As a child, I was fortunate enough to stay in the same house for the full 18 years that I've been on this Earth. This was the home that I was brought to after leaving the hospital as a newborn, and have called my own ever since. This home has given me walls to lean on as I took my first steps and given me a driveway to ride my bicycle on for the first time without training wheels (and some nice grass to land on for my first fall off of a bicycle without training wheels). It has protected me through thunderstorms and hurricanes and blizzards and the sweltering humidity of July. It has cringed at every slammed door and at every baseball, golf ball, or frisbee through the window. It has been the home for countless family dinners where we all had to go around the table and say one good thing and one bad thing about our day. It was the perfect setting for Thanksgiving dinners and Christmas mornings. Its back yard has been the hot spot for prom photos, graduation parties and Fourth of July barbecues.
As I grew up, I watched several of my very close friends move away, some to the other side of the country. I never fully understood how some kids could be so calm about moving from small town Connecticut to big city California. I was always deathly afraid of the idea that I would have to change schools, make new friends and be that awkward new girl that all the guys have already called dibs on before you've even gotten there. I never once felt even the slightest pang of jealousy for those kids who had to pack their lives into boxes and move away... that is, until right now. I could really use their experience with packing to make this process a lot smoother. In about ten days, I will be moving into a dorm with three other girls, and will begin a new chapter of my life.
I never knew how difficult it would be to pack my entire life into plastic boxes for college. To grow up in one place for 18 years, and to have a literal clock ticking away the time until I am uprooted and thrown into a completely new city is absolutely terrifying. Humans naturally do not like change, and moving from a tiny town with more cows than people to Boston is a pretty significant change of scenery.
Although I know that this change is going to be scary at first, I know that every other freshman going into their first year of college away from home feels the exact way that I do. Saying goodbye to the house that I was raised in is only temporary, and I am sure that I will quickly adjust to city life. This house has supported me through the years, but now it is time to go out on my own. I will never forget my roots, and where I've come from, no matter how far away life decides to take me.
