Smudged Graphite

As a kid, I was incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to try out lots of different activities. From dance, swimming, martial arts, ice skating, to learning piano and viola, my childhood was full of dipping my toes into all sorts of hobbies. In my free time, I would read books obsessively, write stories, and post silly little blog posts about new games I invented with my elementary school classmates! Out of everything, though I had so many hobbies, I would say that my favorite thing to do was to draw.

My mind was always bursting with ideas and I had a wild imagination, so when I did take art classes for a brief period of time, many of the studies and exercises I was assigned would be turned into a canvas for fun extra decorations. While writing pages upon pages of stories in my notebook, I’d try to illustrate the ideas that I had in my head onto the paper. My childhood friends were very creative and artsy as well, and I have lots of good memories of writing and drawing with them.

Truly, I was just a small kid scribbling and doodling silly ideas, and I had no idea how much drawing would take my interest years later. I’d ask my mom about how she drawn those little characters in her phone book during long phone calls, and start getting mesmerized by stunning fanart of books I liked online. From little crayon doodles on scrap paper and worksheets purely for fun, to spending all of my time in classes in middle school sketching obsessively with my friends, to my high school years when I fully threw myself into studying drawing and art — to the point that I almost decided on attending design school in New York City — child me would have never believed how far their hobby went.

Nowadays, I can trace almost everything I do and study to the kid with the non-stop urge to make and create. Through it all, my love for drawing has followed me, all the way starting from that little kid who always had smudged graphite on their hands.