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I’m living in a city that I was born in but have few memories of. I’m surrounded by family history and relatives that try to give me the sense of a home that I never had. I’m torn between wanting to be the best and wishing I could be satisfied with normality. I wake up feeling the ambition rush through my veins each morning to feeling the exhaustion of striving for perfection each night when I fall asleep. I’m described as a cute punch in the face, something approachable and relatable yet something equally harsh and abrupt. As a child, I loved reading a book on a rainy day as much as I liked burning leaves with a magnifying glass on my driveway. I’m obsessed with dogs and prefer them to people yet I’m too afraid to have one for fear of how sad I’ll be when they depart.

Every time I have tried to label myself as one thing, the opposite appears. Every time I have achieved a level of “perfection,” I’m hit in the gut with the other parts of me that don’t agree with my own sense of excellence. While the song “Wide Open Spaces” may seem cheesy to some, it has always been a favorite of mine. My favorite line “to find a dream and a life of their own/ a place in the clouds, a foundation of stone” describes my dreams in life. My dreams are as high as the clouds but I remain planted on the ground like stone, wanting to find certainty and stability. I find myself wishing that I could build a stone castle in the sky …perhaps one day I will.