One Girl and a Big World

Dear Reader,

It has been over a month since I have written a blog. In all honesty, I did not know what to write on. I had a general idea, but up until today, I could not put it into tangible words. But now, as my brain has pieced everything together, I am ready for my next blog.

In my nineteen years of life, I have moved eight times. On average, that is a move every two and a half years. This is definitely more than most kids/teenagers my age. Moving around a lot has brought its pros and cons. I have seen the world, but I have also had to start over many times. I have never adjusted to moving very well and I always wondered why that was. Well, as is usual for me, one night, as I was trying to fall asleep, my brain began contemplating life’s questions. I do my best thinking at night.

One night in bed, I began to ask myself why it was that I hated moving around. I mean, all things considered, I had opportunities that most would never have in their lifetime. So why did it feel like the end of the world whenever I was told we were moving? Well, I figured out the question. I do not mind leaving places; I mind leaving people.

This answer led me down a rabbit trail of other questions. As I said, most people consider the night for sleeping; Sofia uses it for thinking time. I will not bore you with the questions I contemplated that night, and to be fair, they probably would not make sense to anyone else. But regardless, I came upon a revelation after nearly an hour of quiet thinking in the dead of night. To me, people are the most important opportunities or adventures I will ever come across. Although I have always had few friends, the friends I did have were what I considered my treasures. On first instinct, whenever I was told I had to move, I hated the idea, not because I did not want to experience what was new, but because to me, the people I am close too (my treasures) far outweigh a new place to live in or a new thing to see.

Whenever I think of a place I have lived in, it is never the places we visited or the opportunities that we took that stand out in my mind. Instead, it is the memories with people I knew that take first place. The sights and sounds come AFTER I have reminisced about the people I knew.

With this background in mind, I will now write the main point of my blog: a thank you to all the people who have made the places I visited special.

My first true memories begin in North Dakota. I was in fourth grade when we moved there. I remember winter tubing with kids from my homeschool group. It was there that I got an ice burn on my nose when I flipped tubing down a hill and slid all the way down on my nose. (For those who are curious, I was laughing the whole time with my friends and showed my mom my bloody nose as a battle scar I was deeply proud off). I remember playing King of the Hill on a huge snow mound made outside of the church my homeschool group met at. I remember the after-swim-meet lunches with a brother and sister who were also in our homeschool group and were on the same swim team as my brother and I.

When we moved back to Texas, I was befriended by one of my now best friends at church. We were basically inseparable. (Also, fun fact, she almost made me cry the first time we met. In her defense, she never intended too and also does not remember the story… anyway). In seventh grade, I was in the best homeschool class I have ever been in. It was a group of four ruffians who had a blast together. One ended up going through school and graduating with me (and also put up with my temper tantrums over physics in senior year. Gracie, you really get props for that, love ya!), one became a type of big brother I never had, and the other, well, we never really saw each other after seventh grade, but he had some good Elvis Presley moves and did make his mark by one day deciding to run, jump, and slide onto a folding table. The table broke immediately and crashed to the ground with him still on it. That is by far one of my all time favorite memories from school. Oh yeah, he also pulled a chair out from under my girl classmate when we were playing musical chairs (full disclosure: we were all laughing our heads off). I really loved that class.

Jumping over to our time in Portugal, although I did not come out of my shell until the last few months we were there, I did enjoy the time with the youth group and I even started a little performance group which was dubbed JB (Jesus Band). I have memories of us sitting out by fire just singing worship music and enjoying the time together.

Back in Houston (again), I obviously had my best friend, and two of my seventh grade classmates. But this time around, I also got the best coaches I had the whole twelve years of swimming. They all taught me so much, and it was from that time in my twelve years of swimming that I truly adored my sport wholeheartedly (even if they made me swim terrible butterfly sets). One of my favorite memories I have is racing my all-time favorite coach in the 500 free, the 50 free, and the 50 fly. Ironically, I also discovered that he was most likely one of my first coaches when I started swimming as a little six year old the first time we lived in Houston. Although I could not finish twelve years of swimming properly, that discovery made it special for me regardless. God truly brought me full circle. I began swimming and I finished swimming in the same natatorium and with the same coach twelve years apart.

And finally, jumping over to the current residence in Virginia, I met America’s ninja pastor and the greatest youth group on the planet. Although I am now of college age and out of high school, that youth group has a piece of my heart and always will. One of my best friends and my boyfriend, whom I love to bother, are there, my mentor is there, the nicest group of high school girls who call me their “mom” is there, and the coolest rag tag group of guys are also there. That group is my second family.

So in conclusion, thank you to everybody who has made my life special. Moving was and still is hard for me (I might even argue that it gets harder the older I get), but you guys make the memories worth it. And for anyone dreaming of seeing the world, go ahead and do it. All I ask is that you remember and treasure the people you have now in whatever stage of life you may be. They are what make a new adventure memorable. Sights and sounds are amazing to experience, but the people God puts in your life might have more to offer you than you possibly expect. Take it from someone who moved and left many people behind: Don’t take them for granted.

God Bless!

Sofia