It has yet to hit me that I have one year left of school. This time next year, my education will be over. Is that terrifying or what? I feel like I just started college. Like last week I was walking up the stage for high school graduation and just yesterday I was moving into my freshman dorm. Where did those four years go?

Everyone was right, college really does go by in a blink of an eye. From the time we were innocent little kindergartners, all we have ever known is school. We’ve spent the last 16 years preparing for the next stage of schooling, until now. Now we are older, wiser and supposedly capable for the real world.

We’ve spent the past four years learning, growing and becoming our own. College has taught me more than just textbooks and PowerPoints. I’ve learned that boys come and go, that you are more than your GPA, that when one friendship ends another is awaiting, that as long as you’re happy it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks.

Soon, there will be no sleeping until noon, no summer vacations, homework to finish or tests to study for. Senior year is the bridge, the phase of limbo between still being a young and carefree ‘kid’ to a mature adult. Slowly we will begin to trade in our leggings for dress pants and spring breaks for business trips. Fruit Loops will no longer satisfy as dinner and class enrollment forms will be swapped with 401ks.

But senior year is the time to put the fears aside, to ignore the ‘what if’s’ (for now). The what if I don’t get a job? What if I choose the wrong career? What if my friends move away? We may not know what comes next, but that's the beauty of it - embrace the unknown.

Our independence is upon us, the meaning of 'adulting' is around the corner. Soon we will have to cook on our own, clean by ourselves, be responsible for deadlines, have steady relationships and hold down a decent job, all while maintaining our sanity. I don’t say this to make you scared. I say it so that you appreciate the next nine months. So that you don’t take a single fun, adventurous, or stressful college day for granted.

Everything from here on out is the last of something. Your last football game and homecoming. Your last formal. Your last sorority recruitment or midnight Wendy’s run. From kindergarten to college, it will be the last time you walk in a cap and gown.

It’s the homestretch. The year that will be filled with tears of joy and tears of goodbyes. I hope it’s the best year yet. I hope that the memories are some of the craziest ones yet; that the friendships are some of the best ones yet; that you have stories to last a lifetime; that you have a year full of zero regrets; that you spend nights laughing until your stomach physically hurts; that you end senior year with a bang.

As much as I am excited to walk for graduation and into the real world, I would like things to slow down just a little. It's not because of the endless papers or impossible tests, but rather that in nine short months, I will be a graduate. A college graduate. Entering the mean, scary, cutthroat world of adulthood. And I’m not sure I’m ready for that. Ready to give up the hours I spend writing a paper, the girls night out, or maybe even those sweaty frat basement shindigs. It’s a bittersweet feeling.

But whether we’re ready or not, it’s here. It’s the time to tie up loose ends, to reflect back on the past four years and be proud of where you are. This is it. Every irritating professor, impossible exam, b****y friend, Sunday morning hangover and looming assignment has prepared us for life.

So here’s to you, senior year. I hope you're filled with new opportunities, friends to treasure and lasting memories. Don’t disappoint.