Learning to Love Myself

A personal essay by JC Eastwood


Transforming my self-loathing into something more.

Nineteen. Nineteen minutes to run a mile and a half. 

Exhausted and wheezing, I paused to rest near a tree as even the girls passed me by. A poor attempt to pretend re-tying my shoes fooled no one. Embarrassed, my little grey plastic inhaler remained in my pocket and when I returned home, I remained in my room. That day, I was not only embarrassed; I was embarrassing.

My parents couldn’t know about my pitiful track time. My father was the famous local basketball coach and my mother, a former swim instructor. Being an athlete wasn’t forced upon me, but it was expected. It was in my blood. It was in my DNA. But, it was not me. I was me. Criminally undersized, fitfully clumsy, and physically handicapped. Even as a fifth grader, I understood that I was just…me.

The Colors of My Room

A personal essay by Matt Easton

Painting my childhood room rainbow said a lot more about me than I knew at the time.

I still remember dad’s face when I told him the color I chose for my room. Are you sure you don’t want a bright blue, or a dark red? he responded, trying to lead me in another direction. No, I answered firmly. I knew what I wanted.

I was only eight years old when I got my first room, too young to know what implications came with wanting to paint my walls rainbow. After all, dad told me I could choose my favorite color, and my favorite was all the colors. Each one spoke to me in a special way; it was like asking me to pick my favorite stuffed animal or put on my favorite Disney movie.

Uncomfortable

A Personal Essay by Hailey Kate Chatlin

“When Citizens prefer comfort to principles, much that ought to be valued is not.” -Joel M. Allred

Zoey Davis sits alone at the lunch table reading a book. She wears a green short-sleeved shirt with a tiny pink bow sewed onto the chest. Her plastic cheetah print headband has shifted to the back of her head allowing strands of curly brown hair to cascade around her face.. I should sit next to her. She’s only reading to fill the silence, I should sit down… but my friends are waiting for me upstairs. What would we talk about? I brush past the table giving Zoey a small smile and wave.

On the Heavens, Scouts, and Weed

A personal essay by Anson Call


A lame week at an Indiana scout reservation allowed us to experiment with newfound idealogical freedoms and the beginnings of growing up. 

Every night, we’d quietly lift our hard, nylon mattresses off of our creaky, rusty cots and out of our dirty, canvas tents down the trail a half-mile to the beach's easy swells.

We laid on the sand, carefree, (Kolten, the two White brothers, and I) listening to the lake while Kolten showed us where the stars were. We'd done constellation requirements before for merit badges, but when Kolten pointed them out, we faced them for the first time.