Feature
Read the passage.
Finding Home
I can remember that first drive up the mountain as if it were yesterday. My mom, trying to navigate the narrow, curvy road, was clutching the steering wheel of our car so hard that her knuckles were white. Mom and I share a fear of heights, so naturally we were moving to a tiny mountain town 9,000 feet above sea level. I sat next to her, sulking, knowing that all of my middle school friends were now 2,000 miles away in Tampa, Florida. It was February, and we were moving to Colorado so that my mom could take a job writing for a respected conservation magazine. So what if I was leaving behind everything that mattered to me: my friends, a middle school that I actually liked this year, swimming outside year-round on a competitive team, and my job as editor of the school paper.
Mom had reminded me during the trip that I would eventually find new friends and that it was going to be beautiful during the winter. “Lilia, look at the gorgeous view,” she exclaimed as we made our way around the final curve into our new town, which was framed by two huge snowy peaks. Looking at it made me dizzy, and I missed the ocean so much that my body ached.
A few months later, after settling into our rental home, I was still mostly miserable. While my mom went to her exciting new job, I walked a quarter mile to a mountain school that served kindergarten through high school. I was surrounded by kids who had known one another since they were in diapers, and who were unable to discuss much besides skiing and snowboarding. I felt stuck in time in a frozen land while my friends in Florida moved on with their lives.
One Saturday morning I came downstairs and into the kitchen to see my mom chatting with Jessie, a fourth-grade neighbor I avoided as much as possible because she talked incessantly and didn’t appear to have an “off” button. Before I could even get out, “Good morning, did you see that it’s snowing again?” I heard my mom volunteer me to go snowshoeing with Jessie.
Fifteen minutes later, I was dressed and out the door, with no choice but to spend the morning strapped into Jessie’s mom’s snowshoes. Jessie yelled, “Come on!” making her way up an old deserted logging path.
All of a sudden, Jessie stopped abruptly in her tracks, looked up, and pointed to a branch above her. Peeking through the pine needles was a little bird with black and rose-colored feathers. I caught up to her as her voice softened to an urgent whisper, “It’s a rosy-finch! I love rosy-finches.” Just then her new friend flew off and disappeared over a ledge about 10 yards away. Unable to contain her joy, Jessie bounded after it, determined to see where the bird was going. However, unlike a bird, my little neighbor was earthbound and heading too quickly for the embankment.
As Jessie neared the edge, her foot caught a rock, and she plunged forward over the ledge and out of sight! Horrified, I moved as quickly as I could to look over the edge. There she was, about 10 feet down, hanging on to a juniper on the side of the steep slope, yelling and sobbing, “Help me, help me, I can’t get back up!” Below her was at least 100 feet of sharp and slippery rock.
Think, Lilia, think! my brain yelled as I tried to steady my shaking body. I pulled off my gloves and tried my phone. No reception. I froze in place for a split second until Jessie’s sobs woke me to the reality that no one could help her but me. She was too far away to reach a hand down, but then I noticed a thick branch on the ground a few feet away. I grabbed it and scooted on my belly to the edge and yelled, “Grab on, Jessie! Use one hand and I can pull you up!” No luck! The branch was not long enough, and Jessie’s outstretched hand could not quite grasp it.
Looking down into Jessie’s terrified eyes, I suddenly remembered that I was wearing a really long scarf. Quickly, I untangled it and secured it tightly to the branch with two knots. This had to work. Again I leaned over, hanging on to the branch and extending the scarf-end down. This time Jessie was able to reach up and grab on with one hand. I clutched the branch with both hands, slowly wiggled backward, and then sat up as I carefully pulled, hand over hand. Once Jessie had that extra pull from above, she was able to help herself. As she scrambled over the ledge and back to flat earth, she saw me sitting dazed on the ground and threw herself into my arms, sobbing uncontrollably.
Something in me changed that day. While the experience was frightening, rescuing Jessie made me feel less afraid of everything. Over the next months, I found myself outside more often, noticing things I had not seen before. As the ground thawed and spring came to our town, I started to hike almost daily on the many public trails, no longer hindered by my fear of heights, and sometimes even standing near ledges. While I was sometimes still lonely and missed my friends, I found that I could talk to the kids at school about things that didn’t have to do with skiing. Jessie and I were even written up in our local weekly paper because, of course, Jessie had told everyone about how I had helped save her life.
Now, two years later, I do still miss the ocean, I think I always will. But now when I go back to Tampa for a few weeks to see family and friends, by the end of the trip I am ready to return to my mountain home.
Question
Why does the narrator state that the kids at her school are unable to discuss anything much besides skiing and snowboarding?
Responses
It establishes the setting and helps readers to connect with the characters.
It establishes the setting and helps readers to connect with the characters.,
It foreshadows the danger that the narrator will soon encounter.
It foreshadows the danger that the narrator will soon encounter.,
It emphasizes how out of place the narrator feels in her new school.
It emphasizes how out of place the narrator feels in her new school.
It helps explain why the narrator is miserable and has so few friends.