Let Your Mind be Bigger Than Your Hometown

I grew up in a very small, conceded town and was raised being told that people/kids from places such as Springfield were lesser than me. At such a young age I had no way of knowing if this was true or not (“true” may not be the best word to use here, being that I see everyone is equal. No person is lesser than another). In my early teenage years, my life got suddenly flipped upside down for reasons that are not necessary to mention and I unexpectedly had to move to Springfield. Keep in mind that I knew no one other than a handful of relatives that I didn’t even know that well and all I had diving into this new chapter of my life was the single-story of these trashy people in this awful town.

It took me a while to adjust to my new environment; and I will admit, the atmosphere, school and kids were very different from what I grew up with. I never got bullied, but I was lonely for a very long time. I was shy to step up and find my own friends because it was engraved in my mind to fear these “city” kids. I soon learned that the students here are not bad at all…if you find the right ones “for you”. The best friends that I found changed my perspective on people here.

In the school I grew up in, everyone was very similar, yet judgemental. If you were too unique or quirky for their liking, you were ostracized. Here at Kenton Ridge, our student body is pretty diverse and multi-cultural. In my opinion the majority of our population is generally accepting; which contradicts what I was raised being told, that everyone here is “stuck-up and too good for you”. I honestly don’t know how my opinion would’ve developed had I stayed in my hometown. Moving here opened my eyes to aspects of the world I’d never been exposed to and it taught me not to judge books by the summaries that other people give me.