Abena Hagan-Brown

Abena is a three-year senior from Virginia who enjoys long walks on the beach, playing the ukulele, and Sean Connery best as James Bond. She is also a member of track.



Hi. For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Abena Hagan-Brown and I am a three year senior. I don’t really know what I’m doing, so bear with me for a couple of minutes. My Choate experience isn’t terribly interesting, nor is it all that exciting, but I think I’ve made it work well in my favor. This place isn’t perfect, and there’s a lot about it that I don’t like. I haven’t always been happy, but I think that I can look back and say that I’ve had a good time. I have learned to live by a saying I saw on a shirt once: Laugh. Love. Live.

Laugh. There is a Yiddish proverb that says “what soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.” If that is true, then laughter has been keeping me clean, fresh, and good-smelling all my life…soap does help, though. I’m a pretty happy person in general, and I have found that taking any and every opportunity to laugh or smile just makes the day worthwhile. On the first day of sophomore year, my first year here, I realized how much a welcoming face meant to me. I remember cracking up during my fourteen hour cram session before the U.S. history winter exam junior year, mostly because I didn’t want to cry from the realization that I hadn’t retained a damn thing. Laughter can also come from the weirdest and most unexpected situations. Now, I’m also pretty awkward, if you didn’t know, and have had my share of awkward moments. Like when you’re walking down the sidewalk to class and a friend is walking towards you and you say hello too early and have nothing else to say as you get closer to her, so you look down or turn your head the other way and pretend someone just called you or you just saw a really interesting bird. Or the time when I was talking freely about a certain teacher of mine when he was walking right behind me. Or better yet, when I was speaking even more freely about a girl, now graduated, only to find that her mother had been sitting right next to me. I felt terrified when those things happened, but they are now some of my favorite stories to laugh about. I’ve always had a problem with coming to terms with the past if I cannot change it, but laughing about it helps. For future reference though, don’t talk about people behind their backs, because you never know when their mom is listening…unless it could make a great story in the future. So just laugh because you can and smile a lot, because you never know when you could be making someone’s day, including your own. The most wasted of days is one without laughter.

Love. Love is something that I felt I had to learn during my time here. I’m not that big on affection, and I can easily say that I have only ever had love for my family, music, sports, and the Backstreet Boys. I’ve never been one to initiate a hug, and explicitly detest being approached and touched from a position where I can’t see you coming. Because of my dad’s job, I have had to move around about seven times, and live in three different continents, and speak three different languages. Every two years, I had to prepare for another move in a new country or city, until I settled in Virginia. I lived there for 8 years, which is the longest I have ever stayed in one place. When another move was proposed, I was crushed. For the first time in my life I had developed relationships, and felt the love and support of a community that I actually belonged to, and once again it was all going down the drain and I would have to start all over again. I wanted stability in my life, which influenced my decision to come to Choate. My first year, I didn’t really like it. In the fall term, I didn’t see the need to become really close to anyone, since I would just get uprooted again. But little by little, through the help of certain teachers and students, I learned that you really can’t get through a place like this without the love and support of your friends. The people are what make Choate worthwhile, and you really have to take full advantage of that before it is too late. I still love my family, my music, sports, and Backstreet, but now I have more to add to the list. I love my friends, I love my teachers, I love my dorm, I love my track team, and I may even love you…well, not really.

Live. I don’t mean just breathing, and moving and all that stuff. I mean, having a pulse is cool and everything, but we go to Choate, we can do better than that. I think the most important thing I did this year was let myself go out and do more than what others expected of me and more than I expected of myself. It was time to take risks, and the earlier I realized that, the better it felt. I started to do things that I would have been terrified to do in the past, usually because of a fear of failing and lack of assertiveness. I started doing things because they made me happy, and frankly, just because I could. I finally auditioned for an a cappella group after two years of “not finding the sign up sheet at Club Fair.” I felt an urge to buy a ukulele, bought a ukulele, learned to play it, and wrote a couple of songs! I started using my voice when I didn’t agree with something, instead of letting people walk all over me. All these things have given me so much more contentment and fun during my senior year, and I didn’t even have to consume any illegal substances to feel that way! Now, I’m not a complete rebel or anything. I still have never gotten a Saturday or Sunday D, and don’t plan to do anything stupid in these last couple of days, but by my standards, I’ve played well with the cards I’ve been dealt, and had a little bit of fun along the way. I’m going to college next year and I’m excited to get out of high school, but I can’t lie and say that I won’t miss this place. There’ve been bad times, really bad times, and then junior year as a collective whole, but there’ve also been good times, some even great. As long as I remember to laugh as much as I breathe, and love as long as I live, I think I’ll be okay. Thank you.