Last week, I had the pleasure of going home and spending time with my family for Thanksgiving. Since most of my family lives in two southern Indiana counties that border each other, I was able to see the majority of my relatives, and I got the chance to talk to family members that I hadn’t seen in a while. Many of them asked me about my job, and I enjoyed telling them about the amazing things we’ve been doing at Girls Inc. this year.

One thing struck me again and again; they kept saying that they wished Girls Inc. programs were available in their communities as well. I have also thought many times about how much I would have enjoyed being in Girls Inc. when I was growing up, and I can’t help wondering what my life would have been like if I’d been able to attend Girls Inc. as a girl.

However, I realized that even though I didn’t have Girls Inc. in my life as a girl, I still had a role model to help demonstrate what it means to be strong, smart, and bold—my mom. She was strong when she took on the role of raising my brother and me after my parents divorced when I was ten. She was smart when she carefully budgeted her money so that we could have the essentials as well as fun vacations. She was bold when she fixed nearly anything that needed fixing around our house herself—if she didn’t know how to do something, she would find out! In these examples, and all of the countless other ways that she was strong, smart, and bold, my mom helped me to become a Girls Inc. girl without even realizing it, and for that I’m thankful!