As my summer officially ends I begin to realize that after the end of this year, everything will change drastically. No more uniforms, no more living at home, no more being taken care of, and no more high school. The fact that I am a senior now is mind boggling, I feel like I went to sleep a freshman and woke up 18 years old with college letters surrounding me. When I was a freshman and had my college advice meeting my goal was this: Go to Texas A & M and become an Infectious Disease Doctor. I had my mind set on that, I was decided. My sophomore year, I realized how much I hate needles and being around sick people. My junior year I realized I wasn’t a huge fan of College Station and I hated all subjects that I needed to do well in to be a doctor. I am now a senior and planning to major in Professional Writing with a minor in International Studies at Baylor University. When my college advisor said, “You will change your mind” he was right. I began thinking about this fact and I realized that when I was a freshman I was still so young, I had no idea what I wanted to actually do with my life. I wanted to be a doctor, because it was the normal thing to say. I wanted to go to A & M, because it was the staple Texas college. As I began to grow and mature, I started to find things out about myself, things that I never realized before, I hate sciences and math, I love poetry and classic literature. Singing makes me feel confident- a feeling I don’t feel often and I would hate spending day in and day out being around people who are sick and gloomy. I want to write, and travel, and work with the poor & orphaned of third world countries. It took four years, heartbreaks, and getting out of my comfort zone for me to realize this. Today, I turned 18 years old, officially adult, official. And as we were at dinner my dad said something to me that I have heard thousands of times but it really hit me today, “Maddy,” he says, “You can do anything you want. If you want to travel the world, buy a plane ticket. If you want to be a writer, get a pen. Don’t let someone tell you that you aren’t enough.” And this was the day that I realized, I am enough. I might not write a best seller, but I might. I might not be the best singer in the world and have a chart topping hit, but I might. And the possibility of success is worth the hard work it will take me to get there, and if along the way I can inspire one person, change one person, and be a role model to at least one person, then I will have truly succeeded.
