Hope S.

Posted by on 14 May 2021

Hope Sokolowski 

My name is Hope Elizabeth Sokolowski, I was born in Sioux City Iowa on May 25, 2001 to Aaron and Andrea Sokolowski. I have five siblings, Denise, Roxanne, Jared, Austin, and a little sister named Faith. When I was 3 years old I remember loving music very much, when I was in the car with my mom on the way to daycare I would always ask her to turn on the radio. My dad was also very into music I remember sitting on the piano bench with him watching him play, he could play any song by ear, the song he played the most was Richard Marx’s I will be right here waiting for you. That was also my favorite song he would play. It was so beautiful. I remember my dad also singing to me from the time I was one all the way until I was four before I went to sleep every night. So since the age of three I wanted to be a singer when I grew up. 

When I entered grade school, I was not very smart in fact I hated school with a burning passion! I actually had to repeat kindergarten again at age six because I wasn’t ready. That was also when I started attending Catholic school as well, and I went to Bishop Heelan until I graduated. I was raised as a Roman Catholic. I was also extremely shy at that age and I hated talking to people, especially adults. But by the time I entered high school, I got over that. It took some work though. I remember one year my dad got me a CD player for Christmas when I was about nine years old with Taylor Swift’s Speak Now album. He knew that I loved Taylor Swift, I remember playing her CD over and over again, while singing along to her music. By that age I had a pretty exceptional voice too. I also loved Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream album, my favorite song to sing was ET. When I got to fourth grade my music teacher started to notice my singing talent, and she gave me a solo in our spring concert. I remember feeling so great because everyone was very impressed with my voice. That was when my passion to become a singer burned brighter.

When I entered middle school I started to do sports more, I joined the track team when I was 6th grade and realized quickly that I was pretty fast. Not many people could beat me in a race. In 7th grade I actually played for two soccer teams traveling soccer, and my schools team, and I ran track all in that same spring. I also started to really like Celine Dion a lot too at that age, I always knew who she was growing up, I didn’t start really listening to her music until 7th grade though. I remember during Christmas time I would play her “These are Special Times” Christmas album and sing it over and over again until I perfected every song on that album. In the fall of my 8th grade year my parents got divorced after several years of fighting, my mother just could not stop drinking and it was a huge problem, my father ended up getting full custody of my younger sister Faith and I. But I still loved my mother very much, I knew that it was necessary and for the best. In 8th grade I still played sports and did very well. I placed 7th in the 200 meter dash at the state track meet and beat the school record, my time was 28.91. I was also in show choir in 8th grade because I loved music so much. My older brother Austin was very musical as well, he was the one who told me to join because he did it too and he thought that I would be extremely good at it. He also sang in the choir and played the drums. I ended up really liking show choir, I could not wait to do it in high school! 

 When I entered my Freshman year of high school the first thing I did was join the choir, and I absolutely loved choir, it was my favorite time of the day besides PE when we had it because I got to sing, which was absolutely my favorite thing to do in the world! Although at that age I really loved playing sports as well. I did show choir again and I liked it still, but I did not like the people, there was a lot of drama and my best friend at the time ditched me all by myself in the cafeteria while we were at one of the competitions. And then she decided that she did not want to be my friend any more after that. So my Sophomore year I didn’t return for show choir.

My brother was pretty disappointed but he got over it. It was also kind of a nerdy thing to be in and I got made fun of all the time by my teammates in sports. But I still sang in our regular choir, I was not about to quit that despite my friends telling me to because it was social suicide, but I did not care. When track and soccer started up in the spring I excelled in both, I was one of the only Freshman that made varsity for track and a lot of the Sophomores that were still on JV hated me for it, same with soccer I played a defender for the varsity team because I was by far the most aggressive and explosive player. And then that’s when people started to get over me being in choir too, because they started to respect me more. But unfortunately I could not do both sports at the same time because I started to fall behind in school, so my Sophomore year I had to choose between track or soccer and I chose track, it was a very difficult decision because I loved soccer so much too. 

During my years at Heelan I was in many service projects, during Thanksgiving we would deliver Thanksgiving meals to families that could not afford it. During Christmas time we would go out to Walmart and buy toys and donate them to children whose parents could not afford to buy their children toys. We cleaned off graves of people whose families were either gone or could or no longer could do it. For choir we would go to the nursing home and sing Christmas Carols for the elderly. I was also part of the Miracle Makers team so we would raise money at school dances like the snowball dance during the winter time, or we would sell holiday treats during lunch time, like boo suckers during Halloween, Christmas cookies during Christmas, and crush pop cans during Valentines. And then at the end of the school year all the money we made went to children with a severe sickness or disability so that they could make their wish come true. Sometimes they want to meet their favorite celebrity, or go on a trip. I loved helping people. It always brought me immense joy to see those children’s faces light up the

way they did. I also volunteered at the soup kitchen when I was in the process of making my confirmation my Freshmen year. I will never forget when this one homeless lady walked in with a baby, it broke my heart. In high school I made the decision that if I ever made it big one day, I would give most of my money to charities and people in need. 

My Junior year of high school started off very tough, in September my mother ended up passing away after being abused by her boyfriend at the time. I was absolutely devastated. This really took an emotional toll on me and I can’t even begin to describe the pain I was in, I would have taken any physical pain over that kind of pain, it was so awful. I was 17 years old at the time, and I remember going to church and praying to God that he would take care of her, and the rest of my family, and get us through it. He did answer me and we ended up getting through it ok, but I’m still not the same after that, and never will be. 

By the end of my junior year I had won many medals in track, and we even won the state meet in the distance medley, it felt so amazing to go home a state champion. Not only were we champions but we had broken a 40 year old record for our school. I worked very hard throughout my entire high school years to achieve that. I remember I would run myself until I threw up in the off season because I wanted it so bad. It also made me realize that no matter how dark and painful things seem, there is always the light at the end of the tunnel if you just keep on pushing. I remember standing on that pedestal after that race and being so happy and sad at the same time because my mother wasn’t there to see it. But I knew she would have been so proud. 

By my senior year I had made National Honors Society, because when I hit high school I knew that I really needed to try in school so that I could go to college. I had to work harder than a lot of people because I am not naturally smart, but I ended up coming far in my academic achievements. I also made student of the year at the end of my Junior year. The covid-19

pandemic destroyed the last few months of my senior year, track got canceled because of it, that was very disappointing in so many ways. 

And that leads me to about now, in September I moved to Colorado for college, I have no help financially, I’m paying for college and my rent all on my own. I still really have a desire to pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a singer/model. I never wanted to have just an average life with an average job, and an average lifestyle. That’s something that I know I was not born for. I want to accomplish the impossible, and make what I actually want to do in life happen. So that’s the end, I hope you enjoyed, and have a blessed rest of your day! 

 

        
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