Feeling the warm sun shining through my window, my mom gently shaking my shoulder to wake me up.
“Breanna it’s time to get up, it’s your first day of kindergarten.”
Here it was the day I’ve been waiting for was finally here, kindergarten. I couldn’t believe it was already here. I jump off my bed running to my closet to grab my uniform. It was a light blue tee-shirt with a navy blue jumper dress, navy blue tights and navy blue Velcro flats with flowers on the Velcro. While my mom does my hair I watch my favorite TV shows Teletubbies and BoohBah. Once my mom had finished my hair she knelt in front of me to help with my tights and shoes.
She looked up at me and said “Breanna, are you ready to meet some new friends.”
I looked down and said “Yeah, but I’m nervous they won’t like me.”
She held my hand and said “They will love you, hunny.”
I run into my parents’ bedroom to kiss my dad goodbye, then run into my room and grab my backpack. It was a bright pink bag with sparkly puppies on the back. I head outside to the car to head off to school. I pose for a picture in front of my mom’s tan 2002 Nissan Sentra. My mom takes the picture on one of the cameras with the wheel that scrolls to reset the film. I get into the car and listen to the high school musical CD and sing along to all of the songs. I look out the window to see we are pulling up to my new school, and I start to get butterflies in my tummy.
“Mommy I’m nervous, what if I don’t make any friends?” I asked her as we pull into the school parking lot.
She turns to look at me and says, “Don’t you worry hunny you will make plenty of friends.”
As we walk into the school yard that is bordered around with cones. I squeeze my mom’s hand tight and she smiles down at me and I smile back. We walk into the coned area and I notice all of the children excited to see their friends, and some are nervously clinging to their mom’s legs, like I am. My teacher Mrs. Brickhill came over to me with this little girl who was noticeably nervous, squeezing onto her hand tightly.
“Who is this beautiful little lady?” she says to me shaking my hand.
I giggle saying, “I’m Breanna Arruda.”
“Hello Breanna, it’s nice to meet you, I’m Mrs. Brickhill I am going to be your kindergarten teacher. This is Jayliana and she’s also new to this school, maybe you two can become friends.”
Who would’ve guessed that after this introduction, Jayliana and I would become best friends for life? I said goodbye to my mom with a kiss and a huge hug. Jay and I walked hand in hand behind our teacher finding all of our other class mates. Once we had found them we all lined up and Jay and I stood right next to each other. The bell rang and we walked into the school building and into the classroom. We walked into the large, brightly colored room and saw that we all had our names taped to the tops of the desk. I find my name and see that Jay is sitting right next to me we both smile at each other.
“We are going to be best friends forever!!!!” We both said at the same time.
Once we all got settled in we went around saying our names and favorite candy. First it was my turn, since both my first and last name were at the beginning of the alphabet, which I always hated. I stood up nervously and shakily said, “Hi, my names Breanna and I LOVE Swedish Fish.” I sat back down listening to everyone else’s answers.
A few people down was Jay and she was also nervous, but she began to saying “Hi I’m Jay and I LOVE Starburst.” When she sat back down we both giggled to each other about our answers. We talked a lot together, but of course when our teacher wasn’t talking.
The bell rang and that meant it was time for recess. We all headed outside and sat around eating our snacks. We shared with people the snacks we didn’t want for other snacks we did wanted. There was this one girl named Sydney who always had the best snacks, she would have things like Cosmic Brownies, Yogo Bites, Famous Amos chocolate chip cookies, DunkAroos, Gushers, and she also would have the chocolate Yoo-hoo drinks. Everyone would trade with her. The bell rang which meant recess was over and it was time to go back inside. We all lined up in a separate grades and the recess monitor called us inside one grade at a time.
Once we got back inside we finished putting away all of our school supplies into our desks, and our cleaning products into the closets above our backpacks. Our teacher introduced us to the class pet, Jo-Jo the monkey puppet, we all loved Jo-Jo. He had a squeaker in his mouth and would squeak whenever Mrs. Brickhill moved his mouth. We then began to play with the toys in the back corner of the room. Jay and I loved to play with the chain pieces, we would make huge chain links in all sorts of colors. We even made a rainbow one that was twice our height, combined. Once we had finished putting away the toys we were playing with, the bell had rung again which meant it was lunch time.
We all sat down at our table and had our lunch. Some people brought their lunch while others bought school lunch. Each grade had their own table from Pre-K to Eighth Grade, Jay and I sat right next to each other. After lunch it was time for another recess. I know right its crazy, two recesses in a day. We all ran outside and played on the playground. Jay and I played hopscotch all the way up to 20, we had so much fun playing around with each other. The bell had rung which meant it was time to head back inside for some learning. Once we got inside we started learning the alphabet BACKWARDS!!!!! Which I found so much fun. Jay and I would race each other to see who could say the alphabet backwards the fastest. She would always win of course because I would always mess up on L, M, N, O, P.
The bell had rung, yet again but this time it didn’t mean more recess, it meant it was time to go home. Jay and I had the greatest idea. We would switch backpacks so that when our moms saw us they would know we wanted to ask them something. We really wanted more time to spend hanging out together, and we just couldn’t wait until the next day. So once we headed out of the school we walked over to our moms holding hands and giggling like crazy.
My mom noticed something was up and said, “I see that’s not your backpack Breanna and hey, look at that, Jay is wearing yours.”
Jay’s mom laughed and said “I wonder what these girls could possibly want from us.”
Jay and I kept on giggling and we both said “CAN WE HANG OUT TODAY!!”
From that day on Jay and I have been inseparable, and school has always kept us closer together. We had always gone to the same school since that day until it was time for high school. She went to Connolly and I went to Dartmouth, because Connolly was just too expensive. Even though we went to different high schools we always made sure that it didn’t impact our friendship. Now that we are both in college we see each other every day because we both go to BCC. She has made me a better person in the way I act around people, and the way I treat people. She gotten me out of my shell when it comes to talking to people I don’t know. We’ve always stuck by each other, and have always been there for each other when times get rough.