Finding my OWN
I’ll never forget my first big role in the Black History Program. Standing backstage, I could feel my heart thumping up into my chest. “Just relax,” my friend Breonna whispered. “You’ve got this down pack” an old slogan we use to use. I nodded and said Bre was right. I’d been practicing my part for the Black History play for about two months. For some reason all I could picture was the audience jammed-packed with kids, parents, teachers and many others made me feel an anxiety like never before. I just wanted to run and hide in one of the many rooms that were backstage.
As I contemplated doing this act in my mind, it was far too late because there was Mr. Joffrion, my drama teacher, introducing my person and I. “Ladies and Gentlemen we will now have the life and legacy told by the fabulous diva herself, Ms. Ella Fitzgerald.” Breonna gave me the hardest nudge, felt like someone had just taking out some anger on my arm. As I walked on to the stage, all I could see was faces upon faces and bright lights. I saw my mom with the camera in hand snapping tons of photographs. As I waited for my cue with the music; I held the microphone so tightly that my fingertips were white. From there I closed my eyes and began to recite everything I had learned within the last two months, it flowed like the ocean with every enunciation and pronunciation to all the words that had once been a struggle to say. Everyone was so quiet and I heard my voice echoing loudly through the