So finals are over. I finished the last one on Thursday. I didn't have a moment to breathe, though, because I then immediately had to pack up and leave. I spent a night in Kentucky, then came down to Tennessee. The day I'm writing this, Saturday, is the first day I've been able to just chill in...a while.

There's probably a better word for this feeling, but I'm sticking with weird. I made it through my first semester of college.

It's been a long semester. I officially moved out of my house and into a dorm for the first time, started playing rugby, and learned a lot. And I mean a lot.

But now it's over. I'm one-eighth of the way done with my undergraduate education. That doesn't feel real.

I'm also a different person than I was in August, which feels like a lifetime ago. There's a whole new level of perspective I have now that I didn't before.

Finals are over, and it's weird, but I'm better for the experience. And if I'm being honest, once I realized that I wasn't going to get better grades by stressing myself out, it wasn't really too bad.

Okay, it was a little bad. But I survived.

One semester down. Seven to go.