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Growing up technology was was a definite distraction as more inventions came along and became more accessible. Especially with a difficult family dynamic, it was very common for my siblings and I to spend time alone in our rooms on our devices rather than engage with our family members in common spaces.

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I have not had a relationships with indigenous communities to the area I grew up, I'm not even sure if there are areas that were reserved for indigenous populations in the Chicago area. As far as my family coming to this area, I'm not sure about my ancestry and only know information about my parents and grandparents who have always lived in this area. In regard to my play outdoors, I did not love the outdoors growing up and only began having more connection in my early adulthood.

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Developmental theories affected my childhood minimally, though I did see a drastic difference when comparing myself to my younger sisters. Their upbringings were conciously crafted in accordance to montessori principles while my childhood was more fitting the Eriksons principle of allowing navigation in a childs environment and they focus on their own social dilemmas as they see fit, typically fitting into his developmental stages.

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My family's strict collectivist culture helped me develop a strong sense of personal responsibility and impacted the way I see those who do not take a strong sense of pride in their space. From this experience I strongly believe in having your sense of purpose but educating children in the idea of different cultures and how they function differently.

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Day 11 - Cultural and Community expertise

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Day 11 - Cultural and Community expertise

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Growing up, my brother had delayed speech and was made fun of in his classes for being behind others in progress. I saw how he didn't make friends easily and always kept to himself and adopted the same kinds of habits myself out of fear of being bullied.

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I never had more than English spoken within my home, but there is extended family knowledge of Slovak and that was practiced in our family prayers before each meal. I never thought anything of it until I started to learn music and realized how music was a language of its own and so many of my friends didnt understand it the way I had learned to. It gave me a new appreciation for my Spanish speaking friends, because I was around 8 years old when I started performing, and I quickly realized that I was not going to be welcomed in the spanish speaking groups in my schools because I didnt grow up speaking it. I felt frustrated by the alienating social factors and became even more introverted as I gained more interest in music.

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Growing up with older brothers, there was a clear difference in how I was disciplined and the expectations I had from others. I was given a lot more emotional freedom and allowed to stay away from things because they were "gross" or "scary" while my brothers were told to man up. I also experienced sexualization in a way they did not and was expected to "act like a lady" and dress as one also. My play was drastically gendered with play kitchens and princesses and dolls while my brother was more interested in technology. While I believe my interests were very feminine, there was no effort form my parents to expose me to more neutral interests.

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With both of my parents in law enforcement and living in the suburbs of Chicago, I had an unfortunate exposure to their prejudice against people of color. Their prejudicies were limited to lower income families of color because of their work and the disproportionate amount of the population that is policed in my hometown, so it was clear their thoughts were related to crime. When it came to my interactions with classmates and my cousins, I was given the freedom to chose who I spent my time with, but there were microaggressions that were clearly different when my playmates were not white. I clearly understood my privilege as a white member of society early on and furthered my perspective that I had to live up to what I assumed my parents expected rather than explore different communities and relationships as I wished.

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Growing up, I was in very strict environments both at home and in school. In school particularly, I was very shy and had already learned I did not want to be labeled as a "troublemaker", so I followed rules to the letter and did not make friends very easily. Play time was blocked out very specifically and I often did not know how to use that time so I found individual activities to do rather than be social. My strong connections to family and desire for a sense of a belonging in all spaces I occupied drove me to be a perfectionist from an early age and that encouraged me in spaces where I had little agency because I had rules and clear instructions for how to use my time.

At home when there was more unstructured time, I got frustrated frequently because I wanted someone to play with though my brother and I did not get along and my younger siblings were not born yet. My cousins were often labeled as rambunctious and rowdy which further encouraged me to look for instructions at home as I would in school.

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Joining the Marine Corps as a musician out of high school

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I was fortunate to be involved in my church growing up which hosted multiple youth events throughout the year. In addition, I attended dance classes until I wanted to switch my focus to band which then became my primary focus for my career and was always well supported by family and friends. It was the biggest part of my childhood and young adulthood and gave me a way to support myself and express my creativity in one activity.

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My youngest sister who insisted on "boy" clothes when she wanted to "get dirty outside"

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I have two older brothers and recognized early on the disparity in our gender roles. I was trained to focus on house chores like laundry and cooking while my brother was instructed to take care of the yard and take out the trash. When my younger sisters were born, they had more gender neutral roles out of necessity since my brothers had moved out by the time they went to school.

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My youngest sister and I for my senior prom

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The culture of my early childhood was family focused. My parents divorced when I was 3, but I went between their houses every 2-3 days and they shared custody. They were both very involved in our lives and continued to keep us involved with extended family as well, even if it required creative logistics with our visitation schedule so that my parents had equal amounts of time. This environment gave me a strong sense of belonging and a lot of respect for others who strive for a strong family connection.

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My dads drug sniffing K-9 and my first dog, Ringo. 

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Growing up in a law enforcement family was contradictory to the culture of a multi racial family. I remember frequent conversations between my white and African American family members about the role of police officers and probation officers, especially for minors who had bad influences. I learned to dislike anything about politics because it was a source of confrontation that was not only a large grey area but also didn’t seem to have a solution. This negatively influenced how I saw conflict when growing up also.

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My first visit back to Chicago after I joined the Marine Corps 

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I attended public schools in the suburbs of Chicago growing up which gave me a diverse socioeconomic community to socialize with from a very young age. I also began attending daycare when I was 3 which had a similar community demographic and facilitated my socialization early on. I always have had a great appreciation for the cultural and class diversity of the Chicago suburbs and was very aware of it because of the class differences in my parents houses.

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My husband and I in Napa for our 5th anniversary in 2024

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My middle class upbringing gave my siblings and I comfort at home and caused trouble in our public school communities. Both our parents work in law enforcement and gave us a sense of responsibility that clashed with the anti police sentiment where our schools were located. My clothes were often a source of bullying and I had things stolen from me often, reminding me that I had privilege in a less fortunate community and created a perspective where I always show respect but trust must be earned. This limited who I played with, but I was fortunate to have a variety of communities to be a part of and saw travel as an opportunity to meet new people and explore new cultures.

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Some of my cousins and I (I'm the unhappy baby lol)

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As a white woman, I have always had a social expectation of being proper and ladylike. I did not have the same experience as my African American cousins who experienced objectification at an early age, rather I had corrections about societal do’s and don'ts that a lady should follow.

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Even with multiple opportunities for different friend groups, I was a shy kid that stuck to hanging out with my large family. I am the middle of 5 kids and have 17 cousins just on my dads side, all of whom lived locally and attended church together every Sunday. Birthdays and holidays were all spent together so it was a built in source of socialization for me. This led me to want to be a part of larger groups later in my life also.