I am so tired. As of now, that is all I can think about. Upon arriving at college a week ago, I was greeted by a cardboard sign announcing, “No parents no bedtime!!”. I believe this was supposed to be an exciting thought, but after a week of staying up too late and waking up too early, I am completely and utterly exhausted.

It has been a whirlwind seven days of pre-orientation, actual orientation, the start of classes, and a constant quest to create and maintain friendships. Looking at my schedule this summer, it appeared as though I would have hours of built in time, certainly much more time to relax than I had during high school. While I do have more time in between classes, there is so much more going on that it seems as though there is really no free time at all. After getting out of my 8 am French class this morning (I would not advise taking a language at 8 am after not speaking it at all for four months), I promptly took a two hour nap, in preparation for the hours of classes, socializing, and school mandated events yet to come. The first week of college is a test, of how many places you can go, people you can introduce yourself to, and how few hours of sleep you can get. I was not anticipating this. Being thrown into a foreign environment with a couple thousand people you have never met is just as frightening as it sounds.

Do not take my lament on tiredness to mean that I am not liking college. I appreciate the new experiences that I have been opened to, but the constant bombardment of activities and new faces certainly takes it’s toll, at least for now. I can already feel myself getting used to this new life, though I feel like the true test will show itself in the weeks to come. Anyone can get through a week where they are herded from place to place and given a definite schedule- the hard part is when that all starts to end and so much time is your own.

Learning to balance hanging out with friends and going to the library (both at the same time has proven a failure) is an essential lesson that I have begun to teach myself. The thing about college is that everything you could ever want is available within walking distance- friends, food, a warm bed. This is both a blessing and a curse, as it leaves a lot of room for overindulging in any of those things. It will take far longer than a week to figure out which activities I want to place the most weight on, and to decide what I want to make my college experience. So far a week has felt like a lifetime, but as I continually remind myself, it is only the beginning.