I can't say that modeling is something that I have wanted to do my entire life; that it was always my "dream." The truth is, I was always the "smart kid," the overachiever, the honor student, and the after school activities player in life. I started singing in choir when I was ten years old and continued right on through to college, which I just graduated from in May of last year. I thought that music was my talent, my passion, but was never allowed to believe that it was something I could make a living in, and thusly dropped it to a back-burner hobby in my set of priorities. My parents constantly harped on me about being "fiscally responsible," and they insisted that I HAD to do something with my life that could at LEAST feed and clothe me so that I would always have a roof over my head. I went to college, got a degree in something I never intended to pursue as a career (psychology), and went out into the world with absolutely no clue what to do with myself. I spent some time working for my boyfriend's band, and as you could imagine, the parents just LOVED that!
Andrew (my boyfriend) is such and amazing man who knew that I had recently become obsessed with the work of Alberto Vargas and his old pin-up style portraits. For Valentine's Day, he took me to do a photo shoot at the beach which he then had turned into a similar hand drawn portrait as a gift. The photos we took that day made me realize that I could really see myself doing the whole modeling thing for a living, much to the chagrin of my parents, who still keep pressuring me to get a real job! To my surprise, I think I have actually found what most people search their entire lives for... the discovery of my true talent. Now I'm starting to work with photographers and stylists who are interested enough in my look to help me build a portfolio.
What started out as a simple token of appreciation and love has turned out to be one of the best things to ever happen to me, and I'm really unbelievably excited to start living the dream, and developing my true potential. As I take more photos and get better acclimated with developing my craft, maybe someone out there will be willing enough to take a chance on me, as I so took the willingness to give modeling a chance. My best friend once told me, "Lissa, don't ever think that you have failed to reach your goals. Failure is what happens when you are given the opportunity to do something, and do not manage to succeed. What you will experience is rejection; the feeling that comes from having been denied the opportunity to try in the first place."
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