Warped Youth Artists
Michael Baquet 
Covenant House, New Orleans , LA

 
I have been drawing as long as I can remember since I was about five or six, I have drawn constantly since then. I express myself deeply in most of my drawings. When I was younger I was using marijuana and alcohol so most of the pictures I have drawn with a cigarette or something, just chilling.

 

 
I have been drawing as long as I can remember since I was about five or six, I have drawn constantly since then. I express myself deeply in most of my drawings. When I was younger I was using marijuana and alcohol so most of the pictures I have drawn with a cigarette or something, just chilling. 

I left home because me and my mom were not getting along to well. I am here at Covenant House to do what I got to do, so I can get on my feet. I am trying to change my lifestyle, before I always liked to smoke and drink and so I figured that was what was bringing me most of my problems cause I was always drinking, breakfast, lunch, dinner and in between snacks. I would spare change just to get something to drink. 

I had a lot of peer pressure, I did not fit in a lot of the time and the pressure was not from my peers but from my step father, he is the one who turned me on to smoking marijuana, I was 10 years old. When I was in drug counseling I would tell the counselors that it was my friends who got me started and they would always tell me to stop lying because I was lying to myself, I did not want to say anything because I did not want anyone to know it was parent that got me stared smoking marijuana. When I was 12 me and my friends would go behind a tree in the back of the school and get loaded and go to class. 

In the future I may want to be an art teacher, I had this art teacher when I was six years old she really inspired me she said stand for what you believe. Everything that she did I was like I want to be able to do that one day, she drew a picture of me and I kept that picture for along time, it inspired me. I want to keep moving forward, not go backwards, I always tell people who say it is not good to live in the past, that it is good to remember the past because by remembering things from your past it helps you get to the future.

I would like to say to people that if you see something that you really want to do, and really truly believe that you can make it, stick with it, don't give up because if you give up it is just another way of saying I could have done this, I could have been that, that could be me, just be true to yourself and follow your dreams and take one day at a time. Just don't give up, no matter how hard times get, keep going and keep your head up.


 
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Danielle Gueli Andy La Donna Dominick

 

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