The heavenly Father mixed minerals of my mother and minerals of my father and carefully placed me, the clay, onto this potter’s wheel of the world. I wish the first spin would have left me smooth, free of imperfections, and with only a mind free to play and explore the forms I could become. But, before I could take any form, words were carved onto my skin, ultimately changing the pathway of my art forever. The words read “Christian,” “African American,” “gay,” and “skinny.” I said nothing.

Clay is always wobbly when it’s young and there are many hands pushing, pulling and tearing at the clay, attempting to influence the finished shape. I allowed those hands around me to dictate my shape, my mind. My father would come in and out of my life, taking bits and pieces as he came and went. But today as I embark on my own path through the passageway of higher education, I am me and I am now carving my own form. Twirling, working and manifesting what I will become.

In those first few spins around the wheel, those around me had hands filled with aggression, lacking delicacy. They wrapped around me, strangled me, and tried to destroy the form that I was working so hard to build. The chisels used to carve words into my skin were too sharp and held loosely. I had a few spins where I made progress on the shape I’d become but I could not reveal my sculpture in fear that someone would vandalize my creation. In an attempt of defense against the questions others asked about my behavior or my appearance, I applied a layer of painted cloth around my clay molding each day to protect myself. My threads protected me from the world’s tainted views of black and gay people.

I used this woven cloth as my iridescent shield, weaving varied textiles to strengthen my defense and covering what they assumed was weakness underneath. I was heartbreakingly torn between the words I tried to hide and the sculpture I wished others could see. The cloth was lies displayed by the polychrome fibers Yet, underneath, my form remained unfinished. Every day, I was gently molding my clay into a product that I could be proud of. I spun their carvings and smoothed them out into daring lines and artful curves.

I have grown to too tall and too confident to be covered in cloth anymore. I am not only African American, but I am also Afro-Latino and proud of my heritage. I have loved and valued my Christian roots, and I’ve grown to understand and become a spokesperson for the idea that sexuality does not determine who I am. Yet, society still asks questions and I have grown tired of explaining. The purpose of art itself is the invocation of expanding the mind to accept, to beautify, and to love. I am no longer a canvas to be questioned of but art to stand alone.

Christianity led me to believe that the heavenly Father would send someone down, angels perhaps, to help me, to remove the projection of others and to allow me to be me. Those who have been sent have saved me. I found friendships with other sculptors who have helped me understand that we were once in the same place. I have even come to understand myself because they gave me the artist’s greatest gift – acceptance. We learned from each other, growing into sculptures of refinement, scoring out words that may have been familiar to others, but only lucid in our eyes. The acceptance of my refined sculpture was the frame holding me together and establishing me into a final product.

Whether it is the heavenly Father or those around me, the encouragement breathed fire onto my absorbent skin. I was a newborn bisque, allowed to glaze my skin with a fresh coat of words and names. With many names previously put onto my skin, there was still one I wanted to keep: Adoni Cruz Simms.

Moving forward there are many names I’ve always dreamed of for myself: an academic, a scholar, and a sociologist. Through higher education, I can own these words and all else that awaits me in my collegiate journey and continue to work on my most important masterpeice of all, my mind.