Everything Changed, but Nothing Changed

“I thought college would change you. I thought you guys wouldn’t want to come.” My high school science teacher said. I smiled, “Nothing has changed.”

This was the end of a conversation I had with one of the most impactful people in my life. She is more than a teacher or a music director to everyone who comes into her life. She is our second mom, the person we go when school gets too hard to handle on our own, the chaperone we take on trips (even when we know we are old enough to not need one), and the place we meet at for reunion Christmas parties. For the last three hours, my classmates and I had just spent sitting around on her living room floor catching up after the first year of college had ended. I too had expected things to be different, for things to change, but in reality, absolutely nothing changed in the best ways possible. We still listened to Joe telling insane stories of his adventure in Arizona, we still shook our head at Ellis’ stories of drunken friends, and we still talk and laugh about memories from high school and how our science teacher changed our lives for the better.

This group of people means everything to me and I thought I knew that, but I know it even more now that these people are EVERYTHING. We’ve been with each other through a lot and I know we will still be with each other through a lot more.

Life Lesson: Find good friends and find good people to put into your life, and never ever let them go. Put people in your life who make you smile so hard your cheeks hurt. Put people in your life who make you laugh so hard your stomach is sore the next day. Put people in your life who make this world even more beautiful than it already is. Put people in your life who make you understand what true happiness is. To me, that’s the most important thing.