Even though I was born and lived a few years in Louisiana, I spent most of my childhood in a small town in Mississippi. I lived with my dad in Columbia, Mississippi until I was in the eighth grade. This is your typical small town where everybody knows everybody, you pray at Friday night football games and there is absolutely nothing to do but cause trouble and to cheer on the wildcats every Friday night in the fall. At the time that I lived there, I hated that place. I was sick of the same people and doing the same things every day. I hated that everyone knew who I was and who I belonged to. Most of all, I hated living with my dad. So when the day came to move in with my mom I was more than ecstatic. I could not wait to go somewhere new and start over- or so I thought.

January of 2012 I stepped onto Fontainebleau Junior High School campus for the first time. I did not know a single person or a single thing about Mandeville, Louisiana, even though I was born there. The school was four times the size as where I had just moved from. My whole class in itself was the size of the high school in Columbia. Despite all this, I was still excited to start over and meet new people in a new school in a completely different place. On that first day of school I walked into the office and got my new schedule and was not prepared for the changes and experiences I was about to face.

I walked into science in third period and introduced myself, and I can still to this day see all the faces staring at me and hear the whispers they spoke as I was given a place to sit. The room was set up with tables that sat four people each. The class was practically full, and I was put a table with three other people. Two of them sat across from me and looking directly at me. I spent the rest of the hour getting uncomfortable stares from people who wanted to know more about the “new girl.” At that point in my life I had always considered myself outgoing, but here I was an outsider, uncomfortable, and I could not find the words to speak to a single soul. Later that day, I sat at lunch by myself that day in a large room full of people and just tried to take it all in. Then I realized, that room full of the people were the people I was supposed to spend the next four and half years of my life with, and I instantly wanted to go back to Columbia. Where I had come from, we ate with the class we were just in and we had assigned tables. At FJH we sat wherever we wanted, inside or outside, and I felt so lost. I sat by myself, had no one to talk to and felt completely out of place. I went home and cried that day.

The weeks went by and it did not get much better. I started to realize how terrible the education was in Columbia, simply because I was an all A student there and struggled at FJH. I called my mom to come check me out of school a couple times because I would get anxiety attacks because of how much more difficult the classes were. I very quickly started hating my new school much more than my old one for many reasons. First was the fact that it was so large and full of people and yet I did not seem to find one I could really call a friend. The second reason I did not like it was because I got written up for wearing a yellow undershirt and got an after school with no warning, and for after school detentions there we had to sit facing forward with our hands on the desk and we were not allowed to say a word. Thirdly I hated that school because I got a Saturday for having my phone out in the bathroom and got it taken away, and that consisted off doing busy work for four hours on a Saturday morning. So the reasons were adding up for me to not want to be there, and then it kept getting worse.

As the days passed I started to meet new people and made a few friends here and there, but I was not prepared for what was about to happen in my home economics class. One day I was in class talking to some of the people at my table about religion. I went on to say that I was a Christian and that I grew up in a small town where going to church every Sunday and Wednesday was the norm. I talked about how I had been Christian my whole life, and the other students talked about it. Then, the boy across from me said something that made me ask the question “Are you a Christian?” and he replied, “no, I’m an atheist.” At that point, the world slowed down. I froze and said “You’re what?” and he simply looked at me and said, “I do not have a religion.” That boy, in the eighth grade, had decided he believed in nothing. I was so shocked because at that point in my life I had never met an Atheist, and honestly I did not even think they were a real thing. I had heard of them but I was sure not they were real. No one had ever told me what to do or what to say when I came across one. I was speechless. From that point on, I started praying every day for those people.

Shortly after that, I met a girl named Sydney who became my best friend. To this day she is still my friend and the only friend I kept all throughout high school. Meeting her and all her friends helped me become more comfortable not only with the school, but the area in general. I made more and more friends. I later did a math project with another girl named Brianna. We did the most boring video we could think of, and had more fun making the bloopers than anything else. Little moments like that made me comfortable and happy about where I was. Things like a guy in my class shouting out that he wanted to be a helicopter when we were scheduling our high school classes. I started to become satisfied with my decision to move even though so many aspects were hard to adapt too.

At that point in my life, I did not think that moving to a completely new place had such an impact on who I was as a person. It truly changed how I looked at the world, Christianity and small towns. What seemed so insignificant to me at the time really changed who I am as a person. I am very thankful for my time in both places because Columbia taught me about God and Mandeville taught me about life. Fontainebleau bettered me as a student and truly prepared me to be sitting where I am today. Even though I really struggled with the changes I faced, it helped me grow in so many ways. So I guess the saying is true; once a wildcat, always a bulldog.