Priscilla

“The first thought was, I’m going to die.”

Early in the pandemic, Priscilla Daniels was stopped at a red light in Vancouver, Washington when a car flew off the top of a parking structure and landed on her car.

“It flew through the air like an action movie. That’s what I thought when I saw it coming. It was slow motion. I just thought okay, today’s my day,” she recalls.

Miraculously, Priscilla was unharmed. Shaken to the core, however, she began to reevaluate her life:

“I thought I was going to die, but then later on, I started really thinking about living — like really living —like, what do I do with my time now?”

Priscilla is an artist. During the pandemic, she channeled her shaken feelings into doing art. She built a mantel for a fireplace; she took up sashiko mending, a type of sewing that uses stitching to create design; she recycled used delivery boxes into 3-D paintings. Sometimes she put her art in the window, creating a walk-by gallery for passerby.

She also enrolled in a yoga teacher training course. After the accident, focusing on her body and mind became a priority.

“I got the opportunity to learn about my body and learn that I was okay with myself…And that I actually had love for myself. Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve experienced trauma to my body,” she says. “In yoga you learn about each part of your body. You learn about your mind, you learn to be quiet and then also find your voice at the same time.”

Empowered by the yoga course, Priscilla felt it was time to make a change. When her daughter enrolled as a first-year at University of Oregon, Priscilla herself enrolled in the Rise to Teach program at PCC.

“This was the right time for me to go back to school and figure out, ok, at 39 years old, who am I now?” she says.

Although she was nervous at first, she has loved being back in school. Priscilla now knows she wants to work with children and teach writing. She’s also working on her own writing and feels courageous enough to share her work publicly.

“I’ve learned that I’m actually capable of being a student,” she says. “And now I want to know more about myself and what I can do.”