 I grew up just outside of Naval Air Station, Pax River, and I went to sleep every night with the sound of jets flying over my head. It just became music to my ears, and I just absolutely love it. I come from a military family with both my mother and my father were aviation officers. My dad ended up getting out after six years, but my mom did the full 20 years, and their fathers before them, they were both pilots for the Navy. My grandfather on my dad's side was a dive bomber in World War II, and he went through his whole career just gradually going from prop planes to some of the fastest jets in the world, which were the F-4 Phantoms at the time, and that's about the time that he retired. My mom's father, he was a reconnaissance pilot. He flew during Vietnam, and he did his full 20 years while he's actually buried over the Corlington Cemetery. Growing up with those figures in my life, I knew from a young age that I wanted to join the military. I always thought it was going to be the Navy, especially after, you know, when my mom took me to go see the air shows, like the Blue Angels, when they would show up, and they would put on these awesome displays of aviation, and it just started a dream within me to become a pilot someday. As I was growing up, I went through high school trying to kind of mold my life to become the best candidate I could be for places like the Naval Academy, which is what I thought I was going to do, but somewhere along the way, I kind of lost my path, and I lost the drive to keep pushing towards my goal, and it was a long time where I thought maybe I was just going to give up on it all together, and after I graduated high school, I was lost. One day I came across the DC Air National Guard, and it was just the new opportunity in my life, that second chance that I was looking for. Going to basic training, I was put in leadership roles that I definitely wasn't expecting. It was great for me, and I had a wonderful time while I was there, and I know it's such a weird thing to say about basic training when you've got people screaming in your face to say that you had a wonderful time, but I loved every second of it, and it made me fall in love with what I was going to do all over again. When I came back, I had a new fire ignited within me to just go on and restart the pursuit of my dream to be a pilot, but this time from the Air Force. I started looking for opportunities, and that's when I came across what's called the LEED program, and that was an opportunity for Airmen to become cadets at the United States Air Force Academy, which is a dream come true. Right now I'm in the process of applying, and I'm waiting on the next step to be opened up to me, and I couldn't be more excited for that opportunity in my life. I'm going to say, but definitely going through basic training, it just started a new passion within me to become more than what I thought I was going to be able to do with my life. The Air Force changed everything for me. I couldn't be more excited to get back into the classroom to be able to go and pursue bigger and better things. The biggest dream of mine is to become a pilot someday, and the D.C. National Guard has given me that opportunity.