This week my partner and I had a very casual conversation. We shared stories briefly about memories connected to music but then we carried the conversation into numerous other topics. We talked about music for a while and my partner told me how his favorite artists included Lil Durk, JCole, and Rod Wave. He mentioned how he loves lyricism in music which is why he loves JCole so much which I found interesting. We also talked about video games for a while and he told me how he loves to play Fortnite so we talked all about the different battlepasses. Although this can seem insignificant or stupid, it showed me how although we are so different we still can have many common interests. My one big takeaway from this conversation is how storytelling can sweep you away. As we were sharing stories and bonding over our love of music and video games, not once did I think about the fact that I was doing this for a class or that Quoron and I were so different. I didn’t think about the fact that I’m a college student at the University of Richmond and he is serving time in a detention center. We were just two people in that moment talking about random things and building a connection.
In terms of his story, I gave it back for him to read to make sure I got everything right and he was satisfied with the story. I was a little surprised because his story is pretty short and I was assuming he’d want me to add some details here and there or fix a portion of the story. It was kind of anticlimactic because after he finished reading it he just handed it back and said “That’s perfect you nailed it.” I also made sure to tell him that he could always change his story (which is about him and his brothers fighting some kids from another hood at school) if he’d like but he was more than satisfied with the current one.