I grew up with Star Trek and The Sound of Music. And it shows. I love to sing, I love to dance. I love space, I love science (chemistry aside), and, caution aside, I love exploring the unknown — things that both mediums share, whether it be the unknowns of the universe or the unknowns of a life and love beyond a little church, in the arms of a captain of the navy and his seven children. As silly as I’ve always thought this sounded (because I believe things will only influence you if you let them) this show and this movie really did affect who I am, who I became, before I even knew there was anything beyond a movie or a show’s purpose to tell a good story. Before I knew about the psychological power of television and the big screen. And these fandoms are still affecting what kind of person I am turning into. What kind of person I want to be. Though, to be honest, I really don’t know who that person or what kind of person that future me is. I don’t know what I want yet, not completely. But maybe that’s the beauty of it, that you’ll never be completely satisfied. That there will always be something more to want out of life, something more to strive for.
I write, but I could never be an artist. I want stability. I can work 16 hour days, but I cannot face the prospect of not having work every single day for the rest of my life. The uncertainty of being able to provide for myself is just too much, even though I know that is an uncertainty everyone faces every day. No one is safe, but working a 9 to 5 job plus 10 hours of overtime in a cubicle, inches you just a little bit closer to that illusion. That oblivion, that routine. I could never resent routine; routine, to me, is a necessity. And I suppose my lack of routine now is why I feel like my life is compressing into one small unaccomplished blob.
But then there comes the want to do what I love, and that is to write. That is to direct people. To not be chained to a desk. To travel all over the world, with a presence as powerful as a Starship Captain and an appearance as captivating as The Baroness. I want my feet dying in 5.5 platform Gucci heels, and my Chanel suit slightly wrinkling from daily 12 hour flights between Asia and New York; my Louis Vitton luggage and Hermès carry-ons heavy with paperwork and successful advertisement pitches; my caffeinated brain confusing the American security guard because I’ll forget that he doesn’t speak Tagalog, Mandarine, Japanese, or Korean. I want to work with all different kinds of people in the creation of a vision of beauty – a beauty like the beauty captured in romances like The Sound of Music or imagined in fantasies like Star Trek; a beauty that is immortalized by its ability to teach and inspire.
Well, my life is just starting (it’s been starting since the moment I entered my high school four years ago) and now that I am in college, the best I can hope to do is keep walking. Yes, keep my eyes peeled for road blocks or required changes in direction. But ultimately: just keep walking.
Because getting lost in space or the hills of Austria is still just part of the journey.
