Dear younger me,
Hey, it’s me—older you. I’m finishing up my first year at college. It’s so crazy, I can’t believe it myself. I’ve done a lot of things over the past year, and trust me, there is a healthy, long life ahead. I’m writing to you to tell you some things I wish I knew before I started college, because where I am today might have ended up a little bit differently. You don’t have to believe everything I tell you, but when you get here, I am allowed to say, “I told you so.”
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1. It’s OK to spend all your money on late-night Dominos and coffee runs.
It may not seem like it now, but in college there isn’t really a lot to spend money on (other than the $64k a year tuition.) This past summer, I worked once a week, for $11 an hour, only to spend it on Dunkin Donuts caramel swirl iced coffees and the occasional 2 a.m. parmesan bread bites. You will look at your friends, mouth the words “we can’t” to each other, but I’m telling you now that it is OK to give in. You worked hard for the money over the summer, and you work hard all week during the school year, so spend it!
2. Growing up has a lot to do with drifting apart from your hometown/high school friends, and that is OK.
At the end of my senior year of high school, I had five best friends. One final left of my freshman year of college, and only one of those friends remains. Don’t get me wrong, we tried. At the beginning of the year, I would try to text and stay in touch. Ellie always said that she, Christina, and I would never be those girls. We were like Charlie’s Angels. We did everything together and spent every free moment we had with one another. But at the end of September, I would call Christina at 2 in the afternoon, and it would be 9 p.m. in Greece, and she would just be finishing up all her night classes. I always asked the same question, “Have you talked to Ell yet?” I would hear her sigh on the other line, “No, she still hasn’t reached out to me.” My conversations with Ellie grew short and more infrequent, and after two shorts months at school, they stopped all together. During winter break, Christina and I visited our old high school and talked to the college counselor that helped all three of us find the right school.
“Ellie came in to see me the other day,” she started off the conversation. “It was odd though, because she hadn’t talked to me all year like both of you had.”
“Did she say anything about us?” we both asked.
“She told me you guys never stayed in touch.”
At first, I was upset that I lost one of my closest friends to something as small as a two-hour distance. Looking back at it now, I can honestly say it doesn’t bother me anymore. If someone can’t make room for you in their new life, than it is OK if you decide not to make the room for them, either. I look at life as if it is a book, and high school was just a chapter. Ellie entered the story in that chapter, helped move along the plot, but afterward, she was no longer needed for, or involved in, the story. I got to college, and she was no longer needed in my life.
Christina came to visit me last weekend and asked me why the collage Ellie had made for me before I left with pictures of us still hung on my wall. “The same reason yours does,” I told her. I hung those pictures on my wall to remind me of that chapter in my life, and where I had just come from, and she was a part of that more so than anyone else, and I will never forget that.
So, if you find yourself drifting away from friends, or an entire group, it’s OK. It just means the story is moving on to the next chapter.
3. Call home often.
The beginning of the year is tough. Everything is so new, and you find yourself missing the feeling of familiarity. Two weeks into school, I would tear up every time I thought of my mom or my high school back home. College was hard, there was a lot of work, and I was emotionally drained. Every night, I felt squished in my twin extra-long bed, and all I wanted was a cold shower and an air-conditioned room. It will get better. You will make friends, and you will lose friends. You will have many sleepless nights, for many different reasons. But your relationship with your parents will only get better. My mom and I joke that we don’t have enough time to fight or get annoyed with each other over a phone call. We joke, but it’s true. You don’t know how much you love your family until you aren’t around them all the time. Call often because as soon as you hear their voices, you’ll realize how much you’ve actually missed them. And trust me, they’ve missed you too.
4. Occasionally, it’s all right to make a fool of yourself on a Friday or Saturday night.
Just know it can’t happen every time you leave your dorm. It’s fine to lose control every once in a while, but you have to make sure you’ll be able to put all the pieces back together the next day. Partying happens, its college, but don’t feel pressured into going out every weekend, or every Thirsty Thursday. Stay in. Do work. Watch a movie. Have some alone, drama free time. But also don’t stay in every weekend. Go out, have fun, de-stress, and meet new people.
5. It’s OK if you go home alone.
Do not, under any circumstances, feel like less of a person if you end up alone at the end of the night. I have spent endless Sunday mornings dreading the fact that at the breakfast table, I would have to answer the question “Kristina, did you go home with anyone?” with, “No.” Do not feel guilty, do not feel less cool, do not feel unliked. Feel proud. You have standards, and it is not your mission to find a guy by the end of the night. Or find a guy every weekend. Or find a guy at all. Going out, and having a good time is about making you happy, and spending time with the people you want to spend time with. If that’s just your girlfriends, live it up! You only have so many days you can spend together. If it’s a really cute, sweet guy who wants to buy you Cro pizza, it’s OK to say good-bye to your friends, and see where the rest of the night (and his charming smile) takes you. Do what you want, whom you want, when you want, and be proud of it the next day, no matter what.
5. The dreaded Freshman 15 is very real.
I came here thinking the weight that I saw my brother gain his first year of college had nothing on me. I was an athlete. I worked hard all summer, worked out every day at 6 a.m. to stay in shape, and played in two soccer leagues. There was no way my body would succumb to the extra weight and fat when it never had before. Take my advice and go to the gym. In high school, I played two sports, all year round. There was no off-season. In college, my season is three months long. That’s it. Three out of twelve months of the year. Also, in college, there is an endless amount of food. Pretty much whenever you want it, there’s a way you can get it. More food + less exercise = freshman weight gain. Do yourself a favor and try to go to the gym daily. It’ll be tough at times, but worth it in the end.
6. With that being said, don’t hate yourself if you do gain the Freshman 15.
I’d say body image is one of the biggest things I’ve struggled with second semester. I look in the mirror or I look at picture of myself, and I barely recognize the heavier figure. The amount of work I will have to put in to be in a place where I am comfortable scares me. However, I have come to realize I am not the only person going through this. And of the people I know in the same place as me, I am the most motivated. So if you find that your pants are fitting a little tighter, or there’s a roll you could swear wasn’t there three months ago, just remember, it happens. Don’t get discouraged, just get motivated.
I’ve had to live life in order to realize these things. Coming in, if I had stopped to think, or listened to any of the warnings or horror stories I had heard, maybe my freshman year would have ended up differently. But, I’ve lived through it, and now it is part of my story. Now you have the choice to start your chapter how you like. Take with that what you will.
