“Never look back. Always point toward the future. If I look to the past I always end up just kind of sitting reminiscing on the mistakes I’ve made, but if I look to the future it helps me grow into what I’m looking forward to. I was kicked out of my house when I was 17 and I keep thinking, whenever I look back, and try to figure out why my parents kicked me out. I just try not to think about that because that really weighs me down.

In high school my counselor told me to drop out of school. She was a terrible counsellor. She found me a job with a good signing bonus and everything like that and said I was just going to amount to nothing pretty much. I said, ‘Screw you, I’m going to go make something of myself.’

Right out of high school I moved to Alaska and became a manager at a fish cannery plant. Then I got my plumbing certificate, became a licenced plumber, made a bunch of money, and now I’m here studying Art and Recreational Therapy.

I had an art therapist for a while and she helped me through a lot of stuff. She helped me express myself and be open through art. I want to be able to do that for other people. You come in. You sit. You draw, paint, or something. From there, art therapists will look at how you draw it. The pressure of the pencil, what kind of pencil you use, the colors you use, what you draw, the amount of time it takes, the attention to detail, everything like that. From there you can assess how someone’s doing, their emotional state, and then you talk about it.

It really made me find myself. It was huge. Before that I was very closed off, very angry and against everyone. I pretty much hated the world. After that I really started enjoying people. I could see the value in myself and I could see the value in other things. Art is a big creative outlet for people. It lets them express themselves in a way that...I mean some people are going to judge, but those people are dicks. You can’t really judge someone else’s art, so it’s just a way for them to get out their feelings and work through stuff.”