In 2015, I moved to the Netherlands. I had decided to take a second junior year in high school so I would know the place I graduated from before heading to college, and after my senior year, I ended up taking a gap year too. That time was the best investment in myself and preparation for college that I could have done, above and beyond any SAT preparation or philanthropic-adjacent club presidencies in high school.
For a year, I worked and traveled, writing and thinking about my future. As a nanny, I worked for three children, ten years old to under one year, a worked as a community office clerk, and a youth church volunteer. I traveled to my friends who had started university in the United Kingdom, to Israel, Ireland, Italy and Portugal. I saved as much as I could for college expenses too. It was the best preparation I could give myself for a transition to life determined totally by my choices, and I practiced those skills first in the Netherlands while creating my gap year experience.
When I was looking for my undegraduate institution, I thumbed through a college guidebook. I wanted to find a place which encouraged innovation, with open-minded and diverse students, and involved faculty. I wanted to know everyone in my year, and hopefully the other three years, be able to try every club meeting at least once, and walk the campus end to end. Agnes Scott College fit the bill. As time came up in the Netherlands, I flew to Georgia for the first time on athlete move-in day.
If you can believe it, coming from the Netherlands to Georgia was more of a culture shock (even though I was born in the U.S.) than a move from Virginia to Europe. Ya’ll was unnatural to me, I couldn’t understand a word.
Over time, soccer practices and can you repeat that please? Georgia became my southern home. Atlanta was a totally new city to navigate, completely unlike The Hague, Amsterdam or London, and unlike my New England New York or Boston. Atlanta marches to its own beat, and I learned to dance to it.
Last summer I traveled back to the Netherlands, because I had time apart to miss it. I craved biking, fries in a cone, Gouda cheese, the windy beaches and my friends. In the pandemic now, I miss Atlanta. I miss the places, trying Buford Highway restaurants, hiking Stone Mountain, walking on campus and saying hi to all the everyone. I even miss my dorm room’s creaky door, the way the first cold autumn night got the library fireplace going.
Right now, I don’t know if Atlanta is destined to be my future or remain in my past. As I think about it, I keep returning to collages made from photos I took there, remembering those feelings of newness and beginnings.
I think I’ll be online again next semester, and then? Who knows where I could be next. I only know I’ll make the most of it.
(See the full art accompanying this post on Instagram @bethanyvelarde)
