“Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.” (Andy)

This is what you tell yourself to get through finals week and pretty much every other big test. As a matter of fact, hope is important to have in order to survive all aspects of college. In addition to hoping to get through the next exam and big paper, we hope to simply make it through our worst classes, longest weeks and largest piles of homework. Hope is essential.

“Lord! It's a miracle! Man up and vanished like a fart in the wind!” (Warden Norton)

We all have that one person that you always seem to run in to who you secretly cannot stand, and when that person that really got under your skin drops out of college or transfers schools, Warden Norton comes to mind. However, since you are a nice person, you keep your mouth shut because everyone else seems to like them or at least tolerate them. When you get the news that college just is not right for them, or they are homesick and going to stay closer to home, you rejoice. God does have mercy on you after all.

“I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living or get busy dying.” (Andy)

In college we tend to get bogged down in homework where the world around us fades. To ease our anxiety of the endless amounts of work, we tend to shut ourselves in our room and hibernate until absolutely no more work exist (which, if you have ever been in college, you know that it doesn’t end). I am guilty of hibernating in my room this semester, buried under multiple papers, readings and assignments, but it is important to remember that a world exist outside of your dorm room and time is quickly washing away. After four short years, you are onto a career where you will have even less free time. Your party days and game nights will soon be behind you, so live them while you can. It is important to live a little in college to avoid dying under never ending homework.

“Every man has his breaking point.” (Red)

C’mon we’ve all been there when we have an eight-page paper due at midnight and fifty pages to read and it is already 10 PM, or that time your computer chooses to spend an hour updating the ONE time you need to use it. College would not be complete without stress, a lot of stress. Sometimes we have just had enough and need to kick back and relax. For me, a nice can of Mountain Dew and the Shawshank Redemption usually hit the spot.

“I find I'm so excited that I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it's the excitement only a free man can feel. A free man at a start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain.” (Red)

When we finally begin our last semester of our senior year, we will be all-too excited. We will be anxious to be done and so tired of the same old assignments. It will be a buildup of excitement from our first semester. After thirteen years of schooling, plus another four or so, it is finally time to take off the chains of being a student and start the next journey into adulthood. No more homework and papers and late-night food runs. The excitement for change and promotion to the next step fills our minds, yet our futures are uncertain. Some of us may have a job; others may not. Those of us with a job could be there a year or two or potentially our whole lives. We don’t know where we are heading or where we will end up, but we will be ready nonetheless.