My Love Of Life In Life

Ever since I can remember, I’ve loved to read. When I was younger, I would grab any children’s book I could find and ask my mom to help me read it over and over again until I was sure that I could do it on my own with perfection. As I got older, the books got harder but I never lost interest. I can’t say the same passion came for writing though. I’ve struggled with writing ever since I first started writing essays and paragraphs in 4th grade.

Music is the reason I wake up each morning; it is the reason I go to school each day; it is what I spend all of my free time doing. Since my seventh grade, music has been my passion. My parents introduced me to the joy of music at a very young age, so music has always offered me the same everyday comforts as Blue Box mac and cheese. I have been exposed to many genres of music from Classical, to Pop, to Jazz, and many others.

Although I was born in Mississippi, I moved to Florida and lived there for almost half of my life. Florida was a time in my life where life gave me lemons and it gave me lessons that I will forever be grateful for.

Love is that crazy feeling that everyone gets to experience at least once in their lifetime. From a young age, we are taught mainly by Mexican parents, that having feelings towards another individual meant getting “cooties”. (A children’s term for getting imaginary germs from another boy or girl by either touching them, kissing them, or holding hands.) However, getting “cooties” never had a real meaning. Well, at least not for me. I was a kiddo that was unique. Ever since I was young, I was always being told, mostly by my parents, that love was the best feeling that you will ever get to feel within you. I’m guessing that neither one of my parents got their heart broken because they never told me that love could also break you. That’s what happened with my first love. The first I fell in love with, and the one who broke my heart. Experiencing affection towards another individual and having my heart broken was the time I learned something new.

I am blessed and have been blessed since the day that I was born with many examples of life. I am the youngest of five so, I have seen the lives of my siblings unfold in front of me and this has taught me more about life than anything else. Each of my siblings has their own stories and troubles that they have lived thought and more than anything they have taught me how every person's life is different and you may come from the same place but your life can be vastly different. Of my siblings only two graduated regularly from High School my oldest brother, David, and my youngest older brother, Conor. While they are very similar in appearance and interests their lives form completely different paths after college David set out for South Korea for five years to teach English while Conor went to college forty minutes away. They each created their own lives and searched for meaning in their lives in their own way.

Growing up carma was something that always followed me. Knowing that, I always tried to be the best child I could be. Although, sometimes I would stray away from that thought. Each time I did something wrong, something bad would happen in return. Knowing that, you would think I learned my lesson at the age of seventeen, but nevertheless, I didn’t. My actions caught up with me and I had to pay the place. After that one particular accident, I learned my lesson. I learned to always tell the truth and never be afraid to just ask. I got in many troubles that could have been avoided by just asking.

My life has always been boring. It’s always been the same things again and again, but without my music, family, friends, and my daydreaming, I would never have a chance to at least try overcome my problems such as social anxiety. Without those things I probably wouldn’t be able to do things like die my hair wacky colors.

I was the first born in my family. I am the oldest of 20 great-grandchildren and 13 grandchildren; I’m the first of my generation in my family. With this being the case, I was often put in situations where it was just me and a bunch of adults. I am very grateful for this because, now, I can talk to adults and strangers very easily. Through these experiences, I have been able to have conversations with all sorts of people. I have heard stories of great success and of grand failures. In my experience, the wisest people are those who had awesome success without losing the meaning or true happiness of life. In my life, I have had two people who were real mentors to me, Jeff Sandefer and Gretchen Anderson.

Kumi Yamashita (Kumi): I was born in a small town not that far outside of Tokyo. I moved to the United states when I was in high school as a foreign exchange student.

Everybody wants to find their perfect other halves. I'm here to tell you, it's not always where or even when you're looking. Sometimes love shows its glorious face when you're least expecting it. I just so happened to find it in a barroom and it changed my life forever. Even though I never thought I would be in another meaningful relationship and I tried to "hook him up" with my friend, Jordan has become, not only my significant other but my best friend and soul mate.

Dear family, mother, father, dearest grandmother, and beloved cousins, if my misfortune is your happiness, then I'll gladly suffer. If my wails at night are music to your ears, then I’ll write you a symphony. If my blood, sweat, and tears keep you shining, then I’ll bleed you an ocean. To my family of whom I would do anything for, if the Hannah Pham in front of you doesn't meet your standards, then, I’ll gladly see her out.

To adequately explain my love of the arts and social sciences, I must first recount my first experiences of art and how that experience shaped me to become, and I quote my mother here, the “artsy fartsy” person I am today. Much like any child, when I was in elementary school I changed what I wanted to be when I grew up frequently. In kindergarten, I wanted to be an artist. A traveling art merchant who sold pieces of themselves off to the highest bidder, a person who traveled the world but always seemed to come back to France because, to me, that was the epicenter of artistic innovation. I'd won several local art competitions by the time I was eight and to quote myself, “If I don’t do art, I will die.” By the time I was in third grade, my romanticized view of art had changed drastically. I was disenchanted with the art scene in my town, and I told my mother that I wanted nothing to do with crayons, let alone a full-blown art career. I quickly latched on to another hobby, singing. My passion for singing, at the time, was so pure and my talents were limitless. My friends and family told me it was a natural gift, and that I was given a vocal range that rivaled even the best in the business, and I believed them. They fueled my desire to train my voice, to join every local choir I could, and to eventually even travel as far as Los Angeles to showcase my talents. But, I slowly become disenchanted with singing too. It became another dream that seemed impossible to waste time vying

I live and breathe music. Music is the reason that I wake each morning; it is the reason I go to school every day, and it is what I spend all of my free time doing. Since the seventh grade, music has been my passion. Because I was raised by parents who introduced me to the joy of music at a young age, music has always offered me great comfort like Blue Box mac and cheese. From an early age I was exposed to many genres of music from classical, to pop, to Jazz, and many others. Since I was an infant, my father shared his love of Mozart, Neil Diamond, and Billie Holiday. In addition to listening to music, I learned to play various instruments over the years beginning when I was four years old when I played “Mary Had a Little Lamb” on the largest pipe organ in Nevada. Unless you count the pots and pans drum set from our kitchen, this was my first experience playing a musical instrument.

I feel like i'm out of my mind. My world keeps spinning off course into darkness, problems, losses and feeling alone in my world. I feel myself drowning. Who can relate? I just don’t wanna be here anymore, i just wanna kill myself. I’ve been praying for someone to love me to take me into their home to accept me who i am. I want to find a reason to live to till the end. I want to find a lover to be happy for once in life. I don’t want anyone to be disappointed at me for being who I am and what I prefer in life. I feel myself moving in this world, traveling to find someone searching each corner, inch per inch, trying my best in life.

Growing up I can remember our house always being enveloped by music. Every holiday we had music playing, during summer mornings and weekends our house was woken up the thumping of a drum or the soft string of a guitar. It engulfed our ears with its voice. I can recall a time when I was much younger where under our television was an elephant of a stereo that roared aggressively like a lion when played. I felt as though my heart was going to explode with each beat a song made, it was the best feeling I had ever had. Mother always told me about her time as a child playing the clarinet, “Oh, I loved it” she would exclaim then with a smirk she’d add, “I was very good at it too”. You could see her love of music like it was her makeup. I’d always found music to be fascinating, always wondering how it could make such a thundering, glass shattering sound, then become as gentle as a kitten's purr. Music, when it reached my ears was pure joy, the beats to each instrument meticulously planned out by the artist. The variety of music was even more interesting than the different tempos it could be played at, a genre for every quinquagenarian a new artist for every song you would hear. It was constantly changing, which is why I think I loved it so much, it reminded me of myself.