(This was written around January 2018, two month before I moved away from Wyoming.)

When I first came to Wyoming, I was unimpressed. It was dull and windy. I came on a particularly lousy day, as I found out later. It felt isolated and confusing because it was different than anything I was used to.

But my husband had been looking for a good job for literally years and this was finally a really good offer. It allowed him to progress in his career and support our family.

He was excited. I begrudgingly said yes because I didn’t feel there was any other option. I moved to Wyoming.

I will be forever grateful for story time at the local library, a program that ran for a very short time. I showed up and I met so many people who had daughters the same age as my daughter. I wrote down their names and I searched them on Facebook when I got home.

I had something unexpected: friends and a community. I even had some neighbors.

We moved there in March and by the time my daughter went to kindergarten in August, she had many friends. She gained many more. I started going to PTO meetings. And school events. And I met more and more people.

A year later, a preschool started in town right when my son needed it, giving him the friends and experience he needed.

We had the community of the tiny town we lived in, and also the community of the bigger town where we went to go to church and do our grocery shopping. They had a little once-a-week preschool I took all my kids to and then did the shopping after. We visited the library there too, and spent time making friends wherever we could.

I put myself out there. I walked up to people and introduced myself. I showed up. I tried. Sometimes I failed. But I tried.

When I moved to Nevada, I was optimistic, but the experience turned out to be extremely difficult. We survived.

When I moved to Wyoming, I was pessimistic, but the experience turned out to be wonderful in so many ways.

I don’t think my expectations had much to do with it. But I am hopeful in new adventures.

I gained so many friends. I will have even more friends in the future as we go to more places.

Thoughts over two years later:

I knew we wouldn’t be in Wyoming long. I could feel it, though the two years we were there seemed too short. It was sometimes difficult to live there, but it was also totally amazing. I miss it. But I’m okay with where I’m living now too. I have made new friends, like I always do. And I know that new adventures will come, over and over again, and new difficulties will come, and there will also be so much joy along the way.