Impassioned.

I don’t understand how someone could express my thoughts half a century earlier and double a dozen times clearer.

I frequently mentioned that if I had a choice, I would choose to be born a boy. However I wasn’t given that choice and I always believed in taking things in stride. I’ve appreciated what I’ve been given and never considered being anything less than a woman, except, I believe in female strength and equality. As kids, we were all told to have our own big dreams and creating our special impact in this world we co-exist in. Somewhere though, I believe things went a little awry and people conform to stereotypes, stereotypes of race, gender. People were told where they belong and how to be themselves.

Standing at 5 foot 2, I came from a protective Asian family with siblings one to two decades older and my parents, almost 3 times older. The following quote sits especially well with me.

“Yes, my consuming desire is to mingle with road crews, sailors and soldiers, barroom regulars—to be a part of a scene, anonymous, listening, recording—all this is spoiled by the fact that I am a girl, a female always supposedly in danger of assault and battery. My consuming interest in men and their lives is often misconstrued as a desire to seduce them, or as an invitation to intimacy. Yes, God, I want to talk to everybody as deeply as I can. I want to be able to sleep in an open field, to travel west, to walk freely at night…“

– Sylvia Plath