Sierra Alva '24 Recruiting Profile

September 1, 2021: I had no identity. As my family moved into our RV, I walked down the driveway bearing an overstuffed backpack and a box of my most valuable belongings. I was limited to bringing all I could carry or wear.

Under the light of the stars, stood my new home, if I could even call it that. Our 24 foot RV, not much longer than our family van, contained a small bathroom, foldable kitchen, and a table that thankfully sat four. My dad, mom, younger sister, two cats, a German Shepherd, and myself filled the remaining space within. 

Friends and teammates asked where we were going and when we would return. My family, unsure, replied “we’ll figure it out.” As the RV drove out of Los Angeles with the sun peeking out from behind the mountains, I attempted to remember every detail of my hometown since I would have nowhere to call my own for a long time. 

That night, we camped at an RV park in the Arizona desert. When the stars came out, one by one, each appeared so bright compared to the same ones hidden by the LA smog back at home. Home. It occurred to me that the same stars would now either guide me — or get me lost. 

From that day on, we lived often not knowing where we would sleep — moving from campsite to campsite and occasionally sleeping at a Walmart parking lot. The past appeared only in the side mirrors, the RV windows focused on where we were going, all while the yellow dotted line led us anywhere (and everywhere). 

We traveled the open road, following no route, as my family and I discovered many places we had only seen in pictures, stumbled upon unknown festivals in small towns, and experienced different cultures and people. At an Alabama beach, locals showed me how to swim with wild manta rays. In the shade of Arizona saguaros, my family exchanged stories with another family from France, who brought their RV overseas. In Miami, our site neighbors shared adventures and mountain biking trails. 

Despite RV parks brimming with people from every background, one night, in Alabama, it all came together in an outdoor golf cart “jamboree” singing “Family Tradition” by Hank Williams. I glimpsed into a thousand lifetimes, the invisible strings of the open road tied all our stories together, briefly, to understand each other's lives, origin, and, in turn, my own. The string of experiences, people, and cultures I immersed myself in created a more notable journey than the one driven. 

Not having an outline to follow, I had no one telling me who I was — with the freedom to invent and reinvent my academic path and myself. By losing myself, mentally and geographically, I saw the beauty in discovering who I was without societal distractions, creating impactful decisions for myself despite what is considered “normal.” I learned to sew beads in my hair, lived in a t-shirt and shorts, and embraced the unknown while finding mysterious coconuts on the beach. 

Living on the road, my family lived everywhere yet we lived nowhere. Everywhere was my home, each sunset I spent with my family filled me with the blissful uncertainty of the future. At restaurants, we bonded with strangers over baskets of fried pickles. At night, our inside jokes kept us awake uncontrollably laughing for hours.

A year after I stepped into that RV with so many questions and worries, I stepped out of it having spent time with America, my family, and myself. Every day I carry the memories — from big cities glistening in the sun, to fireflies in a field of a remote campsite, to every sunrise I woke up to in a different city — knowing my life is still laid out on the open road.