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Sarah Walker
Period 7
10/19/18
My Reminder

After the four hour drive up to Moosehead Lake, my heart fills with joy; I am the same.

My lungs breathe in the same fresh air, and my bare feet crunch through the same spiky grass. I

make my way towards the crooked, splinter-filled, and spider-ridden dock. The lake water is still

cold as ice and the lawn is still littered with potholes and tree roots. Inside, the camp is filled

with the same musty smell and the toilet still struggles to flush. Music of the seventies and

eighties hums in the background as the music of peepers buzzes through the thin walls. Nothing

here has changed. While life around me is spinning out of my control, Moosehead stays the

same.

My life seems to be changing and shaping into something new and unfamiliar with every

move I make. During my junior year of high school, I was lost. My friends seemed to be

changing into people that were not my friends anymore, but strangers. I felt distant from myself,

as I struggled with who to be. I could change alongside my friends; change my morals and

personality to fit in. I spent most of the school year wrestling with what to do.

I arrive at Moosehead the following summer feeling different from past years. My mind

is fixated on my friendships that are growing weaker by the day. I grow worried that missing the

Fourth of July with them will drive us even further apart. My feet slump out of the car and onto

the spiked grass upon arrival, and I am not the same.

Later that night, I am sitting around the campfire with my family and friends and I look

up at the night sky. The stars are glowing with a fierceness I forgot they had. Familiar eighties

music is playing in the background as my dad and his friends make their dumb jokes and my
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mom and her friends howl with laughter. I let myself get lost in this moment, and forget about

my troubles. The feelings rush back of who I have been here, even though I have changed. Pieces

of my past slip away, but at Moosehead time stands still.

Throughout the years, Moosehead has shown me that there is no black and white version

of the same. I am always growing and changing and this place has taught me that change can be

a good thing. However, Moosehead is an annual reminder for me to remember my core values. I

know that I value my ability to stand up for what I believe in, even if it means that I lose friends.

My strength gives me pride in myself, and at Moosehead it feels easier to remember my strong

will.

I have been the girl who runs to the dock barefoot after her parents yelled at her not to;

pulling six splinters out of her heel an hour later.

The teenager who wears her flip-flops out to the dock; the spiders who live there are the

size of baseballs.

I have been the girl who rolls her eyes and asks for a genre change at the beginning of yet

another Prince song,

The kid who sings along to the eighties music with glee.

I have been the girl who would not get out of the lake until her lips were blue and her

teeth chattering.

The one who refused to jump in the icy lake water while everyone else was swimming; a

stubborn middle schooler.

All along, I have been the girl who knows what she wants and will stop at nothing to get

there. I have learned from my mistakes, and grown from them. Moosehead has been the one
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constant in my life; something for me to rely on. I step out of the car, and I am the same girl with

the same love for this special place.