Alissa Cassese

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Blue And Green

...I cut my sun in half and color the top half blue and he bottom half green. And I hold my drawing in the air saying 'Ms. M Im done! ' She takes one look at my drawing and smiles but then points to my sun. 'Alyssa, what's your favorite color? ' I laugh and tell her that I don't have a favorite color. She chuckles then puts a gold star on my paper and says I tried… I tried. I tried? Other kids had gotten golden stars because their art was beautiful, and I got one because I tried? I slumped down in my seat, grabbed the blue crayon and drew over the green part of my sun. I bring my drawing back to my teacher and ask her if its better. If now it's beautiful. She smiles again and says 'Of course I think it's beautiful.'

Teachers in the sixth grade are obsessed with asking their students what they want to do when they grow up. Whenever I hear the question I get a nervous tug on my heart because although I love writing, I like to act. I love the idea of being able to play and pretend to be someone I'm not. I can't choose what I want to be when I grow up and I know from experience that it's not a good thing to like two different things. So when my sixth grade teacher asks me what I want to be when I grow up I mumble out an answer. I mumble that I want to be a writer and an actress. He just smiles and says 'You have to pick just one.'

The realization that I liked girls as well as boys hit me like a freight train because my whole like I had been programmed to think that liking two things instead of one was the worst thing that I could do. But my favorite colors have always been blue and green. So what am I supposed to do about that?

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