This is my fourth year attending Humboldt State University.
Before I started school, people warned me I was going into a very liberal area and I would be exposed to a lot of different ideas, notions that I shouldn't let impact me.
During my winter break of my senior year, I realized just how much I have changed since an eighteen-year-old me stepped foot on the campus of hills, stairs and umbrellas.
And I'm so happy about that.
This break, I made the drive back home, to a place where 53% of voters voted to elect Donald Trump as President.
Driving around during the break, I spotted more Trump signs than I had during my entire Fall semester in Humboldt County.
Since coming back, I've found myself left speechless at certain radio station claims, trying to inform people just how blatantly incorrect and disturbing the idea white men are under attack in America is and defending what feminism is on an almost daily basis.
The county still not a very diverse area with almost 90% of the county being white, something I never questioned growing up. Guns are much loved here and it's a normal sound to hear the popping of rounds on a Saturday afternoon. The traffic has increased and road kill is a sadly common sight, yet the roads remain mainly trash free.
Where my family is located, it's especially rural and the internet barely fires up in some places, leaving the TV and radio as the main forms of content delivery.
This article isn't here to knock people who live in and vote for red county California.
A lot of the people here, at least the ones I know, tend to be overall good people.
Some of these people have valid reasons or concerns for voting how they do. Others are afraid/ignorant and use this fear in an attempt to keep others from making their own choices on how to live their lives.
My hometown itself is slowly changing.
It's exciting to see the new stores on main street pop up with signs boasting of fair trade goods, grass fed beef, and urging people to support small businesses.
What becomes most clear to me this Winter break is that while I love coming back to Placerville, which isn't as little as it used to be, I'm so grateful to have had the opportunity to leave and be exposed to a diverse set of ideas and truths.
It goes without saying; I wouldn't be who I am today without Humboldt State and the people I've meet there.
