We've been on the road for two days now. The trip from Washington to Iowa takes about a 3 day drive. One more day to go, I grudgingly thought. I just couldn't wait to get there already, despite not having a liking to the moving. I just wanted to be anywhere but in this car. It got painfully boring already after the first few hours. Speaking of those first few hours, while it was spent, the thought of moving hadn’t quite hit me yet. And I didn’t want it to, either. Honestly I didn’t think anybody likes moving. You're leaving behind many people you care and love, and an endless amount of memories.

Now I'm going to a completely new state, new school, and new house. Hopefully this would be good for me. A new start. I've got a clean slate to be a better person, and I don't plan on ruining it. I've already had a plan sketching in my mind of I want my life to layout. I plan on going to school, (and do well). I plan on joining the school’s baseball team.

The day my parents told me about the move, I did my research on the new community that I would soon join. Turned out, the high school was named East High. The name caused laughter from my sister, saying that was the high schools name in the movie High School Musical. Frankly, I wasn't too keen on the idea of attending a high school named the same from High School Musical.

As I read on about the school, it was said to be the largest school in all the state of Iowa. Like as if I wasn't intimidated enough, the baseball team was one of the best in the state. They competed in the State Championships, something I've wanted to accomplish in my life. From then on, I knew I needed to get on the team, no matter what.

All these thoughts ran through my mind, as I sat quietly in the car. I wondered what it'd be like at my new school. Then again, I wondered a lot about the new place I'd soon call home. These thoughts jumbled around my head and it soon made me mentally fatigue. With a tired sigh, I made myself as comfortable as I could in a passenger seat, and closed my eyes for sleep to take over me.

Finally, we have arrived in Des Moines, Iowa. The first thing that hit me was the weather. It was extremely hot and extremely humid. The hot air felt like a slap to the face when I got out of the car, and it stuck to my skin. It was unsettling to have your skin feeling sticky and gross. I tried not letting it bother me, but the only thing I wanted to do was take a cold shower.

After getting over the fact that it was unbearably hot, I looked in front of me, and faced my new house. A white two-story house, with a large backyard in a closely knit neighborhood. And when I mean closely knit, I mean it was really close knit. As in I can touch the side of my new house with my left arm and touch the side of my neighbor’s house with my right arm. There was only an arms length of space. Talk about no privacy. With one last examination, my family began unpacking our stuff.

Now after an entire year has passed, life was okay. Nothing special, nothing bad, but just okay. My life was tolerable. I joined the baseball team, but with a few consequences due to past mistakes. I made new friends whom I enjoy spending my time with. I even got a job. And overall, I’d like to think I adjusted well in school and Iowa in general. The hardest part to adjust to though, was the people and the environment of the town. People lived in poverty, the houses weren’t the best, the crime rate was pretty high, and so to sum it up the place was ghetto. I had to really choose who to avoid and who to hang out with.

I’m not saying it wasn’t a struggle to go through, because it definitely was. Just some things were hard to grasp. Like when I asked if we were ever going to go back to Washington? Were we ever going to visit? I never got a definite answer, it was always brushed off. If I were lucky, I’d get a “maybe”. I didn’t want my friends and family back in Washington to think I forgot about them. The feeling of not being remembered is painful, and that’s not something I wanted for them to feel. But I always questioned if they ended up forgetting me first? Was I not important enough to be remembered? I needed to stop questioning myself so much. It did me no good.

But something that did do me good was joining the baseball team. Yet I didn’t play much due to my grades, I was still part of the team. It felt great having that familiar feeling of being accepted in the sport that you love the most. My life could never go wrong with baseball, it benefitted me so much. Practice after practice, the physical task was exhilarating, pushing my body to the extent of exhaustion. It always surprised me how much my body could handle, and how each and every day I was slowly improving. I walked into the practice field with my mind already set with positivity. Something I learned that could help me out in life. Though for most games, I just sat on the bench, I didn’t let that get to me. I cheered my team on, I slapped them on the back, congratulating them for a job well done. Or maybe even just a simple sentence of reassurance like “Forget about it. You’ll get the next one.”

At the end of the summer, East High’s baseball team made it to the State Tournament. The excitement that flowed through me when I heard the news was intoxicating. I told my family and you could practically see the enthusiasm drip off my lips. My team was told that’d we be playing in the baseball stadium located in downtown. Now that was something to brag about, because not only was it a professional baseball field, everyone knew that that stadium was the same stadium the Chicago Cubs played at. I couldn’t believe it myself. But once I walked into that field, there was no doubting that it was all in fact real and I was very much alive, and not in a dream.

Unfortunately, we only made it up to 3rd place. I was mad to be truthful. The other team only won due to many errors my team caused. I know we could’ve done better. Our fans were incredibly amazing though, always cheering us on, and shouting encouraging words. It all felt surreal, standing in front of a cheering crowd containing a little over two hundred people. I stood there on the foul line, grinning from ear to ear. I couldn’t help but think that, this moment was one of the best moments I’ve ever endured in my entire life. All due to the fact my family moved to Iowa.