Salt Lake City never had positive connotations to me. It’s a city out in the middle of nowhere, overrun by Mormons, that held the Winter Olympics at one point in time.

TO BE CLEAR. Being overrun by Mormons isn’t a bad thing–I’m simply describing the place.

I just never really heard much about it.

But.

But I got here and every positive thing that could happen, happened to me.

First of all, they have In-N-Out. That was enough to save the city in-nd-of itself.

After ordering a triple meat with cheese protein style with animal fries minus the cheese, and after tilting the tray sideways so all the contents could fall into my mouth at once, I made my way to my Airbnb.

My Airbnb here is essentially a basement with five beds–two bunk beds and one regular twin. I was alone the first two nights, but last night it was a full house(or basement?).

I must say that it’s very weird to sleep with strangers. I almost can’t sleep like that. I must’ve only gotten five hours last night–but it’s nothing a double shot of espresso can’t fix. Ya dig?

But there’s something else that’s happened here that I really haven’t told anybody about.

I met someone.

Isn’t that a little weird?

It’s my first-time meeting someone that I’m into while literally out on the road, and it’s both a fantastic and crazy thing all at once. It’s crazy because my plans are already semi-set in stone. But it’s fantastic because, well, that’s how meeting someone feels in case ya’ll forgot.

But it’s more than just being into someone. I met all of her friends who are here from The Phillippines on an internship of some sort. It makes me remember my college program. She’s essentially right where I was two years ago.

But Salt Lake City has been so much better because they’ve showed me everything! I know where basically everything is after three days of being here. I wanted to get out of my shell more to meet people, and it’s paying off.

Life is definitely pretty funny. It always finds ways to give you glimpses of who you used to be and who you want to be all at the same time. Who would’ve thought that this God-forsaken place–well, that’s quite an ironic name for it–would be somewhere that I met some cool people who would turn into my friends?

And the truth is it’s not a God-forsaken place at all in both a very literal and figurative way. It’s beautiful. The University of Utah is just up the hill, the mountains hug the east side of the city, and there’s tons of things to do.

What a surprise.

It seems like the city directly smack dab in the middle of my road trips seem to really make an impact on me. Austin was that way for me. El Paso was even a nice surprise.

But I think I’ve finally experienced something that I’ve been looking for for quite a while. I’ve managed to find someone that I really like in a random city in the United States. And I know it’s been three days, and I know I’ll soon be home, but I’m a big fan of human beings. I want to meet every kind of human that I can, and even if nothing comes of it, I got to meet some really cool people in a city I thought I’d hate.

And that in-nd-of itself is a major blessing. It seems this place isn’t God-forsaken after all.