It's Saturday afternoon. I'm sitting in my dorm room that's a little too cold, on a fall day that's a little too dreary. Days like this, I wish that I could be home cuddled up on our big couch with my little dog curled up with me.
These days, I'm counting down the days until Christmas break, and after that I'll be counting down the days until graduation. I'm on this weird little ledge right before "real life" begins. Because, supposedly that begins after college.
But really, I know that that's not true. This is real life, right now. These are the years that I have spent learning about people and learning about how to be on my own. These are the years that I have been able to spend with my best friends from childhood, and also make some new friends that are now counted among the closest people in my life. These are the years where friends become family, when you're apart from your family for the first time. When I leave this place, I will leave with a strong sense of who I am, and confidence in who I've grown to be. Before college my confidence was tied to my family, my home base. That's still where my foundation is. But it's also grown to be rooted in who I've found myself to be, and who I know I can grow to be in the future.
College isn't the ticket anymore to be guaranteed success in life; my professors tell us this every day. Tons of people go to college these days. But my experience in going to college has given me more understanding, not just about books, but about life. About how to be human. About what other humans are like, even if it's not pretty sometimes.
Life after college will be filled with decisions that will lead me a little further along my story, whether that means a few states away or thousands of miles. But wherever those decisions take me, I'm glad that I made the decision first to go to college.
I'm so thankful for this experience, and what it's shown me, more about myself than about life. When I was getting ready to go to college, I was excited about getting to know new people, which has been a great thing about it. But more than that, I got to know myself. That's priceless.
