my life. The textures, found objects, spray paint and even the glitter offer a glimpse into who I am as a girl becoming a woman. The world has shown me pain and neglect from my alcoholic mother, which is represented by the nails as I […]
I was already eight, but I still had no words. One winter in second grade, nai nai and gong gong visited us. As they stepped through the door to leave, my father gave me a quick glance, raising his eyebrows and nudging his head toward my Chinese grandparents. But there was nothing for me to […]
“I am different because I’m an outlier. I am constantly taking the path less taken. Everyone else fits nicely into categories and groups and I am that one piece in the puzzle that doesn’t fit. My drawing represents my outside persona which is happy, free-spirited with coachella vibes. My outgoing nature and my bold clothing […]
I was an alien. Simultaneously trapped in two different worlds that loved and hated me. My feelings were a puzzle I could not put together. Perhaps I didn’t belong in this world. Perhaps the world didn’t belong to me. I remember hearing the judgements and looks from across the room. They snickered at my mother […]
My work deals with my ADHD that I live with on a day to day basis. It makes a lot of things difficult for me. Expressing my thoughts and feelings through words is something I have never been able to do well. Once I found photography, it made things somewhat easier for me. I celebrate […]
I remember your eyes like juniper and mint leaves, the eyes you said held me when I was just a twinkle in your mind. Narrowing at the girl who refused to sit on my bed because I was too dark, and brown paint stained. The first moment I remember looking up at you, your hair […]
Just as women are put under a lot of pressure to act feminine, men are put under even more pressure to act masculine. Usually, if a man/woman doesn’t conform to the stereotypical behaviors and image of a “manly man” or “girly girl” then they are ostracized or […]
Five, six, seven, eight: a count off before you begin a dance. This was screamed every time we’d start a dance at a theatre company I’d lost interest in two years ago. The wood floor was pulled up in some spots, the walls were a dirty color of salmon and the wide mirror in front […]
“Wow, your hair is so weird! Elliot, feel this!” Though I did not know what it was at the time, I first experienced what can be called a microaggression on my first day at the Maret School, where I am currently in 11th grade. I was a 6th grader at the time and I was […]
This work deals with women’s inner conflict with body image. The figure refuses to look at herself, disinterested in her appearance and unwilling to accept it. But she spots an escape to her conflict – she spots knowledge and wisdom, a book at her feet. I believe […]
Knowing who you are comes from knowing your past. That’s what most people think, though not everyone leaves their homeland as a baby. In the spring of 1999, when I was six months old, I traveled from China to the United States with my adoptive parents. Raised in New Jersey, I tried to absorb life […]