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Nose for News by Sarah Stultz

This Thursday, my daughter, Sophie, would be turning 17.

I like to think she’d be doing well in school, exploring her love of the arts and likely getting into many other new hobbies by now if she were still with us.

When she was 8, she was beginning to grow as an artist. She loved drawing, painting and creating, and she loved music.

Though she wasn’t always on key, she sang her heart out with the church children’s group and loved a game we had on the Nintendo Wii that she could use to sing karaoke.

I can picture her now as if it were yesterday belting out a song from our living room as she read the words running across the bottom of the screen.

My husband and I used to chuckle as we remembered her singing her heart out, sometimes not hitting all the right notes, but trying her darndest.

She loved trying new things.

A month or so before she died, she went up in an airplane as part of the Young Eagles program at the Albert Lea airport.

She wasn’t nervous or scared in the least but was all smiles as she climbed into that plane. After they flew around for a short while, that smile was still on her face when she came back down and got off the plane. She had an adventurous heart.

While my son, Landon, likes to do things more on his own time schedule, Sophie was willing and eager to try new things at any time — and boy, did she have a great laugh.

Thankfully after she died, we recovered some videos she had recorded on her tablet of her and our dog at the time and others of her just being silly in the house, smiling and laughing. These are treasures.

Maybe I’m a little biased, but from how I remember her, Sophie seemed so smart. She was 8 years old going on 18 and sometimes just seemed like she was an adult stuck in a child’s body with some of the insight she had.

She always seemed so much older than 8 that last time I saw her, but sometimes I look back at photos and now she looked so young.

My how time changes our perspectives.

I’d love to know the things she’d be doing if she were in high school right now, what her interests would be and what she would want to do after high school graduation.

Would she want to stay at home or go out and start a new adventure at a college somewhere in the country? Would she want to travel abroad to another country?

There were no limits for that young lady.

Until we see each other again, I will continue to daydream about her smile, her contagious laugh and her strong spirit.

My sweet daughter, may you have the happiest of birthdays with all of our family and friends who have gone before.

Until we meet again.

Sarah Stultz is the managing editor of the Tribune. Her column appears every Wednesday.