Kyndall Lewis
"It’s really a place where I feel comfortable being myself”
Interview
“Can you start by stating your name and your age?”
“Okay. My name is Kyndall Lewis, and I’m 20 years old”
“Where are you from?”
“I’m from Albion”
“How long have you been a citizen of Albion?”
“Forever. I’ve always lived here. I’ve lived in this house for my whole life, so 20 years”
“What are you involved within the community?”
“Right now because I go to Albion College a lot of the stuff I am involved with is at Albion College. I am an Albion Bonner Fellow. I’m also a part of the women’s lacrosse team. And I’m also a part of CSC on campus”
“So within the Fellows program, what kind of service activities do you do?”
“So my first year I was over at Play Right Sports Academy with Mr. Barnes. That was such a fun experience. That really solidified that whatever I do I want to work with kids. Just because, it’s so much fun. Some people can’t do that, but I love it. It’s so much fun. But as I moved into my environmental studies major I realized that I wanted to do, my placement needed to be changed. So now I’m at the Community Gardens with Trisha Franzen. Right now we are doing a lot of stuff in Olin with inside gardening over there. So, it’s cool”
“So, why did you choose this location, referring to your house?”
“So I chose my house because growing up I was in Albion a lot when I still went to school here in elementary school and then a little bit into middle school. But once the schools closed down or were headed in that direction, we moved schools to Western over in Parma. And in doing that, this became my home base because I was over there all the time, like Parma, Spring Arbor, Jackson, for everything. And so, Albion really was this house to me for a few years because I wasn’t involved in anything here, I was really over there doing everything, everything was over there except for where I lived. So this was really my roots, it really kept me, yes I’m from Albion. This is where I’m from. This is where I live. So”
“So to kind of switch it a little bit and start talking about Albion, what is Albion to you? Are there specific people, locations, feelings?”
“I think to me Albion is a lot of, it’s a lot of different people. Obviously like Albion is a location, I think that, like my house is a location, it is a big one. The schools are a big one for me, Albion College has become a huge one for me now, downtown. The Festival of the Forks is something that I’ll always point to. If you want to experience Albion, go to the Festival of the Forks. It’s really just home because when you are from a place like Albion that doesn’t have a school system, coming back is a big deal. Like when people come back it shows that this place has a great community, which I believe it does. And so, it’s home to me; that’s what it is”
“This rolls right into the next question. Would you consider Albion to be your home and why?”
“Yes, absolutely I would. This is the place I feel like I’m most, I can be most myself in. I can be all of the different things. I can be from Western, but I can also be an Albion citizen. I can be somebody that’s biracial, but also a citizen of Albion because Albion is such a mixing pot of so many different people. It’s really a place where I feel comfortable being myself”
“So, what does Albion mean to you?”
“I’ve said it a bunch of times, but Albion means like home to me. It’s just, it’s where I feel comfortable; it’s where I feel welcomed, and yeah”
“And then to just switch it a little bit, in what ways do you think Albion could improve?”
“I think that if we’re talking about the infrastructure of Albion, there’s a lot of different people that are either from here or not from here, that try to come in and try to build things, but they don’t necessarily look at the needs of the people from Albion. Like they’re like, it would be cool to have this, it probably would be cool to have whatever you’re talking about but it’s not necessarily what everyone here needs. Sometimes it's not a lot of things that people can afford, if we’re talking about businesses and business practices. And so it’s not, it’s not helpful. It’s more catering towards, I feel like Albion College community. And those students and those families, and so if we’re building a town or rebuilding a town based off of a subset that’s not even here for a whole year, then I think that’s an issue we need to look at. That we need to turn the focus, okay what can have that can benefit everyone that lives here? So”
“Last question I have for you is to describe Albion in one word using the statement Albion is and then your word”
“Albion is home”