i have always been concerned about human rights, social justice and equality. i wanted to become a social worker to be able to advocate for people and challenge systems in a meaningful and informed way. i acknowledge that i still have so much to learn and this will indeed be a lifelong journey.
spending seven years in the military enabled me to grow some thick skin. i remember when i had an interview with my chief petty officer regarding my request to want to transfer from the navy to the army to become a photojournalist. she looked at me dead in the eye and said i wouldn’t make it with my resting bitch face, people in the army wouldn’t know how to interpret me, apparently. shout out rebecca lol. i ended up trying to transfer to become a photographer in the navy instead. was highly recommended but the communications branch wouldn’t release me. so, i put my discharge in. they then miraculously said they would release me to become a phot, but it was all too late. my mind was made and i was done with their boy club + the bureaucracy.
i left behind a black and white, rigid world for a non-binary one in social work.
it feels weird to say that im thankful for those rejections to take place. the butterfly effect in full force. it led me to become who i really was meant to be.
i am inspired by the many communities i consider myself a part of and the ones I get the pleasure to spend time with. community can come in many different shapes and forms. different geographical communities, communities of association and identity-based communities. i’m proud to be a social work student, ballet student, a member of the lgbtqia+ community, a photographer, a traveler, a woman among many more.
on a field trip for my com dev class, we were lucky to go to the espresso train in nundah. it’s a beautiful community enterprise. following the field trip, i volunteered my services to social worker and community worker, Alex. I came back a few weeks later to take some portraits of the people that make the co-op.
i’m delighted to have produced these beauties:
