If you walked into a house nestled into Heritage Landing on Lafayette Landing Dr, walked up the carpet of the stairs, headed left and opened a door on the left hand side, you’d find what appeared to be a colorful explosion that what one could only describe as “sheer free will.” The blue bed in front is covered in stuffed animals with mushroom printed pillows. Plastic vines line the top of the ceilings, and crude childish drawings fill the lilac colored walls, with some development of skill being seen through on the papers. Knicks knacks create little colorful specks littered on shelves and cabinets.

Your first thought might be that maybe it belongs to a younger sibling in elementary school or middle school. But no, it doesn’t.

The room is mine, 16 year old Brianna Taliaferro’s, the junior at Francis Howell North who lives in the house nestled in Lafayette Landing Dr and I couldn’t change it for the world. In other words, it’s what I call home.

For example, It’s the best place to watch “Steven Universe” and “Bee and Puppycat”, the best place to dance to music and play “Grow a Garden” and “Dress to Impress” on Roblox for hours. Not only that, but I can express myself with the loads of skirts, charms, dressy shirts, funky pants and cartoonish shirts stuffed in the dressers and cabinets. All without possible judgement, until I step out of the door, and leave the house on Lafayette Landing Dr.

But at this age, those things are probably not what you were expecting me to say, right? I know Bri from three years ago would probably have her head in her hands right now begging me to stop writing -but over the years I’ve learned something that has made me less afraid of walking out the house in funky pants and dressy shirts.

Some time ago, I used to leave a certain part of me at the door whenever I left my house, especially when I went to school. In my mind, it didn’t really feel like a choice. Sometimes it still doesn’t.

I sometimes think that if the things that I like and the way that I dress seem immature, people will inevitably think less of me as a whole. Before others can squash my passions, I do it to myself.

And other times, I still feel that tug in my heart, the part saying- “hey this is something really special to me” and I go and show that part of myself to other people-and it feels the same as if I was on stage in the Knight Theatre having the whole school sit in its seats and scrutinize everything I ever loved.

I know, I know. That way of thinking is dramatic, it’s crazy and it’s obviously just anxiety talking, yet in my opinion I see it as the reason why sometimes it’s more comfortable to understand a certain group of people more than others, and why sometimes we don’t even bother to understand the things we’re not comfortable with.

“We”-as in probably everybody who’s ever lived- don’t want to feel like we may possibly be scrutinized, so we close ourselves off to things that would feel uncomfortable to admit to or express ourselves with.

And while I know it can be uncomfortable, I also know that it’s point-blank miserable. Take it from me. It is miserable to hide yourself, and to close yourself off from things because it’s not expected or normal. And it’s agonizing not to talk to people about how I think Bee and Puppycat is one of the cutest shows I’ve ever seen even though I know some people will most likely automatically think a little less of me for liking a show that seems childish and cartoonish.

So, despite my fears, little by little, I’ve decided to bring one more piece of me at a time out of the house on Lafayette Landing Dr. Whether it’s in the colorful pants I wear, or laughing just a little bit harder at something than I would have the day before. And maybe- eventually the people around me will feel like they can too.

Don’t get me wrong, I still occasionally feel the “standing-in-the-Knight Theatre-being-scrutinized” feeling lingering in the back of my mind. I remind myself though, that as Martin Luther King once said (see, Mr. Fowler- I learned something), people should be judged by the content of their character, and while I know I can be the type of person that watches cartoons hours on end and absolutely crushes it in Dress to Impress and quotes silly, brain-dead impressions back and forth to my sister, I also hope to be the type of person that can love and understand with not only an open mind, but an open heart.

And if I have to play Roblox for hours and decorate my room like a 4th grader’s to be that type of person, then so be it.