I go to sit in my backyard. The sound of the crickets and rustling sagebrush fills my ears. It is an interesting sound, but I like it. I look up \u2013 splotches of blue under the growing gray clouds taking up space in the sky. They drift underneath an airplane and then cover the sun. The rays, escaping the darkness, shine down on me as I get up from my chair and peer past the fence into the dessert. There are only a couple of houses near mine here in our small town of Canyon\u2019s Edge. You can see the edge of a canyon \u2013 I can\u2019t remember the name \u2013 in the distance. When I\u2019m older, maybe my next birthday, I\u2019m going to go into the canyon myself and explore.<\/p>\n
I walk inside to get a glass of water and notice our aloe plant in the window of the side yard along with four cacti, a tomato plant, and some neat rocks. My mom says that aloe goop, as she calls it, can heal burns, sunburns, too. She says if I go outside for too long here I will probably get a bad sunburn. I agree but would just use the aloe. The leaves grow back. I get my glass and sit in my favorite spot in the house, the sunroom. Obviously, it\u2019s my favorite. Not that we don\u2019t get a lot of heat in the blazing temperatures of Arizona, but, I don\u2019t know, I like the heat. My mom told me she went to a place once that was so cold it snowed. I\u2019ve never seen the snow. Not even in winter.<\/p>\n
I hear my mom calling from upstairs. I find her in my room, a big cardboard box on my bed. \u201cHey, kiddo,\u201d she says, \u201c I\u2019ve got some news. Your dad and I have been promoted at work and if we want to take the positions, we have to move to Indianapolis. It\u2019s in Indiana.\u201d I don\u2019t say anything. I want to be a geologist, go to the canyon and study rocks. Does Indianapolis even have rocks? But it would be better for my family and I can\u2019t be selfish. I sigh \u201cokay.\u201d Inside I feel cold.<\/p>\n
Five days later, it\u2019s moving day and everything is ready to go, packed up in boxes in a U-Haul truck. I don\u2019t like the emptiness of my house as I look inside for the last time. I hope this is worth it. I take a look at the house once more before getting in the car: sandy-colored, two stories and a 7-foot fence. I wonder if it snows in Indianapolis. I think so. One thing I know is that I\u2019m not excited about the super long car ride to get there. I haven\u2019t even seen any pictures of my new house, and who knows if the people there are nice like everyone in my town.<\/p>\n
After several days of travel, we pull up to our new house: a fence, two stories and\u2026it\u2019s red. There\u2019s also a weird-shaped window in the upper story. I like it. I go inside and choose a bedroom. I start to unpack my boxes and notice my new room is bigger than the one back home. I hang up a picture of the canyon and feel homesick. At dinner, mom tells me school starts tomorrow, so I head to bed early feeling anxious.<\/p>\n
I wake up the next morning and it feels like the middle of the night, my eyes can barely open. Shoot! I haven\u2019t adjusted to the new time zone yet. Why does Indianapolis have to be like this? I trudge down the stairs and eat breakfast. Everything here feels different, even eating my favorite cereal. It\u2019s like it<\/p>\n
has no taste. I get ready to go and ask my mom if I\u2019ll be walking to school like normal. \u201cNo,\u201d she says, \u201cthere\u2019s a bus stop outside our house that you can go to. You can meet new kids! I\u2019m sure they are nice. Have a good first day. Love you!\u201d I mumble goodbye and head out to the bus stop. There are eight kids already there and I walk up trying not to draw any attention to myself. I see a girl standing by herself, so, I slowly walk over to her to say hi. She turns around first. \u201cHi! I\u2019ve never seen you before. Are you new here?\u201d she asks, smiling. \u201cYes,\u201d I say. \u201cCool,\u201d she says, \u201cMy name\u2019s Sierra. I live next door. What\u2019s your name?\u201d \u201cHailey,\u201d I say, \u201cNice to meet you.\u201d Sierra responds, \u201cCool. We should be friends. And you see those kids over there? Those are my friends Mae, Natasha, and Lauren.\u201d I look to where she is pointing and see a group of 3 girls with sketchbooks and pencils. They look up and wave. Sierra smiles and says, \u201cI hope we are in the same class!\u201d I smile. Me, too.<\/p>\n
Through the first week, I meet so many new people and explore my new neighborhood. I talk to my new friends about so much cool stuff. I tell them about Arizona and how I like geology and how I feel like waking up for school is a big mistake. They all understand. On Friday, our science teacher tells us that soon we are going on a field trip to Turkey Run State Park. She says there are canyons, and rocks and other minerals there. A big forest, too. I feel excited as I think about it.<\/p>\n
Later in my room, holding the picture of the Arizona canyon, I think about everything that has changed so quickly. I go to sit in my backyard. The sound of birds and cicadas fills my ears. It\u2019s an interesting sound, but I like it. I look up \u2013 tiny white clouds under a deep blue sky. A bi-plane, with a really ridiculous advertisement banner following it, passes underneath the clouds. The clouds do not cover the sun. The rays shining down on me are beautiful as I get up from my chair and peer past the fence into Sierra\u2019s yard. She waves and asks if I want to come over in a bit. I say yes. There are lots of houses around mine here in Indianapolis. You can see the city skyline in one direction from down the road and Ellenberger Park, which I love to go to, in the other direction. Next summer, or maybe my next birthday, I am going to go explore Marengo Cave and see all of the cool rocks in there. As I walk back inside, I notice the aloe plant, the one from our house back in Arizona. My mom says if I go outside for too long here I probably won\u2019t get a big sunburn, but it will be here, just in case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I go to sit in my backyard. The sound of the crickets and rustling sagebrush fills my ears. It is an interesting sound, but I like it. I look up \u2013 splotches of blue under the growing gray clouds taking up space in the sky. They drift underneath an airplane …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9195514,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-105","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","column","twocol"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9195514"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/105\/revisions\/106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/butlerbridgeprogram\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}