Hey y’all! I’m Maria, and I‘m a second-semester junior studying chemical engineering. I guess in order to explain what Tide 4 Christ truly means to me, I need to start at the beginning. I chose UA as my college when I was about 10 years old, and that stuck with me. In fact, I only applied to UA and I really don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t have been accepted. To make this decision even crazier, the first time I saw the campus was during Bama Bound in late July. I’m glad I liked it. And, speaking of Bama Bound, it ended up being a weekend of silence for me after my mother and I showed up late and she called the president. So embarrassing! I made it, though! Then, as the summer came to a close, it was actually time to move to campus. The day I moved into Lakeside, I wasn’t too nervous (other than I was the first of us moving in and I had never met my three roommates). My parents dropped me off and it was sad, but I was okay until I was sitting in my room by myself for a few hours. Then the panic hit. I realized that, as I sat in my dorm room, I didn’t know a soul out of the 33,000 people at UA. For an introvert, this was a big obstacle to overcome. I decided to text one of the ladies from my home church because she had mentioned to me that she had family in Tuscaloosa. Low and behold, she is Mrs. Mona’s cousin. From there, Mona made things a lot easier for me. She introduced me to Trae Durden (our former campus minster) and the Tide 4 Christ ministry and I knew I had found a safe niche to form friendships. The welcome week with Tide 4 Christ made it clear that I was going to be a part of something great, and I was so excited. This group has given me a place to make friendships that go deeper than any “friend” I might make in one of my classes. This group is such a blessing because it is full of people who are striving to live lives with the same general goals I have. If there is one thing I know this group has taught me, it’s that walking the Christian walk is a whole lot easier when you have a support group fighting the fight with you.
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