Road trip

Seeing the country with my mom surprised me

NU Magazine - October, 2009

This past summer, two women with overstuffed suitcases and plenty of college books piled into a big red minivan for a weeklong college road trip.  Yes, my mother and I drove 2,365 miles for a total of 41 hours in the car to visit six colleges. Crazy, right?

We started in the nation’s capital to visit George Washington University and American University, then down to North Carolina, further down to Atlanta, west to Nashville, up to St. Louis, and finally back home to Morristown. We toured five major cities in the course of one week.

To be perfectly honest, I was dreading this college trip.

I wanted to stay home and hang out with my friends, not sit in six college information sessions.

However, the trip became much more than a tour of some of the nation’s top universities. My college tour became a journey of our country like I had never seen it before.

I got to walk the streets of the music capital of Nashville. I saw the giant Coca Cola factory in Atlanta, and loved hearing Southern accents.  I felt the humidity and heat of North Carolina, and was awed by its green, rolling hills. From a stop on my guided tour of GWU, I was able to see the Lincoln Memorial.

In addition to all the “classic” sights and stops, my mother and I experienced the change President Barack Obama is bringing to the U.S.  On most highways and major road, there was roadwork and construction, a result of Obama’s stimulus package.  It was truly unbelievable to see firsthand the positive beginnings of reconstruction of our country’s economy.

I took so much more out of the experiences on this trip than I ever thought I would.

I got to spend some valuable and enjoyable time with my mother. I learned more about the college process, and figured out what it is I want most in a college or university.

Most importantly however, I got to see the beauty of our country firsthand, and witness Obama’s start to improving America today.

Elana Widmann, 17, attends Newark Academy and is a member of Nu’s teen board.

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