Colville teen Samie Beardall hopes to use her
own life to help make other children’s lives better

BY SOPHIA ALDOUS
S-E Staff Reporter

    Visiting with Samie Bear¬dall, it’s easy to forget that she’s only 17-year-old. De¬spite her impish smile and the mischievous look that steals over her face like she’s se¬cretly planning a small insur¬gence against authority, she carries herself with an unas¬suming maturity. She can go from carefree and comic to serious and thoughtful in conversation as any been-there-seen-it-all adult, and all with¬out the jaded attitude.
    “I’d say I’m eclectic,” Bear¬dall described herself. “I can be pretty outspoken, and I don’t think I’m very conven¬tional. Just because you’re young doesn’t mean that you don’t have anything to say.”
    Beardall, who was born in Spokane and raised in Colville, decided that the con¬ventional path was not for her, and left Colville High School last February to pur¬sue her High School GED on¬line and through the Commu¬nity Colleges of Spokane Colville Center.
    “I’ve got one more test to take, than I’ll have my GED and be done with high school,” Beardall said. “I’m really excited. I’m not saying that high school is bad; a lot of teenagers do just fine and like it, but I didn’t, so I wanted to try something dif¬ferent. For me, it was just about getting a piece of paper out of the way.”
    At first, she admitted, her mother was unsure about her daughter finishing school on¬line, and a bit disappointed that she would not get to see her daughter take the tradi¬tional walk on graduation day, but she was supportive.
    “My mom is very caring and involved in my life; it’s always been that way,” said Beardall.
    There was hassle from peers and adults about her choice, but Beardall has had the last word. After she receives her GED this month she will be moving into her own apart¬ment in Colville, financing the move with the money she earns at Arden One Stop and True Live Productions, an in¬dependent step for one so young.
    “I’ve had some people give me a lot of flack about not completing high school the normal way,” Beardall said. “They were like, “You will do nothing and be stuck in Colville for the rest of your life.” Well, I am doing some¬thing, and what’s wrong with being in Colville, if that’s what a person wants to do?”
    Beardall has always had that self-governing streak, for as long as she can remember. Due to her mother’s job, which requires her to travel a lot, she started living with her grandmother and learned to grow up fast.  She insists though, that is was a positive propulsion.
    “I did it because I wanted to, not because my mom aban¬doned me or anything like that. If I had cried and begged her to quit her job and try to find something here so she could stay with me, she would have,” stated Beardall. “But she still calls me all the time and we talk about what’s happening in our lives. We’re very close and I admire her a lot.”
    In the future, Beardall said she wants to have a career in children’s justice and social work. Being a young person herself, she said she has seen too many teenage girls who are uneducated and without resources, or kids who’ spend their free time drinking and partying, and she would like to impact children’s lives in a more positive way.
    “Not to be rude, but I hear a lot of adults who say, “well in my day,” or “my generation, etc., etc.” said Beardall. “But it’s not your generation any¬more. It’s entirely different in a lot of ways, and I know a lot of kids here who think there’s nothing else to do besides party and drink lots of alco¬hol.

‘If adults want to help, they need to be involved.’

    “If adults want to help, they need to be involved, especially parents. We actually have tons of things to do here; you just have to look around. Par¬ents just need to have a posi¬tive influence in their kids lives, not overbearing, just participating.”
    Adults who Beardall credits for having a positive influence in her own life are her mother Dawn, and Andrew and Kim¬berly Kesner of True Live Pro¬duction Studio in Colville, whom she takes pictures with.
    “They (Kesners) really care about the youth in this area,” Beardall praised. “They want to make sure kids have a creative outlet for their ener¬gies. Any kid can go in there and ask Andrew to teach them about photography and he would. Both he and kin give so much to other people.”
    The arts are another area Beardall is passionate about. She enjoys photography, modeling, acting and painting, the latter of which she claims to not be very good at.  
     “All the paintings I make come out really weird, so I just call them abstract,” laughed Beardall. “But acting and modeling are a lot of fun, because you get to act out emotions that are different than what you portray every day in your own life. It’s fun.”
    In five years, Beardall said she looks forward to helping fix the state’s current child welfare system so that it bet¬ter serves the needs of fami¬lies and children, as well as many having a family of her own.
    “I realize that 22 or 23 is still pretty young to be having kids, but it’s something I really want to do,” said Bear¬dall. “I’m a family person and I want to be in a position to support that. I figure as long as you can be happy with your life and not hurt anyone, you can do whatever you want.”

    Profile
    Age: 17
    Family: Mother, Dawn; grandmother, Mallory
    Favorite book: Star Girl by Jerry Spinelli
    Favorite movie: Singing in the Rain
    Television: That 70’s Show
    Food: anything Italian
    Favorite school subject: art
    Most influential teacher: Tracey Delyea

  

 Samie Beardall