As a child I was dyslexic and shy. Learning was hard and school was terrifying for me. Like, if I had to speak up, I became extremely nervous, because I had trouble pronouncing words and reading. I was one of those kids that never raised their hand and participated in class. So I never spoke and adults were scary to me.
At home, though, I felt safe and nurtured. My mother studied fine arts, and my father architecture and their artwork was all over the house. The basement was always full of projects; every Christmas my parents would be downstairs silk screening Christmas cards. My mother was a fiber artist and was always weaving something — her loom was in our living room. So I grew up in that kind of environment, where, you know, we were creative. Unlike school, it was easy, because I could draw, and I would escape by drawing.
My mother would find opportunities for me to enter drawing competitions, I remember entering a Baskin Robbins ice cream competition and winning 31 free ice cream cones, and every time you win something you gain confidence. When I was about 12 I submitted something for a UNICEF contest. The theme for that year was family and I drew a scene of my whole family. Even though I didn’t win they sent me a copy of a UNICEF textbook where they used my drawing as the cover art. I remember opening up the package and taking the book out. I was like, ‘that’s my drawing on a real book!’ And I’ve been drawing ever since because, honestly, it’s the way that I best connect with people and with the world.
I realized this even more during COVID to tell you the truth. One of my classmates had this idea of having a reunion over Zoom, and then this reunion started becoming kind of like a weekly Sunday gathering. I don’t enjoy myself in big groups and so I started to sketch during the meetings. I sort of doodle draw everyone and the things we are talking about and it sort of became this thing where it started bonding us together, you know, like people would want to come to the meetings because they wanted me to draw them.
I’m blessed, because I can use my pen to tell stories and bring people together and that’s what I love to do. Drawing has given me the confidence to be visible and have a voice.