I guess you could say I had it pretty easy growing up

I guess you could say I had it pretty easy growing up. Besides living out of state for the first couple years of my life (which I obviously don’t remember) my family moved once. I was 13 years old and it was a mile up the road. Neither my schools nor friends were affected.  While I couldn’t admit it then, my teenage years were easy and carefree. I lived with both of my parents and my 3 siblings and we had what we needed. My biggest challenges were AP tests and upcoming swim meets and water polo matches.  Oh, and boyfriends.  Life was just fine and change was a term I probably didn’t even understand the exact definition of. In fact, since we are only OMSIII, I still probably don’t…

Imagine my reaction when I found out we were moving out of state for medical school. Out of state?! What a swear word! People in MY family don’t do that. I had been married for almost 4 years and would have my second child by the time we moved. It was the end of the world, clearly. I guess I should mention that we moved one whole state away, which turned out to be about 11 hours driving. Knowing what I know now, I should be embarrassed for my “Drama Queenery.” But then, this was HUGE. I didn’t even know what to expect. We would be moving from Salt Lake City, UT, a place where I felt extremely comfortable and protected, to Phoenix, AZ. All I knew about Phoenix was that it had cactuses, scorpions, and it was one hundred and a billion degrees in the summer time. None of those things have proved to be wrong, but I’ve found so much more.

I grew up on the east benches of Salt Lake City. When I looked out my front room window I would have a majestic view of the towering Mt. Olympus. Whether is was Spring, Summer, Fall or Winter that peak had all sorts of secrets to offer my eyes when I peaked through the blinds. It is beyond beautiful.  When we wanted to roast marshmallows, we drove 5 minutes to the mouth of the canyon and were immediately buried in towering trees and 100 foot cliffs and our ears were inundated with the sounds of rushing water. The parks around my home had the softest, greenest grass and everyone in the neighborhood had lush gardens full of colorful flowers. When we wanted to cool off from the “hot” summer we sped up Parley’s Canyon to the legendary Park City, and just a little further to beautiful lakes and rivers.  It really was a dream. Even the dreaded winters were beautiful (when blankets of haze weren’t covering the valley). So the biggest problem I had with Arizona? It’s beauty, or lack thereof.

We had just driven through Las Vegas and I’m not sure what I was expecting to see but I wasn’t seeing much. There was a pile of rocks there and a bigger pile of rocks over there. Then there were cactuses. Those entranced me for two miles and then I realized something: there were no mountains (at least what I consider a mountain) and none of the “trees” had leaves on them. Wait, were there any trees? Then we finally got to our destination and I opened the car door. You know that feeling when you open your oven door when it’s 400 degrees inside? I felt like I was walking into a 400 degree oven.  I had come to a conclusion. Arizona was ugly. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly.

We had gotten settled and I hadn’t really changed my mind about what I thought about the physical appearance of my new home. That was until we experienced our first monsoon. It was the beginning of August and the wind was blowing dust like mad.  I was receiving warnings on my phone about a massive dust storm, the “mythical” haboob. They DID exist! Once the dust died down, nature performed the most awesome light show I had experienced in my life and then it started to pour. Like buckets. And guess what? It was BEAUTIFUL! That night I turned a new leaf (hahah, leaf, those rarely exist in AZ). I was going to find all the beautiful things Arizona had that Utah didn’t. Now don’t get me wrong, I still laughed when people told me I was lucky to be living so close to the mountains that I could go hiking everyday. Sorry, but those “mountains” you speak of are literally the size of the sledding hill at the local park back home. And those “hikes”? Those were more like a walk around the block. But on a more positive note, here are some of Arizona’s beauties I discovered with my change of attitude:

-Sunset: The myriad of colors those things produce on a nightly basis are breathtaking. And there are no mountains to get in the way of those. Nothing but a wide-open spectacular of the sun retiring for the day.

-Cactuses: While there are countless numbers of these pokey creatures ALL OVER the state, did you know they bloom? Yes, those painful plants actually produce a flower. And not just a simple flower, they are gorgeous.

-Bunnies: Everywhere. But cool nonetheless. There isn’t a lot of wildlife back home that come out at night to eat your grass. I mean, they’re a lot better than raccoons and skunks, but unfortunately cause just as many stains in the road as one another. I may or may not be a culprit.

-Coyotes:  Beautiful? No. But completely awesome and different? YES! Just a few months ago I was on a morning jog and was greeted by a coyote that thought it was being sneaky by running along side me concealed by the brush.

-Road Runners: Beep Beep. Enough said

-Lightning: I know I already mentioned this before, but it’s definitely worth mentioning twice. When it storms here, it is lightning non-stop. I could just stand outside and stare. But I don’t, that would be dangerous…

And much, much more.

This experience on finding the physical beauty in Arizona has been so refreshing to me, and the farther along my family moves in our medical journey, I’m realizing how metaphorical it is. There will be so many times where we are let down and things don’t go the way we planned or hoped them to go. But there is always beauty. Beauty exists everywhere. Sometimes we just don’t see it at first because we haven’t experienced that type of beauty before. Whether it’s finding the beauty of being alone, or changing jobs or specialties, I believe beauty can exist in every situation, we just have to open our eyes and hearts to see it.

And for those of you still dwelling on the fact that you have no idea what a haboob is or if it is an actual word, it is. They say it on the news, so it’s real. Now watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vQMuwRjI6s

Don’t you just want to go stand in that? I do. But husband says I can’t. I’ll get something called Cocci. Whatever THAT is.