I was branded as the loud kid from the moment I entered elementary school. The worst part is that I didn’t realize it. For me, my volume was just my normal speaking voice and I would get frustrated with my teachers every time they told me not to shout while I spoke. It turns out I was breathing with my diaphragm and that gave me a voice that drew attention to me every time I spoke. The worst part is that I loved to talk. So every day, I would struggle with the fact that kids would avoid me and tell me to be quiet for something I couldn’t help. Though I can’t blame them. I must have been hurting their ears. Thankfully, I was able to utilize that strong voice in my after school program's choir and theater. While most singers struggled to project, I did it effortlessly. For the first time, I was proud to be loud. Soon, that would translate into my presentation skills during AVID in middle school that would later be refined in high school through Virtual Business. Though I think the best part about being loud is that it’s impossible for me to go unnoticed. I easily draw the attention of my teachers and constantly participate during class discussion. At some point, I also forced my classmates to recognize me and forbade them from ever letting me disappear into the background. I practically engraved myself into the memories of others. Now I’m one of the best public speakers amongst my class. I’m often the first one to present. I get full points on volume and audience engagement. I even auditioned to be a graduation speaker and was the first to do the interview. I didn’t get the part. But I still got to present the speech in English class and caused a girl to cry from my speech on legacy. How legacy is something we all leave behind through the people we meet rather than the achievements we have accomplished. My English teacher loved it so much and asked if she could use my speech as an example for future speeches.i said yes, of course. Soon, I’ll be off to pursue a Bachelor’s in Creative Writing where my words in books will have just as much meaning as my spoken ones. And who knows, I might find other ways to utilize public speaking beyond presentations for things like activism, motivational speeches, lectures, and whatnot.

Writing is an important art form just as any other media. It evokes emotion and forces the reader to contemplate thought. I remember being a young girl who discovered a passion for reading that would later become a passion for writing. It was there I decided, "I want to be the next biggest writer and inspire many young people like myself." Tell me of a book you love. Either from the present or the past. Do you remember getting lost between the pages? Perhaps even wanting to be part of that world? Do you remember wanting to be in shoes of the protagonist and contemplating what you would do in that position? Books provide a form of respite and console the young mind when it has to make due with the harsh reality it is facing. The wonderful thing about writing is the expanse of the author's mind and their ability to walk you through it. An author will conjure worlds from the most abstract concepts that have the chance to manifest in the real world because they're tied to human nature. 1984 and the eradication of thought and changing the past to fit the narrative. The Hunger Games and trying to maintain your humanity in the games while trying to survive, and then start a revolution to dismantle an unjust system and lose sight of mission when all you want to do is to eradicate those who maintain the system. The Handmaid's Tale and how society ends up oppressing women by deciding what is best for them and "protecting" them from men. All these are topics a relevant and are a mirror to our society. Books are some of the most accessible art mediums and therefore important to the distribution of controversial ideas and alternative thoughts. My current project is a book on the usage of AI and how that might look like in society. Much like 1984, it will delve into thought. How these machines are rendering humans incapable of thinking and rendering them incapable of anything meaningful and profound. Today, we see that literacy rates are declining, students let AI do their homework, and there is an overall hatred for humanity because they can't see beyond their own wants. It will also take from Fahrenheit 451 and Brave New World on the loss of individuality if we let AI do our writing, art, homework. It cannot think, and inept of capturing the human experience. It isn't the AI's fault. No, the fault lies with the people who are pushing it to be used in hopes of making art into cheap labor to capitalize on. They will take from the artist and feed their soul into the machine to produce an abomination of mankind simply because they can't satiate their bottomless greed.

My parents are not helping me with my higher education, and I have had to excel in my studies to get the degree I want. Thankfully, I am off to Full Sail University on a $30,000 scholarship for a Bachelor's in Creative Writing, but I need to cover the rest of my tuition with more scholarships. I plan to make an impact through my writing because the most profound experiences are the ones you make people live through. I want to be one of the greatest writers to ever live and have people remember me after death. In fact, let me tell you my love story and how I see romance so you can taste a bit of my writing. Now, my sexuality wasn't something I contemplated, I like both men and women, but didn't realize I could date whomever I wanted until my teenage years. However, I was weary about getting into a relationship. Growing up, I saw how couples would have their love turned fickle by time for a variety of reasons. The lady withered and could no longer be loved by her man, and he would turn cold and unkind until his lady could no longer bear it. Or they simply were so immature and would begin to purposefully hurt one another to retaliate against their partner. I simply vowed to be careful when it came to choosing a partner. In a way, separating my sexuality from my appreciation for beauty allowed me to understand my emotions better. I could love a woman for the way she was kind to the world and understanding, and I could love a man because he was a nurturer and considerate. Seeing the person prevented me from falling in love with the idea of them. However, I had not truly fallen in love until I had met my beloved Judas. I remember it vividly. A friend brought a classmate into the D&D club I was a part of. Immediately, I saw a reflection of their soul in the way they presented themself. The colorful hair and the quirky little earrings of rats, pompoms, skeletons, fuzzy worms, and even Dr. Pepper. I thought, "You're so cool... You'd probably never want to be friends with me." I would later find out they were trans, but that didn't matter. He is a human all the same and I wanted a connection all the same. I wanted to get to know him, be his friend, and understand him, without realizing I was stumbling down the road to love. It started small. Letting them ramble about all the things they found interesting. Consoling them if his parents got overbearing and wouldn't let him foster independence. And then my Judas told me about his experience dating. Both genders. He was hurt and wounded, and I came to bandaged them up. I understood what the Greeks meant when it felt as if Eros had shot them. I had fallen in love. I cared deeply for this person and and was in awe in the sheer beauty of his soul. Somehow, I ended up in a relationship with a trans man, and I adore the fact I have my freedom to be with him because to my parents he is my "girl best friend." I know that with my writing, I can encapsulate human experiences and make people understand. I can change their way of thinking and force them to put aside their prejudice because the driving force is empathy and love. That I can eradicate whatever irrational thought and emotion is clouding their head and make them see.

Does creative writing count as an art form? If you don’t think so, it does. Much like how an artist will stir the hearts of those who lay eyes on their creations, a writer can evoke the most heart-wrenching thoughts and force a reader to walk a mile in the tumultuous journeys fabricated by their mind. Just like cave paintings, a written language and storytelling is a defining trait of humanity. That’s what entranced me about reading. Every form of expression and imagination became a more mature version of playing pretend in elementary school. However, it wasn’t until middle school that I was actually exposed to the idea of writing through fanfiction. A girl’s favorite piece of media, and being able to insert herself into the world to interact with the beloved characters. What more could see want? Well, to write her own fantasy books that will have young children like her enamored with her storytelling. And that’s exactly what I want to do. I may be no Shakespeare, but oh to have your work immortalized and loved for centuries after your death. Dare I say, it made me a better thinker. I sometimes wonder if I was a poet from the Romantic era considering how much of the ideology I carried without knowing it could be classified as Romantic. Pardon my morbid thoughts on death. I am quite the melancholic. Not in the sense that my sorrow comes from unknown roots, but from knowing too much. Out of the four humors, melancholy was revered. A melancholic person’s wisdom comes from spending countless hours mulling abstract thoughts in their head that most people are too cowardly to even entertain. Often times, melancholics are lonely because they can’t stand not being around others who can’t reflect for the life of them. Yet we wouldn’t trade our knowledge for blissful ignorance and conform just because ordinary people say so. All these thoughts came to me from reading and writing. Writing is the most sacred art form because it’s not always meant to entertain like a play. Much like a painting, it’s supposed to make you look deep within your soul and confront emotions you didn’t know were buried there. To bash it open like a pomegranate and disect it to extract the succulent, ruby fruit from within. Then with patience you savor the juice of the seeds that bursts on your tongue from when your teeth gently sink into the delicate flesh.

My family is a mess you see. I could probably make a telenovela out of it. My father came from Mexico looking for a better income since he grew up on a ranch. My mother faced a lot of financial instability in Nicaragua and needed a way to send money to her sons. Somehow they met, and I was born, completely unaware of the injustices I would have to overcome. Both my parents resent each other, and in turn, caused me to resent some parts of myself. My mother would lament the way Mexicans supposedly talked, and constantly corrected my Spanish if I used words she didn’t deem proper. My father would also nitpick at tendencies I picked up from my mother, saying I nagged like my mother and wasn’t proper Mexican because I ate food from her home country. Then I was in for a rude awakening when I discovered my father had many children before me. He tended to be absent for work as most Latino fathers do, and left me to be raised by my mother. However, he once brought me to meet my older siblings who were only a few years older than me. He did not protect me when they took out their anger on me. I understand they were children, but I shouldn’t have taken the brunt of my father’s shortcomings. It only got worse in high school. He told me he paid for their college, a few of which haven’t done anything with their degrees, yet he won't help me for my college for reasons I cannot fathom. Yet he's the one telling me to apply to MIT and Harvard when he doesn’t know anything about student loans. My mother was a wonderful woman, but she became a Scientologist. If you don’t know, it's a cult. That’s all I need to say, and I feel bad because I know they’re taking advantage of her emotionally vulnerabilities and want to take her money. She won’t listen to my pleas, so I’m left on my own to make my own path. The biggest thing I got out of this family is resilience and spite. Thankfully, my mother strove for my education despite my ADHD hindering me at first in school. She let me be held back in second grade because I wasn’t on par with my peers, and it helped me. With an IEP, I was able to continue through middle school and high school as an honors student. Even now, I'm part of the National Society of High School Scholars, and many colleges have offered me scholarships to attend their schools. As of now, I’m going to Full Sail University on a Creative Minds Scholarship for creative writing; most of which will pay my tuition. I want to make a life out of my writing, get my mother the help she needs so that she can leave Scientology, and make enough money to help my younger brother also get through college, who is also going through the same hurts I did growing up in this family.

Writing is an exhilarating experience. There's so much fun in complex world-building, plot-making, and character development. I began writing in sixth grade for the enjoyment of changing the endings of my favorite shows and media, but soon it became my artistic expression that I would hone for years. Writing helped me throughout emotionally excruciating times. I won't get into the personal details. It would feel as if I were to expose a very messy and raw side of myself, but to summarize, I made poems and short stories based on small concepts such as burnout, lethargy, and anguish. I found that the solemn short stories and poems were cathartic, soothing my woes like a balm to a gushing wound. I also adored taking inspiration from Romantic Era writings because they resonated with my writing style, and it sparked my interest in publishing my works. Once I got better, I decided to expand on writing through my schoolwork. I enrolled in advanced classes such as Pre-Honors English, Gate, and AP English during high school. My objective was to keep honing my writing and learn other forms such as argumentative essays to build on my experience with plot-making. I also joined a creative writing club that didn't last long because they didn't hold meetings that often. I've also reached out to newspapers and magazines to publish my works. I'm also looking to join writing competitions once my financial situation gets better. Once I graduate high school, I hope to become a renowned author or journalist. Other than that, I adore using my writing capabilities to help my peers and friends. I occasionally proofread and offer feedback for essays and CERs to my peers to meet the rubric's criteria. However, I get to exercise my technique and display my experience when it comes to making D&D (Dungeons & Dragons) campaigns. I taught the DMs (Dungeon Masters; think of them as the narrator) how to make stories to keep their players engaged while also ensuring that they don't abandon the campaign, a common problem due to too much improvisation. It's called "sandwiching", and you do it by having a beginning and an ending to act as the bread of your story. Everything else that you put in between will be the rising actions, climax, and falling action. They found it very helpful. Since writing is a big part of myself, and since I'm in the Virtual Business course at my school, I'm working on making a company with affordable editorial and marketing services. Though, I know that's not always promised with AI threatening the livelihood of writing, I need to stretch myself out and seize every opportunity I come across.