Truth One: Sofia Bishop was born at a very young age. At first, she was not able to walk, and could only communicate by screaming. Now, she is going to attend Cornell University in the fall. We all love some character development. 

Truth Two: Almost dying on someone’s floor after consuming an entire apple pie and being gaslit after is a rare way to solidify a friendship. 

The first time I ever talked to Sofia Bishop was on a metal bench on the soccer sidelines. It was preseason at Lutheran, rays of sun impaling us and baking our backs to sandpaper consistency as we snacked between weekend games. (Neither of us got played.) She judged me for eating Frosted Mini Wheats with a fork out of a plastic bag, and I judged her for being British. Nevertheless, I offered her sunscreen in the triple-digit heat. She declined. She showed up on Monday with a nose that would put Rudolph to shame. I laughed and I laughed, but it was the start of a great friendship.

I chose a random seat in Chemistry 1, and, incidentally, she sat in front of me. I survived polyatomic ions and getting a 43 on my titration test by studying with her and reading the back of her band shirts. We got to talking and lowering the IQs of everyone around us. 

Very importantly, us two exist on the same wavelength of stupid humor. Despite constant encouragement to “lock in” and actually take things seriously, we are often unable to. One could call her an extreme yapper. She says she was born speaking Latin fluently, but Dr. Latin, CEO of Big Latin, visited her and took her hair in exchange for this gift. She then proceeded to trade in her baldness and Latin skills for the ability to walk. 

However, she’s undoubtedly an academic weapon. It has been an honor drawing hollow husk faces on the AP Chem board before tests. She especially excels at calculus (mourning the loss of her 105) and physics, and she has rigorously stayed in pursuit of her native language for the last decade. Latin, as you may have guessed, occupies a significant portion of her life. It’s very common to see her in front of her computer in her Latin IV class. She loves splitting hairs about word etymology or talking about some Roman guy’s diary about beating native people.

I suppose that we have integrated into each others’ routines so much that her being nearby just becomes a fact of life. An open seat near me will nearly always be filled by her. A silence will nearly always be filled with stupid, mutual, infectious laughter. Whenever there’s a movie in Film Studies where I fall asleep (mainly Charlie Chaplin films), there is always a familiar face and hand shaking me awake when the lights turn on. There are many jokes I cannot elaborate on here because I want this to be a published article.

Sofia is a member of the Bad Movie Club. We continued it sophomore year over Zoom, and when she recommended a French art movie about cannibalism, I knew she’d be a great member. She is a movie buff and we have seen so much together, from There Will Be Blood to Battlefield Earth to The Invitation four separate times. She started the Board Game Club in junior year. She’s played in the Youth Orchestra of San Antonio for six years as a violinist. Her favorite movie is Dirty Dancing, which she has seen six times, and Sofia is the biggest Henry Cavill fan this side of the Atlantic.

Call her a coffee connoisseur or a sleep avoider or the embodiment of “well, actually.” Call her silly goofy or a tenacious volleyball player or a questionable driver, she is making the world a better place. She’s conducted cancer research at San Antonio biophysics and biochem laboratories for years. She examines protein interactions using fluorescent stuff that, to her, is “shiny and looks like noodles.” It is a constant struggle for her to not snack on these molecular gummy worms. Anyway, when she “locks in,” her work involves looking at IDPs, which are intrinsically disordered proteins (an integral part of the “regulating mechanisms within cells”). She also raises awareness for pediatric cancer through bike rides and her Stonecatcher project, and raises money through the Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation.

I asked her what she wants her mark on the world to be. She told me she “want[s] to help people, to give them the ability to live a life unaffected by medical issues, to make hospitals more environmentally friendly, to run a lab to research and develop treatments and cures, and to be compassionate and the best doctor/surgeon [she] can be.” Other than that, she wants “to revive Latin as a language.” 

I hope she touches grass and sometimes feels the sun at Cornell, but I can’t get my hopes up too high. I hope they like her jokes about the first third of banana repeated two times, pedantic “well, ACKTUALLY” ramblings, and most importantly, her friendship.

Sofia is one of the closest friends I’ve ever had, and knowing her has made my life better. I will miss us bursting into laughter without warning or cause.