Coming into college, I had no interest in Greek life. I wasn’t a legacy anywhere and frankly just never saw myself as a “sorority girl”. Perhaps that would still be the case if I went to a big university, but I chose a small college. My roommate was very passionate about joining Greek life and had been since before we even moved in. She dragged me to some of the welcome events the different sororities on campus put on, and I was surprised to find myself loving every minute. I then began to learn more and more about Greek life on our campus, and slowly but surely, I began to share my roommate’s enthusiasm for joining. The winter semester began, and dragging along our other friend who basically lives in our room, we all signed up to rush.

The recruitment process at our college, though all good fun, is a stressful one. There are three rounds: teas, spreads, and desserts. After each round, your choices of sorority narrow down from five to three to two to finally the one. When we first learned about the process all we could think of was how cutthroat it seemed. You needed to be invited by sororities for their next round, and we were in one of the biggest recruitment classes Alma had seen in a long time. But we were determined. We would make it to bid day.

Through the rounds, sororities were slowly eliminated. Almost every day we had to dress up and head out in the cold in our heels. Our friend would come to me every day so that I could draw her eyeliner with wings sharp enough to kill a man. As the process raged on, we all wanted more and more to join a sorority. None of us expected to want it this bad. It was torture after each round as we waited to see if any of us got that dreaded call saying we had no invitations back for the next round.

Then it was the morning of bid day. There was still seven hours to receive the dreaded call, and all three of us were anxious as heck. The hours passed by incredibly slow, but sure enough, we didn’t receive any calls. I was so excited walking from rehearsal over to where I would find out which sorority would become my family. We sat in a classroom and silently opened our bids, big smiles forming on our faces. We all signed our invitations and then it was time for walkouts.

Walkoutswasone of the craziest events I had ever witnessed. I watched as each new recruit was practically tackled by a crowd of their new sisters. Then it was my turn. I walked up to the microphone, said “I’m Allison, and I’m going Alpha Gamma Delta!” then braced for impact as my new sisters and a giant squirrel ran at me. After so many hugs and pictures we were treated to late night IHOP and came back to find our doors decorated by all our new sisters. It was a long and stressful day that lead to a wonderful night. I am so glad that my roommate convinced me to rush because now we’ve all found our sisters and our homes.