Building My Yellow Brick Road

In a single ride, I left behind a life of constraints in Illinois and stepped into a world of raw beauty and self-discovery. This is my journey—my yellow brick road—to freedom and authenticity.

Riding on the back of a moped in Ha Giang, Vietnam – cliffs dropping behind me, the world spinning in emerald. All I could think was: I made it. Finally.

My $100 box braids flowed in the warm, gentle wind. I could smell the lush, living green of the mountains.

This was a far cry from a girl who couldn’t even raise her hand in high school.

Back then, I didn’t know what I was searching for. I just knew it wouldn’t be there.

I grew up in Lake Bluff, Illinois – the kind of town where the houses are big, the expectations are high, and the diversity was always lower than my math grade.

I felt out of place my whole life, one of the few black kids. I straightened my 4B curls just to sit with the white girls in elementary school while they braided each other’s long, blonde 1A hair.

In middle school, I caked on drugstore makeup, hoping my crushes would think I was pretty. By senior year, I was applying to every high-ranking, low-diversity college in the country – because that's just what everyone else was doing.

I was following the yellow brick road.

But it never really felt like mine.

The road cracked senior year. Her name was written all over it.

We’d been friends since fifth grade – paddleboarding on Lake Michigan, skateboarding around the block, making YouTube videos we swore we’d play at our weddings.

She wasn’t just my best friend. She was my sister.

People always say, “One day, you’ll realize all that high school drama was stupid.”

But in the moment, it felt like I’d been erased from my own story.

Losing friends left and right over a story no one asked my side of.

Turning to drugs to grieve someone who was very much still alive.

Welcoming depression and anxiety into my everyday reality.

I fell in with a new friend group – one that revolved around drinking, smoking, and running from our problems.

Through that chaos, I also found love. Real love. A group of people who understood the ache. We were all going down the same path together – slowly deteriorating.

There were moments of joy, like sneaking onto rooftops in the city at 2 a.m.

But there were also moments of spiraling.

I skipped class nearly every day – just to smoke a little earlier.

I craved more truth, more peace, more purpose.

I was just too high to go find it.

May 1st – Decision Day – was around the corner.

Every ounce of light inside me had dimmed.

I wanted to move as far away as I could.

Far away from the Karens. Far away from the racist classmates. From the flat land.

After giving it my all – rehearsing monologues, studying Shakespeare, submitting an audition, and getting a callback – I was denied from Chapman’s Acting for Film and Television program.

I had nothing left.

So I did what any heartbroken Gen Z would do: opened TikTok, started doomscrolling, crying, smoking – trying to feel less.

Then came Lexi Hidalgo.

She changed my life.

Now, I’m not a big influencer girl by any means. But Lexi had this… glow.

She moved to Hawaii with her best friends, lived in bathing suits, ate açaí bowls in bright clothes, and danced like no one was watching.

May 1st – I committed to the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa.

The palm trees, the ocean air, the rainbows after every rainfall–it was everything I needed and more.

I joined school clubs, a sorority, and a play.

I bought a moped and learned how to surf.

I put myself out there in ways I never had before.

I discovered independence,

I learned about true friendship.

I found the first taste of real love–on the island of Honolulu.

I was no longer chasing the yellow brick road.

I was building my own – one moped, one moment, one miracle at a time.

Hawai’i showed me what it meant to feel alive.

And once I tasted that freedom, I couldn’t stop searching for it.

Not just on an island. But everywhere.

So I took that sense of freedom with me–across oceans, continents, and time zones.

After a semester in Hawai’i, I transferred to an online university to pursue my dreams of exploring the world and myself.

I came home, got in a car with two of my friends, and spent a month exploring Alabama, Georgia, and all of Florida.

I traveled to San Diego to visit old friends from Hawai’i.

Then, I signed up for an REI membership.

Bought a backpack.

Got my vaccines.

And one week before I was set to take off across Europe–

The actors strike hit.

I didn’t know what to do. I had everything planned: backpack through Europe, then live in Berlin or London for a year, pursuing my dreams of acting for theater and film.

So I was back to square one.

Back on Google flights, Skyscanner, and Kayak.

“$600 one-way ticket to Bangkok with a 23-hour layover in Abu Dhabi.”

I booked it with no idea what I was doing–just a feeling I couldn’t ignore.

I was chasing the unknown.

Chasing what I had missed out on for the first 18 years of my life, living in what felt like a jail cell.

I was running away from the typical college path all my friends were taking.

I was running away from everything.

In hopes of finally finding the answer to my question:

Who is McKenna Burns?

Thailand. Laos. Vietnam. Cambodia. Bali. Singapore. Malaysia.

Solo female backpacker. Nineteen years old.

Each new stamp in my passport was a breadcrumb on the path back to myself.

Thailand taught me to always say yes.

Yes to feeding elephants bananas.

Yes to renting mopeds and learning to drive on the opposite side of the road.

Laos taught me patience.

Patience when my visa wouldn’t get approved.

Patience sitting in a hot air balloon while the clouds were black.

Vietnam taught me self-love.

Strangers telling me that my box braids were beautiful.

That my chocolate skin glowed under the Vietnamese sun.

Cambodia taught me to step outside of my comfort zone.

Talking to two British girls on a 13-hour bus led to a week of shared hostels, Greek dinners, and exploring Angkor Wat at sunrise together.

Bali taught me mind over body.

I earned my 200-hour yoga instructor license.

And healed parts of myself I didn’t know were wounded.

Singapore taught me that being alone can be comforting.

Even with an old friend nearby, I ate dinner solo and went to a Christmas light show–later learning it was meant for couples.

I loved every minute of it.

Malaysia taught me gratitude.

Gratitude for food, for two working legs, for friendship, for laughter.

The more I traveled the world, the closer I came to myself.

I wasn’t lost–I was just searching for a version of me that had been buried under years of shame, silence, and trying to fit in.

Now, I travel not to run, but to return.

To myself. To my joy. To my truth.

And I’m just getting started.

The road I’m on now isn’t paved in gold.

It’s rocky. Messy. Wild.

But it’s mine.

And that’s the magic.

McKenna Burns

https://whateversmeant.com