Essay

You sit in the middle of your college cafeteria—top floor—and things become very apparent to you, very quickly.

I often wonder how plants feel. It’s hard to comprehend how there can be living organisms that don’t seem alive, such as trees. So still and silent. I remember the house plant growing from a seed, but it seems unbelievable.

I can almost feel the warm Florida sand under my feet from last summer. The sweet sea air tickling our noses. My friends and I rushing to the ocean every morning, swimming for hours and talking over lunch.

United States Department of Education,

I'd like to start off by saying that this is a matter that has multiple ways of approaching it, discussing it, and evaluating it.

In a historical aspect, “perfectionism” is described as the American desire to constantly improve society. Many people think of perfection as something to strive for, something like striving for the moon and actually landing among the stars.

From time to time random memories of my childhood resurface. Memories from when my mind was simple. From when I didn't bother to understand myself because I was too busy dusting up a pair of Nikes.

You know, sometimes I have these moments. Moments where I snap out of the rubber band ball of my own mind– and it hits me. Like the salty aroma of a beach, the profuse sentiment of sonder is inhaled through my nostrils.

To be a leader, you need to be brave, you need to have courage, and you have to decide what is best for those you lead. A leader needs to be smart, and a leader has to speak up for injustices in the world.

I have this "thing" about finishing chapters that sort of changes the experience of reading for me. I don't like to quit in the middle, or after the first page, even if it's a book I hate. I have to finish it.

The Washington Monument, Mt. Rushmore — these places were the pride and pinnacle of what America should’ve been.

The cymbals clashed. The audience erupted. The lights flipped on. And then, it was time for us. Time for the dozens of hours we had spent practicing to pay off in three minutes.

Grief, in all forms, in all ways, changes you. I am not afraid of spiders—they crawl, and they creep, and they dangle from their long lines of gossamer webbing, and they watch me.