My life story begins in February of 2001, where after being born I was swiftly introduced to the two weirdest people on Earth

 Who also happen to be my mother and father.

 

My mother is an Indigenous Nahua of El Salvador whose harrowing tale of immigration and survival in the United States could bring anyone to tears. Her and her story are the source of my strength in tough times, as well as my motivation. At my core I want to help make a better world. A world that would have been kinder to her, as well as to all of our ancestors who came before.​

My father is a guy from San Luis Obispo. He's pretty cool too.

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Growing up, three languages were spoken in my house. I was really bad at communicating though so I never used any of those languages to talk with other people. Instead, my best friends growing up were my cat Buttercup, a big tree in my backyard, and the various other animals and rocks that would talk to me.  My dad tried to help me make human friends by getting me involved in sports. Unfortunately, at the age of five, right before I was probably about to go pro in baseball, my mother gave me a pencil and a Thomas the Tank Engine coloring book. The coloring book came with a story, and my judgmental five-year-old brain thought that the story completely missed the point of Thomas the Tank Engine. So late at night, I stole dozens of sheets of paper from the family printer and wrote my own stories. My parents found me at the kitchen table, having stayed awake all night, finishing my twelfth story about "the power of friendship" as told by talking steam engines.

 

My dad took these stories and threw them away, because for some reason he thought that we'd get, like, sued?

For copyright infringement I guess?

 

My mom comforted me by saying that if I liked writing so much, I should write using original characters. She said that she believed I could become the greatest writer of all time.

Her incredible belief in me definitely didn't go to my head. [that's a lie, it definitely did I was a very overconfident child]

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In elementary school, before I even knew what theatre was, I was making it. I didn't have many friends, but the ones I did have I would make play "Imagination" with me. Where I would draw a comic with original characters and dialogue, then they would perform it for me and I would re-write the comic based on how they performed it. It's truly a wonder that I had any friends at all. 

Once each comic was complete, I would give it to my dad and ask him to mail it to "the internet." I'm still waiting for a response.

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In middle school I got really into a website called fanfiction.net, and that's all I'll say about what I did in middle school. Except that, at the end of 8th grade, after I got kicked out of my band class by a homophobic band teacher [who somehow knew I was gay before I even did], I learned I had to take an extracurricular my first year of high school. I didn't really want to do band anymore, and I was bad at singing so I couldn't do choir, which left drama as my only option.

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This freshman year drama class is what I would still consider to be the greatest class I've ever taken in my entire life and I consider my teacher that year to be my greatest inspiration. She instilled in me the core values of what theatre should be that I still carry with me, she taught me to love myself and to find love in every single person I meet, and most importantly- she said something that I remember almost everyday. Our school held a district wide one-act theatre festival every year, and I wanted to be part of it, but I couldn't find anyone to direct the play I wrote. And she said, "You don't have to wait to find someone, you should direct it yourself. If it's something you want to happen then you can make it happen." The team and I would go on to win the one-act festival, and that began my directing journey. Since then I can only think of one year in my life where I didn't direct a show. And for the rest of my life, I don't think I want there to be a year ever again where I go without writing or directing. 

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To abridge the story a little more, my high school days passed just like any other persons. Filled with finally making friends, getting home at 2am from performances. With my friends we would continue the game of "Imagination" by creating many short films together. The most fun I had though was on the weekends, where every Sunday two of my friends and I would travel to a different religious building in order to attend their meetings and learn from the people there. We visited Sikhs, Zoroastrians, every denomination of Christian in a 200 mile radius, and many others! [as well as a few cults]. The usual stuff. Outside of the usual, my desire in life has always been to learn and experience as much as possible. So in high school I would do everything I could to leave the bubble of my hometown. I remember I used to go to the nearest city and just try to talk to whoever I could and ask them about their lives. I learned very quickly that no one wants to tell their life stories to a random sixteen year old on the street. Except for the unhoused population of the city, who I loved talking to. Talking to them and learning their stories is how I first became politically engaged and active. On the recommendation of a friend, I would become hyperfocused on reading as much political philosophy as I could. Along with a newfound love of history, I gained a particular love of the works of Gloria Anzaldúa, Kierkegaard, Thoreau, Gramsci, Thích Nhat Hanh, and actually so many more. My love isn't particular at all, I think I just love books with big words.

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After high school I moved from my life chill life in Norcal to an incredibly busy life in Santa Monica where I would act and direct plays until the Covid-19 Pandemic. When it first began, I lost my housing. Thankfully, Buddhist friends I made though my adventures in high school would save my life by allowing me to live in their temple at Plum Village until I was able to find housing once again. The same week I found housing, I started an organization to support the local unhoused population of Westwood called UCLA4ALL. We would bring water bottles, warm meals, clothes, a charging station, tents, and other requested items to the population of Westwood Park and the surrounding parks in collaboration with Homeymade Meals and Streetwatch LA. I also became one of the chairs of the Immigration Justice Committee of the DSA-LA. When the Black Lives Matter marches began in 2020, I became a trained street medic. 

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But even though my life had become largely occupied by activism, I always found time for theatre. During the beginnings of the Coronavirus pandemic especially I would write plays in response to current events, then gather friends to do readings of them through Zoom. They never really got any traction, and I now feel a little embarrassed by them, but oh man at the time I was so confident that the radio plays I posted to SoundCloud were going to change the world.

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In the year 2022, when I was 21, I was taking a gap year and considering not going back to school. This was the one year where I hadn't been involved in any theatre. It was also part of the most miserable two years of my life. It just so happened that I would attend a musical at my old high school. There, I ran into an old friend who I graduated with, and she said, "Eden, it seems that you're bored with your life. If you have nothing better to do, you should transfer with me to UC Irvine. We can study theatre for two years, make things, then forget it ever happened. It will be like high school again!" And at the time, "high school again" sounded a lot better than what my life was.. So I transferred and went straight from most miserable two years of my life into the craziest two years of my entire life.

We're almost at the end [figuratively]!

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This will be the absolute hardest part to abridge, but in the shortest summary possible:

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In my first week of arriving to UC Irvine, I was suddenly on the college's improv team, the competitive sketch comedy team, the Neofuturist playwriting collective, and I was slated to direct "Mojada" for Brown Bag Theatre Company with a budget of $10,000. That was a lot for a socially awkward, recently transitioned Norcal girl to go through, yet it literally only got crazier from there. 

I also got really into lighting design, stage management, and I made sure I never forgot how to act by performing in some Shakespeare shows.

 

 I directed many shows at UCI, most of which can be found on this website [yay!!] I later became one of the leaders of Brown Bag Theatre Company as well as founded the UCI Thespian Society. I got to take my shows on the road to high schools, city events, and performed for award shows such as the Latino Excellence and Achievement Awards. I learned from the smartest, coolest mentors I could have ever wished for, as well as the outstandingly talented students who I got to work with and become friends with. From directing three shows at the same time while still trying to pass classes, to driving for hours with friends just to find a specific cupcake I vaguely remembered from my childhood - UCI was where I finally began to understand who I am, what I want to do in my life, and what I want to do for the world.

 

And the message all along was the same as what I wrote about back when I was five and writing about Thomas the Tank Engine- the power of love and friendship. Now that I have graduated and I begin the next story, I hope to share my love for life and theatre though my art and through my being.

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So if you're reading this right now, wow that was a lot so thank you so much for reading, and I hope that you can be part of this next grand adventure!