Here we are: another trip back to school after four long (yet somehow short) months at home together.

What a summer it was, filled with memories to be cherished and also challenges we worked together to overcome. I am so blessed to have spent my summer break living at home with you and Dad and the dog.

We're in the car now, with the trunk packed to the gills and with our favorite oldies music playing on the radio. In about an hour we'll be back at the place I love, the place I loathe, the place I've come to regard as my second home. I am so thankful for that place, the place you prayed I would find and feel connected to.

Two years ago when we first made this trip together, I was terrified. But that's not news to you. It was written all over my face. I know you felt for me and I know you wanted to take it away. I am glad you couldn't. I am so thankful for those first anxious and fearful days, because I took so many lessons away from them.

I learned that you fight your battles on your knees, because that is where your strength is. I learned to be a joiner instead of staying burrowed under the covers in my shoebox of a freshman dorm where I felt some semblance of safety, because branching out is how you grow. I learned that it's okay to not be okay but that it's not okay to stay that way, because you can't wallow in self-pity forever. I learned that I can always come home, because that is where I will always belong and be welcome.

I learned these lessons from my first year at college, yes, but even before I learned them on my own, you had already instilled them in me. Maybe I hadn't listened completely or maybe I thought I had already learned them, but in those initial weeks at school, it was your voice I heard in my head, gently reminding me of things you had said months and years before. Thank you for teaching me those lessons even before I was ready to learn them.

This year feels so much different. I actually couldn't wait to go back to school. Not because I won't miss you and Dad (you know how much I will), but because I have so much at school to look forward to. While I'll be nutso, crazy busy, and while I'll still have bad days where I call you near tears, I've finally traded in my anxiety about school in for excitement. That's because I took your lessons to heart and now I am a better, more secure person for it. I have found my niche, my calling, my passion. Thank you for helping guide me to it. Or more accurately, thank you for guiding me to the Lord, who showed me the Way.

I love you to the moon and back. Here's to another year of chasing my dream. I hope I make you proud.

All my love,

Your Girl