Idenity in TC

What career did you aspire to pursue (in elementary school) How has that changed? I wanted to be a ballerina. And then I wanted to be an underwater archaeologist. That changed when I realized that I was not going to be either one of those things. One, I never took ballet. Two, I hated scuba-diving classes when I took them. I went to school for social work and sociology and worked for 14 years as a social worker with the Department of Corrections. I wanted to be on the same schedule as my kids and the position here opened up, so it all just aligned.

Photo: A. Swanson

What kinds of foods did you enjoy (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I loved Macaroni & Cheese, hotdogs, Taco Bell soft tacos, and spaghetti. My parents were busy people so we did quick, easy stuff.

What genres of music did you listen to (in elementary school)? How has that changed? When I was younger, it was Top 40. My parents also always had music playing when I was growing up, so we would listen to the variety of different genres of music that my parents listened to.

What kinds of clothing did you wear/what was your style (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I wore pegged pants, Sperrys, and polo shirts (sometimes double polo shirts). I also wore slouch socks and if you had a bunch of different colors stacked that was cool. It’s interesting because you do see styles come back around and a lot of the stuff was what we used to wear as kids and teenagers. There’s certainly a different spin on how people go about wearing it now but the general feeling is the same.

identity traverse city in

by: ADDISON SWANSON staff writer

In our spin-off of Human of New York, the Black & Gold Quarterly went out into the Central High School community in search of uniquity. Our mission was to find inspiring stories and share them to encourage self-expression. Through a variety of randomly selected people, we were about to find one commonality: passion. Stories like theirs are what makes us believe in the power that comes from expression through journalism. People are art. We feel combining their words with a visual story, a unique and inspiring message is created. Members of our community have conveyed their identities and inspired us through their words and sense of passion. To us, this is the truest kind of journalism--finding moving stories and sharing them.

What career did you aspire to pursue (in elementary school) How has that changed? I wanted to be a teacher. I would always play school with my friends as a kid and I always thought that being a teacher would be super fun! That’s changed now and teaching isn’t really an interest for me anymore. Looking back at it now it seems like a huge job and I don’t think that it suits me. I think I really want to go into something music-related which wasn’t really on my radar when I was younger. Middle school to high-school is when I decided that I really liked to sing.

What genres of music did you listen to (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I liked listening to Kids Bob. I also liked early 2000s pop music. I can’t remember any songs specifically, but I did listen to artists like Lady Gaga and Selena Gomez; just stuff that was popular at the time. Now I listen to some music that follows the trend, but I mainly listen to broadway music because I’m really passionate about musical theater.

Margaret Kernan Photo: A. Swanson

What kinds of clothing did you wear/what was your style (in elementary school)? How has that changed? When I was younger, my mom helped me pick out my outfits because I didn’t really care about what I wore when I was that age. I used to wear a lot of dresses. Now, picking out an outfit is so much more difficult. I’m just looking around in my closet like, ‘What am I going to wear? I have no clothes!’, which is not true at all because I have lots of wonderful clothes. What kinds of foods did you enjoy (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I definitely wasn’t as diverse of an eater and didn’t particularly love a lot of different types of foods. Now I love Asian food, Indian food, Seafood etc. I also really enjoy sushi, oysters and brussel sprouts.

What career did you aspire to pursue (in elementary school) How has that changed? I guess I wanted to be a lawyer for a while. Now I realize that going into and studying law would be a lot of hard work and a lot more schooling than I really want to do in my life. As for what I want to be, I don’t have any idea.

What genres of music did you listen to (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I was really big into KHQ, and the classics like Lady Gaga, Ke$ha. Now I listen to rap.

Photo: N. Fagerman

Michael Gibson

What kinds of foods did you enjoy (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I used to eat shrimp raw, like super raw shrimp and that’s really weird but I ate a lot of raw shrimp. And now I like hummus.

What kinds of clothing did you wear/what was your style (in elementary school)? How has that changed? I had the worst style. I wore super old jeans all of the time and t-shirts that didn’t fit. Now I mostly just wear sweatshirts.