Lala Land Designs

The past week, I've been interning at a small little advertising agency. It's fifteen people at best and no pay. But I've had a blast. Today's my last day and I'm sad to leave. Crossing my fingers I can come back.

But this past week has taught me a lot about creatives. Sure, I'm a creative myself, but I like to think I grew up in a unique situation for a creative. Both my parents are more math and science oriented. I love my dad, but he wouldn't know what creativity was if it slapped him in the face. My mom was an elementary education major with an emphasis in math. She's not the most creative person in the world, but she's a whole lot closer to that label than my dad is.

My parents never stomped out the creativity when it came, but they sure didn't know how to cultivate it. At least not for me. My little sister is a typical artist. She draws. They knew what do to with that. My sister has been doing art classes for a long time.

The creativity I have is a whole lot different. I took a liking to designing and coding back in the sixth grade, and for a year and a half, I ran a website for a singer. Then in eighth grade, the writing bug that I knew was crawling all over me finally bit me, and it's still here.

My parents had no idea what to do with a thirteen year-old who was writing a book about a teenage killer. They didn't know what to do with a kid who sat there picking apart HTML codes.

And my dad's a computer science major.

Like I said, I'm not bashing my parents. I love them. I'm grateful for what they've given me in life.

As I've been working here the past week, I haven't done much, but I've learned a lot about myself.

For instance, I don't know if I'll ever be a full-fledged creative. Growing up in my family, I walked a straight and narrow line between creative and practical (and any real creative will probably agree that the creatives aren't always the practical ones). It's a line I've walked my whole life, and I always seem to straddle that line.

It's a curse and a blessing.

A curse because I doubt I'll ever be able to abandon the "practical" side of myself to dive head first into creativity. A curse because I can't stand other creatives (for the most part) and I find myself surrounded by practicals who don't understand creativity.

A blessing because I can see both sides. A blessing because I feel like it gave me a different type of creativity. A blessing because it made me more passionate about my creativity.

But. I'm a creative.

And I'm so glad about it.