Petra Bardócz
I was sitting in my living room, laptop in my lap as I was looking through America’s cheapest states to live in. You see, me and my mother were about to move back to America, having left the country when I was five. Sadly, along the way my parents got a divorce, so we had to move out from my father’s place, and that is why we need to find a new place. Right now we are crashing at my mom’s sister’s place. It’s kind of nice if I’m being honest. I like how quiet it is and at the same time, I really like ‘Aunty O’ too. She’s one of the coolest people I’ve ever met.
Why am I looking for not-so-expensive houses and affordable states, you may ask? The particular reason for that circumstance is that my family from my mother’s side is not exactly the kind of family you would call rich. Let’s just say we are in the lower middle class, a family with average people.
So as I was looking for the perfect state, an idea popped into my head. Science I am a big Marvel fan I decided to check out Missouri. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe Missouri is where Star Lord, also known as Peter Quill, was born in 1962, on February 4. To my surprise, Missouri seemed like an affordable state, so I dug deeper in information.
To begin with, I found out that many well-known musicians were born or have lived in Missouri. These include guitarist and rock pioneer Chuck Berry, singer and actress Josephine Baker and even the “Queen of Rock,” Tina Turner. My eyes brightened as I read all of this.
Furthermore, Missouri is the native state of Mark Twain. His novels The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are both set in his boyhood hometown of Hannibal. Moreover, I found out that the filmmaker, animator and businessman Walt Disney spent part of his childhood in the Linn County town of Marceline before settling in Kansas City. Disney began his artistic career in Kansas City, where he founded the Laugh-O-Gram Studio.
These were also very promising news; I love Disney and his work. I think I am able to say that he is one of my role models. I cannot really explain why, it’s just what it is.
As I was scrolling deeper in Missouri’s history, my eye got caught on a year: 1904. This was the year when Missouri hosted the Summer Olympics at St. Louis. It was also the first time the games were hosted in the United States. I had mixed feelings after reading it, because watching the Olympics was mine and my father’s thing. One interest that we shared, and now he had left us, me with this unfilled empty hole in me that I feel like no one can ever fill or replace.
Anyways, I quickly shook off the feeling, got up from the couch, and ran off toward my mother to show her my research. Finally I found her in the bedroom, folding our laundry. I told her excitedly what I had found and deeply expressed my opinion on every pro and con. After a lot of talking and planning, calls and more searching, we decided that Missouri would be the state that we would move to. The only thing left for us was to find a suitable high school for me and a nearby house for sale.
At last I came upon the the pictures of Brentwood High School; it seemed very sympathetic for me even after I read through negative as well as positive comments. And for our luck, we also found a house just some blocks away from the school. I feel like this was meant to be, and let’s hope so that it is.
Missouri, here we come!