Becoming Throughly Musical: A Musical Introduction.

I am going to start my little blog out with an introduction, however, this introduction won't be a simple few sentences explaining who I am but will be an introduction with songs that I've chosen to help explain myself. To start off, my name is Maria Guido and I am an incoming freshman at Indiana University. I will be pursuing a theatre major during my time here at IU. I'm going to separate this post into chunks based on the four questions I've picked to answer to help give you a small idea of who I am. Let's begin!

Where Are You From?

I am from West Lafayette, Indiana and graduated from a fairly large high school. My school and a few others in our area are notorious for just going to Purdue (or as some like to call it Harrison/West Side part two) and remaining stuck in West Lafayette for the rest of their lives. Don't get me wrong, West Lafayette is not the worst place to live but there is so much more out in the world that Purdue and West Laf. just don't have. I was so terrified of staying home and losing myself in the monotony of my hometown. So, anytime I find myself feeling homesick I remember that not for the life of me could I be stuck living as a lifelong townie. 

What Kind Of Life Do You Lead?

Already in my life I have dealt with some fairly heavy things especially with my own health. When I was finally recovering I decided that a serious change needed to occur in my life: I needed to become more positive. I vowed to myself that I could not go on in my pessimism and self-loathing. I needed to live my life like the beautiful gift that it is. Growing up music was such an evident being present in my life. Even while struggling through depression music could lift me out of myself and help me cope. When I was sick I found a song that I absolutely fell in love with and it really does remind me that I am loved and I am alive.  

What Do You Value?

As a person I feel that I have a tremendous amount of values and of course my own personal morality code. I am Lutheran and definitely value my religion and God in my life. I value my lovely Italian-American family and our cultural traditions.  I also hold myself to a high standard of accepting myself and others. When you are struggling with depression there is really only one person who can dig you out of the comfortable and dark hole you've made for yourself: you. I am of the belief that while those of us with clinical depression did not choose it we can definitely get ourselves out. I know that I am in charge of my life and what happens in it and if I'm in a bad place I can just (generally with quite a bit of effort) get myself up and get myself out of anything. 

Who Are You?

My final question is the question that was hardest for me to answer. It filled me with so many more questions like: should I go for a Broadway song since I'm an actress? Or should I go for jazz since I love to sing jazz music? There were many more questions but I won't bore you with such trivial matters like my crazy thought process. Somewhere in the mess of questions I settled for a song that represented both childhood Maria and quasi adult Maria. My siblings and I have pretty substantial age gaps (eleven years between my brother and I and seven between me and my sister) and so I was often left on my own as a child. So, naturally, I did what any kid would do and made up my own worlds to play in and my own friends to play with. This, however, involved a lot of little me talking to myself loudly while playing outside. Whenever neighbors came over to inquire upon my mental well being my mother would simply say "she's lost in her own mind." While this isn't exactly the best thing being lost and absorbed in my mind is where a lot of my creativity comes from. I still find myself dreaming up such beautiful and crazy things when left to my own devices. 

These four songs do a pretty decent job in telling you about who I am but I hope you'll learn so much more about me as this blog progresses and we embark on this journey together. I am so blessed to be here at Indiana University and I cannot wait to see what life throws at me here! Until next time!

XOXO

-Maria