Second Draft

Chapter One Memoir

Here I am

Just one year ago I was a senior at North Carolina State University finishing up degrees in political science and psychology. I had applied to twelve law schools (quite late in the cycle, might I add) and did not yet know how the entire globe would shift upside down. I did not know that I would soon be told not to return to campus after Spring Break. I did not know I would have to pick a law school sight-unseen as every anticipated subsidized trip to visit the schools I was accepted to was canceled. I did not know that in a few months I would pack up my things and move to New York City after never going further north than D.C. prior. I did not know that ninety percent of my first year of law school would happen in a freshman-dorm sized room through my webcam. And yet, here I am.

Where I am from

My background and life experiences brought me here. I am a low-income, bisexual, half-Latina woman who was the first person in my family to graduate from college. Before my mother moved to the United States, she lived on a literal dirt floor in Honduras. She only had a 6th grade education prior to getting her GED here (that’s as far as public education goes there). I threw in a line in my personal statement about how one of my homes, Tegucigalpa, Honduras was ranked number one for highest murder per capita rate when I lived there from 2008-2010; whereas, the second of my homes, Holly Springs, NC, was the safest town in the state. I also talked about how my marginalized identities feel much more present in the United States. While my dad is a white American whose family were poor farmers in Holly Springs for at least five generations, there has been a population boom in Holly Springs of primarily upper-middle-class residents. In Tegucigalpa, I understood the privilege of the relative wealth we had to live in a neighborhood with armed guards—particularly during the 2009 coup d’état.

These experiences, in conjunction with the many conversations I had online, started my political shift towards leftism. Interestingly enough, my dad is a hardcore Trump supporter (you should have seen the yard during election season) and he was the parent I grew up with after my parents’ divorce when I was a toddler. But that did not stop me from serving my community in leadership positions in Students for Immigrant Rights & Equality (SIRE) and in Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) throughout my undergraduate career. That activism felt much more meaningful to me than anything I learned in class and is what really pushed me towards a career where I could help make material change for marginalized groups.

Where I am going

My main interest is in working for immigrants, but I can also see myself in civil, human, or workers’ rights work. One of the main things SIRE did was support a family whose father was forced to live away from them in their church as sanctuary from ICE after living here peacefully for 20 years. I always wanted to be able to do more than just fund-raise and bring groceries and law seemed like a career field where I could actually make things happen for people.

I am not a perfect advocate. I have felt the pressure that Columbia puts on its students to go the big law route, with almost every event and so many resources tailoring to that. However, I know now that my practice will stay with my roots. I am still interested in studying something like community psychology or sociology at the graduate level in order to diversify my skills and knowledge to serve communities in the ways that they need and avoid stereotypical upholding the current system that many lawyers do. Being stuck indoors, apart from a community, learning black-letter law courses has reinforced my desire to get out into the world and into the work.

In the next two years of law school, I wanted to focus on experiential work and finding connections with lawyers in the fields I am interested in. I did not know a single lawyer or law student before coming to law school, nor did I have any fancy internships in undergrad (just working at a restaurant), so I have quite a bit of catching up to do. That being said, I am hopeful. This year has made obvious to many more people a lot of the deeply rooted problems in the United States and worldwide, which makes change seem more attainable. I also have more confidence in myself and my abilities after surviving an academic environment five times more difficult than anything I have encountered prior. On a personal note, attending therapy this school year has helped me contextual my experiences and know that I do not need to feel bad about where I felt I lacked in comparison to my classmates and that I should be proud of myself. And while I may not have much of my life planned out yet, I’m learning that I can make it what I want it to be—not just for myself, but the people around me too.