Three words is all it takes to start an introduction, but the answer is much more complex than just that. Laura Gonzalez, that’s my name and almost everyone calls me that, save for the few friends and family who call me Lala. Most people here have one thing in common, they live in Georgia however me and a few others are the exception to this rule.
Born in Coral Springs, Florida, I have spent my whole life down in the “Sunshine State” spending weekends at the beach and holidays at Disney or Universal. Despite my homes nickname and my love for laying on a towel along the coast with a book in hand, I tend to be compared to a paper sheet with a complexion so pale I feel like Edward Cullen when standing in the sun. But even though summer has just begun, time has begun to pass as senior year approaches and failed attempts to tan fall away. So how will I spend my last summer? How will I let it define me? That has yet to be seen.Back home I have been attending Coral Springs Charter School since 6th grade seeing how the school contains both middle and high school. After years within the same school, I’ve come to learn that change never stops with new and old friends leaving as well as new and old dreams arriving, but one thing that has remained constant in my life is literature. When I say literature it sounds fancy and broad but in reality I’m a person who thrives when reading a heart- wrenching romance or an action-packed adventure. Because of my interest in reading, I grew to want to write fiction. Telling the stories that I lived out in my head and writing out the dreams I had harbored allowed me to live out my fantasies through the characters that lived in the pages of my notebooks, but this wasn’t something I was able to learn about in school so I turned to the next best thing, journalism.
Going into journalism my freshman year of high school I thought I had signed up for newspaper but to my surprise, I somehow ended up in a yearbook classroom full of people who looked just as lost. I had made up my mind, I was going to ask to be transferred out, but then the teacher started talking and all thoughts of leaving left my mind. Mrs Harwell was loud, confident and VERY straightforward and when she looked at me she said, “If you don’t want to be here leave because I’m not going to put up with your bulls**t,” and with that I knew I was in this for the long run.
Now going into my senior year I’m glad I decided to see it through because without Mrs. Harwell and the editorial staff, high school would’ve really sucked. Freshman year I became an assistant underclassmen editor and by sophomore year managing my own group of kids as an editor. Junior year I did good enough that she let me be senior editor — I mean who ever heard of a junior being senior Editor — I was sure someone was going to come at me for it, but I knew I could do it so I saw it through. Next year I’m going in as editor-in-chief of my school yearbook and I know that all my effort throughout all these years was worth it. I get to call the shots, I get to have the final say. I get to prove to that freshman girl that we were worth the bulls**t.
But as much as I love yearbook, my true high school achievement lay within our literary magazine, which I have been editor-in-chief of since sophomore year. Freshman year no one seemed to care about it but I knew it was something I couldn’t look past, something I couldn’t let die out when our editor-in-chief left for college. Learning the ropes freshman year I picked up additional skills in my sophomore year practicing design in my free time. That year, I won the award for Best of the Best Literary Magazine spread at the FSPA states competition. I couldn’t believe it, I mean I was the first yearbook kid under Mrs. Harwell to ever win a Best of the Best at states. Who would’ve thought? The next year I went on to win that category once again. Journalism is more than just writing about someones story, it’s capturing the essence of it, whether that’s in a lit mag spread or a feature story.
Not everyone can say that they know what they want to be when they “grow up” and quite honestly neither can I, but I think I have an idea. My dream is to live life to the fullest: to read every book I find interesting, travel to every place I have on my list, take every risk that makes me feel like the world might just end if I see it through. I want to be able to travel and be free, not held in place by the weight of expectations or societal acceptances. Yep, my dream is to live in the Lala land I’m made up in my head (maybe now you’ll understand the nickname).
Life is meant to be enjoyed. To quote a show I did not quite love but did enjoy, “You Americans live to work. Here… here we work to live.” Thank you “Emily in Paris.” I think this is pretty true but I want to be the living exception, I want to break that rule. I may not seem that brave or extroverted, but in my mind there’s nothing that can stop me. No fear, no doubts, nothing. It may only take three words to start and introduction but it takes just two to respond. Laura Gonzalez. Two words that’s all they are, but those two words identify me.
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