It was a warm early August day when I was driving to Covert, MI for a weekend with family and friends. At the time, I was listening to Taylor Swift (go figure) with about 30 minutes left in the two hour drive. My phone started buzzing rapidly, and what I thought was a group chat blowing up turned out to be the Chief of Staff from Senator Dick Durbin’s office calling to interview me for the US Senate Page Program. I immediately pulled over, and spent the next fifteen minutes answering questions about my sleeping habits and work ethic on the side of the highway. The call ended with me getting offered a spot in the program and finding out I had literally two weeks before I was going to be shipped off to Washington, DC for two months. I was freaking out, panicked, excited, terrified, and scared all at the same time. All I could think about was how this would mean leaving behind my life for five months and not having my phone in the process.
The next two weeks were some of the most chaotic days of my life. While my mom stayed up late every night filling out countless forms, I spent every day with friends. I’d go to field hockey, come back for lunch, hang out with friends, grab dinner, go to bed, and repeat it all over again the next day. During those two weeks, my bedroom floor slowly became more and more occupied by the clothes I had planned to pack as well as some other miscellaneous items. Somehow packing my life away in clothes for five months wasn’t as hard as I thought.
Telling my friends that I was going to be leaving was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. The first person I told was my best friend, Sloane. I drove her home from practice one day, and we stopped at Deep Purple on the way. I remember saying to her, “Wait before we go in, I need to tell you something”. She fully thought I was going to say something stupid until I told her that I was leaving for DC in T minus one week. It was waterworks from that point on. Seeing my friends cry whenever I told them I’d be leaving was just so gut wrenching. It made saying goodbye even worse than I anticipated.
I got to DC on September 3, one day before I was supposed to start school as a Page. I was a nervous wreck. All I wanted was to be home with my friends and in my normal routine. Instead, I was running around Washington, DC grabbing all my essentials last minute that couldn’t fit in the two suitcases I consolidated my life into.
The next day, my parents and I got to my dorm at 11:00 a.m. I was one of the first to arrive, right behind a blonde boy who I would later learn had driven all the way down from Indian Island, Maine. His name was Eben, and he became one of my best friends. I was the first to move into my room, meaning I got to pick my bed and space in the closet first. Shortly after I got to my room, I was joined by four other girls. There was Piper from Virginia, Lauren from West Virginia, Ella from Oklahoma, and Sophie from Utah. I didn’t know it then, but these girls would soon become four of my favorite people in my life.
I wouldn’t call my first month as a Page difficult as much as it was just different. While my friends were watching the homecoming games and participating in Spirit Week, I was either at Starbucks on Pennsylvania Avenue or doing homework in the Senate Chamber lobby. I didn’t feel sad about missing out on these events because I knew I’d be there for them next year. While my friends back home were in Choir in the morning, I was already at the Capitol, probably debating my Republican peers on topics like the Second Amendment, reproductive rights, or a free market approach to our economy. I returned to Chicago still a Democrat but with more understanding to listen to those who have different political opinions than my own.
My time in DC changed the way I looked at Republicans. My Republican peers weren’t as awful and dumb as I thought they’d be. In fact, they are some of the most intelligent people I have ever met. They were kind students who came from a different background, and just held different beliefs than my own. They were always there for me, and they truly showed me that politics aren’t as black and white as we may think.
The last week of January I was studying for my finals, packing my life in DC back into my duffle bags, and exploring tthe Capitol once and for all. The only people who have as much access to the Capitol as the PPages do, are actual Senators. So unless I run for office in fourteen years, I knew I would never be able to do some of the things that I could as a page,, like being on the SSenate floor everyday, having access to “Senator Only” rooms like the lobby and the “Marble Room,,” and even the “Senators Only” elevator.
Coming home was an adjustment in terms of curriculum and having a sleep schedule that lasted more than fivefive hours a day. H. However, it was comforting to know that despite leaving my normal for a semester, I was still going to come back to what I knew. My time in DC gave me perspective on political issues and gave me friends from both sides of the aisle. My time in DC showed me that leaving “my normal” isn’t so bad after all.
