By Sadie York
As fall 2007 babies, Sophia Doan and I were the first among our friends to receive our driver’s licenses. As a result of this, we instantly began to go out more together, simply because we could. While Sophia and I share many, many, aspects of our lives (such as working the same 2 jobs, sharing multiple AP classes, and being involved in the same sport), one of my favorite activities, which has become a necessity in our lives, is to aimlessly wander the aisles of Target. Starbucks or Lilikoi boba in hand, Sophia and I could spend hours talking within the walls of Target. Majority of the time, there’s no apparent reason for visiting the store, besides debriefing on the recent events in our lives and smelling the same shelf of candles. The beauty of our “Target runs” is that, while they’re not required in our day-to-day lives, they become a method of de-stressing after a tiring few days. The routine is quite simple: we enter the Target either with our bobas (Sophia orders a Thai tea and I a Jasmine Milk tea), or a Starbucks, and our first stop is the $3 dollar section. Most times it’s the blankets, mugs, or candles which catch our short-lived attention.. Then, we move on to the athletic wear, where Sophia and I will talk about how cute the clothes are, make a few remarks about buying them next time, then walk off. Every single time. At this point, we go upstairs and smell a few candles, which takes us down the aisle to books. We’ll pull a few that look interesting from the shelves, or make a comment on the ones we’ve read, which then leads us to the toy section. More specifically, the legos. I’ll look at the same shelf of lego cars, and enthusiastically show Sophia the set I want. She’ll tell me to buy it, and I’ll say I don’t want to spend any more money. That pretty much sums up our friendship. Finally, we’ll make our way to the Pillowfort weighted stuffed animals, where we’ll settle down on a few bean bags, and talk until one of us gets a text to come home. While these Targets runs may sound irrelevant when described, I could never get bored of the time I spent there with Sophia, and am truly grateful for these small things in life.