My One Regret From College

I have only one real regret from my college days at the University of Oregon. And before you jump to conclusions—because you saw the cover image of that goofy, exaggerated caricature of Trump—no, my regret isn’t voting for him. I didn’t even vote while I was in college. My regret is actually making that image in the first place.

Between 2014 and 2018, in one of my digital art classes, we had weekly assignments to create something new. One week, without much thought—almost like a random doodle—I threw together a silly caricature of Trump. It wasn’t deliberate, it wasn’t meaningful, and it definitely wasn’t rooted in my own beliefs. I didn’t know much about him at all back then. What I drew wasn’t based on any personal conviction; it was more like a reflection of how I watched my friends talk about him. Their reactions and attitudes were what shaped that doodle, even if I didn’t realize it at the time.

When the assignment was printed and hung on the wall in a gallery-style display, I remember feeling detached from it. I don’t even recall what explanation I gave during the critique. Whatever I said probably didn’t match any real thought of my own, because I hadn’t formed one.

And that’s exactly why I’m embarrassed by it now. The image doesn’t represent what I actually thought—it represents what I thought my friends thought. By making it and showcasing it, I accidentally revealed something I didn’t recognize then: that my opinion of someone had been shaped almost entirely by the people around me. Not through research, not through understanding, not through any genuine personal reflection.

The regret isn’t about the artwork itself. It’s about realizing that I once expressed someone else’s view as if it were my own. And that careless doodle, hanging on that wall, reminds me of a time when I hadn’t yet learned to think independently.