Oh Hi There, District 5
It started with a walk to Junipero Serra Elementary School.
Small feet stepping one in front of the other, off-beat to the second pair of feet trailing inches behind him. With a backpack too big, waiting to be filled with purpose, carrying a bagged lunch, and space to carry more on the return journey. The walk to school was a daily ritual—a slow, observant one. I memorized the color of mailboxes, which driveways had oil stains, which fences hid dogs that barked too loud to be small.
It was a quiet time. Before the lunch lines, before the court games. A place to be seen without having to perform. If timed correctly, there were 10 minutes to spare before the first bell rang, to feel the exhilaration of freedom.
The swing’s seat—rubber curved and faded to a matte, toast-gray—held the shape of every kid who ever sat crooked. Chalk streaks, sun cracks, and a sag in the middle told stories of weather and weight. Its chains clinked with memory, thick metal ovals dulled by time and finger grease, each link humming when touched—or even thought about. Rust gathered where metal met seat—orange like a bruise that never healed.
And when the wind came—just right, just barely—it creaked, not a swing, not a sway, just a whisper that said, I remember you.
That’s where the small things stuck.
Like Sam. Sam had autism and diabetes and a full-time aide named Donna who helped her check her blood sugar and navigate lunch. Every day, one classmate was allowed to walk with them to the nurse’s office. At first, it was a mystery. Then it became an honor. A kind of quiet currency.
Over time, you learned how to sense what Sam needed, even if she didn’t say it. You learned how to stay steady, not because you were the strongest, but because you were trusted. Eventually, a mural was painted on the cafeteria wall—Sam and Donna’s favorites. I was in it. A cartoon version of me, smiling wide, the frays of an American Flag across from another student - green cargo pants and oversized red t-shirt. I looked like someone who had made it.
But I was still learning how fragile that belonging could be.
On the playground, kickball ruled. Your worth was measured in how long you stayed in the game. Some kids had specialty kicks—arcing over second, skimming down third, back-spinning chaos kicks. I watched, learned, tried my own. When I lost my place, I joined the wall. Then four-square took over. The court got smaller, the rules tighter, the politics more personal. There were days I didn’t feel fast enough, loud enough, chosen enough. Sometimes I didn’t play. Sometimes I wasn’t picked.
Then came the moment I still carry.
Sarah, my next-door neighbor, used a wheelchair. We were playing—racing, joking, moving too fast. Her front wheel caught on the blacktop and she tipped. The fall was loud. The air went still. And suddenly we were in the principal’s office, my play mistaken for cruelty. The words “bully” floated near me, heavy, misapplied, but present enough to sting. That’s when I learned that not everyone sees the same moment the same way. That intention and impact rarely match, and sometimes your defense won’t matter if the story’s already been written.
Then came the braces
Third grade. First one in our class. I became interesting by default. People asked questions, wanted to see, touch, tease. For a moment, I belonged in the glow of something shiny and new. And then, when I got them off, the attention evaporated. Others were getting theirs. The spotlight moved. And I realized I had confused attention with affection. I missed the curiosity. The clarity of being someone worth circling around. I missed the certainty that came from being the reason people looked your way.
That was my early education in how difference operates—how sometimes it gives you power, and other times, it isolates you.
And maybe that’s where caretaking really began: not just for others, but for the stories we tell ourselves to feel less alone.
That walk gave way to the yellow bus because Balboa Middle School was further.
The sidewalks didn’t reach it, and my legs weren’t ready. So I waited on street corners with other kids from District 5, barely speaking at first, bonded only by proximity and an unspoken understanding: this is just how we get there.
Some clutched homemade sandwiches, crusts trimmed, tucked in wax paper. Others had money in their fists, still warm from their mother’s palm. One said, "I made this for you." The other said, "I couldn’t, but you’re still covered." Both were love—measured in different currencies. Our backpacks came with us, stuffed with books too heavy, saturated with information no longer applicable to what our futures would ask of us.
The Balboa quad was too wide, too exposed. There were no lunchroom walls to dull the hierarchy. You either had somewhere to sit or you didn’t. Girls grouped in braids and bracelets, claiming picnic tables under shaded overhangs. Boys sprawled against concrete planters, trading insults or tossing half-filled water bottles like they meant something. You watched some kids become invisible by trying too hard to be seen, and others became central simply by sitting still. Those first social exiles weren’t banished—they drifted, subtly, one missed invitation at a time.
And then there were the floaters. The ones who sat nowhere, or sat everywhere. I was usually somewhere in between.
Even as a teen, you could sense that where you lived in Ventura was associated to certain clothes, appearances, haves. And now, as people leave Ventura because they no longer feel like they belong here—or arrive and struggle to break in—I recognize those same patterns. Whether it’s spot in the quad or area of town you live in, there’s those who sit comfortably, peering out with expansive moats not realizing they’re contributing to the increasing barrier to entry for others - NIMBY’s.
Dancing with Usefulness
The gym was lit too brightly for anything romantic to happen, which should have made it feel safe. But there was danger in visibility too.
Girls gathered in corners, their bodies huddled together as if they were cradling something delicate, something precious that needed protection from the world around them. Their whispers and giggles filled the air, creating a bubble of intimacy that seemed impenetrable to outsiders. Meanwhile, boys threw themselves into the fray with reckless abandon, engaging in mock wrestling matches or losing themselves in the pulsating beats of strobe-lit dancing. Their arms moved wildly, as if they were attempting to shake off the weight of expectations, to shed the layers of identity that clung to them like a second skin.
And then there was me.
I was the one who worked the dance, not in the sense of moving to the rhythm, but in the literal sense of the word. I distributed wristbands, ensuring everyone had access to the event. I filled paper cups with Sprite, the fizzy liquid a small comfort in the heat of the moment. I taped signs onto the bleachers, my handwriting crooked and my grammar over-corrected, a testament to my earnestness and perhaps a hint of self-consciousness. I was a helper, a contributor, someone who found purpose in the mundane tasks that kept the dance running smoothly.
This was my role, and I embraced it. It was the secret that allowed me to navigate the social landscape without feeling the pressure to conform. By doing something, I gave myself permission to exist outside the binary of participation or abstention. I didn’t have to explain why I wasn’t dancing; I was doing something important, something that mattered.
In this role, I discovered a hidden power. Doing something meant not having to choose a side, not having to betray my own desires or fears. It allowed me to watch without being watched, to observe the world around me with a sense of detachment. I could hide in the guise of usefulness, a cloak that shielded me from the scrutiny of others.
It would take me years to fully understand the depth of my feelings. What I truly wanted wasn’t found in the corner with the girls or in the chaos with the boys. It was in the act of looking, in the observation that fueled my longing. It was a longing without a name, a yearning that I couldn’t quite articulate, but one that was undeniably present, simmering just beneath the surface of my consciousness.
Locker Room Politics & The Myth of Maturity
It happened slowly. First, the voice drops. Then the shadows appear under their arms. Then their jokes get sharper, and meaner. Some boys turned into men overnight. Others, like me, found other ways to grow up.
I didn’t rush to change for PE. I stalled. I faked stomachaches. I wore compression shorts under my gym clothes so I wouldn’t have to strip down in front of anyone. My body felt like a question mark next to their exclamation points, a constant comparison that weighed heavily on me.
But what I lacked physically, I started to replace socially. I ran for student council. I made teachers laugh. I mastered the skill of adaptation—of winning people over before they knew why they liked me. Influence became a kind of armor, an overcompensation built to distract from the insecurities I carried.
I couldn’t outrun puberty, but I could outwit it. Out-maneuver it. Build a structure where I mattered—not for how I looked in a locker room or in the field, but for how I could manage a whiteboard, a clipboard, a budget. Yet, the need to matter often felt like a performance curated not for myself but for my Father and friends, hoping to fill the gaps where physical confidence was absent.
And yet, the locker room never left me. It became a room I built inside myself—a place where vulnerability and competition fought for dominance. I often wonder how to make this matter less—to strip away the comparisons and the echoes of overcompensation, to be seen without the armor, to believe that being enough doesn't need to be proven through achievements.
How do I make this matter less, not just for me, but for those whose opinions I internalized the most?
By the time I reached Buena High School, walking or busing felt like something I had graduated from —not out of status, but survival.
I had slipped into the rhythm of carpooling: a carefully coordinated relay of handoffs and honks, backseats and front-seat diplomacy. It wasn’t mine, but it got me there. Each ride felt like a different language. Some were quiet, with radio talk shows humming low and seats that smelled like early coffee. Others buzzed with energy—siblings squabbling in the back, morning announcements shouted over the dashboard. I adapted quickly. Knew which houses required you to take your shoes off, which cars asked you to duck if you were eating fast food, and how to fold yourself politely between two people having an adult conversation that wasn’t meant for you.
And I paid attention. To the way the interior stitched itself together. To the hum of the engine. To the feeling of how close some people were to having their own car, and how far I still felt. Some were gifted with freedom early, granted keys as proof of trust or tradition. Others waited and watched, keeping mental ledgers of whose turn it was next. I didn’t envy it, exactly. But I did track it—like a weather system. The privilege of wheels meant autonomy, but it also meant something else: that you had been given something without having to ask.
The school parking lot was a socioeconomic census; expanding to include more than just District 5 now, but like everything else in District 5, it said what you couldn’t:
who had time,
who had resources,
who had to work after school,
who didn’t.
We emptied out of our cars slowly, like something poured too fast—sloshy, uneven, eager to settle.
The Quad Years
The quad was open to the sky, and so was the social structure—just big enough to contain everyone, and just exposed enough to show who fit where.
Where you sat in the quad wasn’t just about friendship—it was about proximity to power. Some sat beneath the shade structures. Some in open sun. Others stood, always moving, pretending like they didn’t want to stay too long in one place in case someone noticed they didn’t have one. In that exposure, gender choreography became real. Girls performed friendship like a musical—they harmonized their walks, co-wrote their sentences, blended into one another. Boys flailed and flinched like badly written side characters—loud, poorly timed, arms in constant orbit.
Wall ball courts peeling with sunburned paint were a safe haven to the outliers. Hurdles from track meets were dragged across the lawn after practice and left abandoned like half-formed ambitions. You could hear laughter in bursts, the slamming of lockers out of sync with their bell schedule, the thrum of early 2000s playlists played too loud through someone’s Sidekick or Razr.
By high school, the backpack didn’t just carry books. It carried roles. Expectations. Secrets.
Mine bore the weight of honors classes, Corrales napkins smudged with hot sauce from morning burritos, and To Kill a Mockingbird scripts—where I played the prosecutor with so much forced conviction that even my teacher winced. In retrospect, it felt a little too easy to argue a case I didn’t believe in, which said more about my ability to perform than I was ready to admit.
There were other props: student council flyers, keys to the new concession stand, a spiraled notebook I always rewrote my notes in—partly for neatness, mostly for control. The desire to be useful had become its own identity, something I clung to so I wouldn’t have to explain why I didn’t go to the dance floor, why I laughed too hard at jokes I didn’t find funny, why I always had something to do.
And I was working again. Not the dance this time, but the student store. I signed up to sell Otter Pops at break so I didn’t have to figure out where to stand. I handed over sour straws and pocketed moments to hide—again under the cloak of usefulness. I learned every staff member’s name before most students did.
What no one tells you about high school is that belonging is measured in glances:
• Who looked up when you entered the room?
• Who didn’t?
• And who did—but too quickly turned away?
The locker room comparisons had sharpened into something less physical, more subtle: who had a car, who had a curfew, who you could borrow money from. These weren’t fights; they were frequencies—some people were tuned into them, others didn’t even know they were playing.
You could tell which neighborhoods kids came from by what they worried about. Some worried about tests. Others about where their mom had gone last night.
And in the in-between, I became a translator.
Fluent in both lunches packed with love and laminated free meal tickets.
Fluent in pre-calculus and pretending not to correct someone’s grammar too obviously.
Fluent in being wanted just enough to be funny, but not enough to be found out.
We talked about college like a promise no one could afford but couldn’t afford not to chase. You were either trying to escape Ventura or hoping to stay—very few kids had a narrative that allowed for both.
The Exit Row: Why I Chose DC
I needed the fastest version of the East Coast I could find.
Not New York, not Boston. I needed movement with meaning.
I wanted the hum of ambition without the collapse of anonymity.
Even its silence felt like it was planning something.
By senior year, I had outgrown Ventura—or at least, outpaced what I thought it could give me. I had run for student government, joined every leadership council, staffed the concession stand, helped organize blood drives, club meetings, campus clean-ups. I filled every minute with effort. I was building a resume before I understood what a resume really meant. And beneath it all was the quiet ache of distance.
I wanted to study business, entrepreneurship, strategy—the things that sounded like forward motion.
I didn’t just want to learn how systems worked.
I wanted to learn how to build them.
I wanted new rooms where no one already knew me as “the helper” or “the nice one.”
I wanted the kind of cold that stung your lungs and made you feel new again.
I wanted proof that I could belong somewhere on purpose, not by default.
And, if I’m honest, I needed to flee—from my parents, from expectations, from the version of myself that was always performing goodness
American University offered the kind of scaffolding I could grow inside.
It didn’t need me to be shiny—just determined.
It had a policy school, a business school, access to embassies and internships and late-night debates with kids who already wore blazers to breakfast.
It was idealistic without being naïve.
And so I said yes.
I got the acceptance. I packed the suitcase.
I bought a coat I didn’t know how to wear.
And when I left Ventura—truly left, boarded the plane, looked down on the mountains from above—it didn’t feel like escape.
It felt like crossing a line I had drawn myself.
A Call Back
Now I’m back. Older. Carrying a braided brown man-bag— still full just packed differently. It holds contracts and community meetings, a journal with hidden photos from before I knew how District 5 might shape me, containing new ideas written in the margins of to-do’s, new connections, and restaurants I want to try. It holds a dog leash, a few too many keys, and a memory of every street corner I ever waited on, hoping I was going somewhere.
But I think about today’s kids. What do they carry? What are their backpacks filled with?
Is it still lunch or laminated meal tickets? Still spiral notebooks or tablets they’re afraid to drop? Are they still mapping out the color of mailboxes, the smells of sunscreen and cheap cologne, the feeling of not being picked, or maybe finally being seen?
And is there someone on the sidewalk, the swing set, or the sidelines making sure they know they matter?
The mural in the cafeteria is still there.
But do those moments still happen the same way?
We don’t get to choose the moment a kid decides they belong—or the moment they decide they don’t.
But we do get to be part of the landscape they walk through.
The smile that makes them look up.
The street they feel safe on.
The adult that remembers what it felt like to carry a backpack too big.
So Venture to Ventura
Not the version of it that closes off, fences in, or forgets. But the one that dares to stay open. To evolve without erasing. To build enough room for everyone still finding their way.
Let’s create a Ventura where every kid has a shot at flourishing—where memories are not just something we look back on, but something we build forward.
Where every journey begins with a walk—and someone waiting to say:
“Oh Hi There!”
Once a Member of District 5, Always a Member -
Nate
P.S. Where did your walk begin, and where is it asking you to return?
Maybe, you belong here.
