In 2001, a very disgruntled and exhausted three year old touring Washington D.C. heaved a huge sigh and exasperatedly turned to her mother. “Mommy… When are we going to finally see some sites?” That three year old was me. I was standing at the back of the White House with the National Mall sprawling before me and the Washington Monument directly ahead. We had spent the day everywhere from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial, and still my younger self was unsatisfied. Little did I know that fifteen years later -- and after numerous days and weeks of sightseeing and gallivanting around the city -- I would still be entirely unsatisfied but in a completely different way.

At three, for some reason the magnitude and majesty of D.C. just did not strike me. I was largely unimpressed. My favorite thing had been a statue of the democratic donkey because it was a bright blue horse, and horses are fun to three year-olds. Everything else was boring. It was hot, my legs were short, and the city was seemingly nothing special.

Today, at eighteen, the magnitude and majesty of D.C. continues to overwhelm me. I am constantly impressed. My favorite sites are numerous and an ever-expanding list, but in my heart my very favorite thing will always be the Lincoln Memorial. Today was hot and muggy, my legs were considerably longer, and the city itself was immensely special.

I’m not exactly sure when this change took place. For nearly as long as I’ve been able to plan my future, I’ve mentioned that I would love to live in D.C. It just sort of clicked for me one day. I felt that it was where I was meant to be. As a kid, my family took trips to D.C. at least once a year. My dad spent part of his childhood in the city, and some of our relatives lived in the area when I was younger. Somewhere between the ages of three and eight, the city really began to grow on me. I fell in love with the history and importance of it. I began to look forward to our trips all year, usually requesting they be sooner or at a particular time of year. I could not get enough.

There’s just something about D.C. that draws me. The entire atmosphere is charged with something that I cannot tag with a name. The city itself is a convergence of opposing and differing entities. It’s a juxtaposition of past and present, influence and insignificance, power and poverty, ambition and ambiguity. As you walk the streets, you hear a myriad of languages and accents. The city pulses with an urgency unlike any other. Everyone moves and evolves of their own volition and according to their own individual lives, but despite these variances, you can’t help but feel united. Everyone is somber and respectful at certain monuments. Everyone is united in their pursuit of their goals. Everyone is united in their patriotism. Despite the urgency that grips the city by day, there is a calm that engulfs it after nightfall. When the monuments are illuminated and bathed in moonlight, when the quiet settles over the streets, when the pulsing of the city itself slows, I can’t help but feel at perfect peace.

Once I learned to appreciate the city, I knew I one day wanted to call it home. I thought maybe I would move to D.C. after I started a family one day. Eventually, I started to say I wanted to go to law school somewhere in D.C. One day, a friend asked me why I didn’t just get my undergrad somewhere in D.C. Outwardly, I dismissed the notion. It seemed far-fetched and impossible. Inwardly, I began to ponder the question quite a bit. Was it really so impossible? Why must I wait longer to live in the city of my dreams?

I honestly cannot recall the exact time my focus shifted, but one day I just looked up and realized there was nothing farfetched about living in D.C. sooner than I originally anticipated at all. I could do it. I would do it. I made my mind up that I wouldn’t wait around. I felt at home in D.C., so I would make D.C. my home.

So here I am, eighteen, completely in love with D.C. and entirely too excited to make it my official home. Once I made up my mind, I never doubted that this was exactly where I would end up. Leaving my friends and hometown was extremely hard and emotionally taxing, but I never once felt like I was meant to be anywhere other than D.C. While packing and preparing for the move, my mother shared her one trepidation with me. While she’s understandably upset to be letting her youngest child venture so far, she has always accepted the fact that D.C. is the place for me. Her one real worry, she claimed, was that I would become desensitized to the city. She doesn’t want me to stop being so enamored with and engrossed in the city. I could not even imagine that happening.

D.C. is unlike any other place on the planet. From the grandeur of the monuments to the glistening of the Potomac, the city just stirs something in me that my three-year-old self could never have anticipated or understood. It just feels right. It just feels like home. That’s a feeling that’ll never get old or dull.