College can be scary and overwhelming, but in the end, it will be the best years of your life. The first few people at college can either be your worst enemy or your best friend. No matter what happens you will find your family somewhere during those first 4 years and if not then just maybe that wasn’t the school for you. Friends can be easy and hard to come across during the first few weeks of freshman year due to busy class schedules and outside actives as well.

You might meet your forever friend in your orientation class like I did my freshman year. We had a whole weekend of freshman connect/orientation the weekend right before classes started. This is when we got the chance to move in before the upper classmen and meet our whole class with no one else around. We had a special class just for a group of us freshman during the weekend and into the next few weeks of school. In this group, we grew as friends, classmates, and family those couple of days. Some of us grew closer than others did, but in the end, no matter how close we were there was always a friendly smile in the halls. I had the chance to meet some amazing people in this class that I am still really good friends with to this day. I meet my best friend from college in this class during an ice breaker. That icebreaker helped us see how alike we truly are, not only because we are nursing majors, but because we are into the same things. I meet much more friends throughout my freshman year, but the friendship I created with Lexey was the best I ever made that year. We spend the whole year together, studying and bonding over many great memories.

Soon later came our sophomore year and she was not living on campus so I had to adapt to not having my best friend around. But this year I meet some more amazing people who will be my forever friends as well as Lexey. My roommate this year was someone I meet through family friends and I am so grateful because she is so amazing. Cassie is the best roommate I could ever ask for and an even better friend. I know no matter where life brings us I will have my friends from college right there by my side.

Along with these two great girls that I now call family, I acquired multiple other friends along the way at Clarke University. These girls are also amazing and will always be there for me no matter what happens. We have gone through multiple fights, tears, happiness and sadness during our times together, but seem to always find our ways back together.

Friends come and go but family will always stay by your side no matter what. These friends that you will make during the 2 or 4 years of college can be the members of your family away from home if you want them to. You have to allow them in to your world and allow them to love you as much as your own family loves you. Friends are our family we decide to keep in our lives.