Going away to college is something completely unique. For the first time in your life, you have a ton of independence and you can finally get away from high school drama and your hometown. You get to call a new place "home." Sometimes, though, you feel a little conflicted over where your home is.
When college first begins, many students are incredibly quick to call it their new home. A new room, new food, new friends, everything about it is perfect. For the first month or so, you completely forget about everything you've left behind with your family and friends, and it's all exactly like what you've always dreamed of. College is your home now, and it is amazing.
But then you go home for a break, and that idea changes.
You realize how much you missed your mother's cooking. You reunite with your pets and get back to bantering with your siblings. Maybe you hang out with an old friend or two and you finally realize that this place, too, is home. You'll get hit with a wave of sadness when you think about school and how much you miss your life there. Which place is your true home?
Change is a huge part of life, and along with change comes a large amount of discomfort. Once we realize that we no longer have exclusively one place to call home, we are accepting that discomfort. When you're home, you wish you were back at school, and sometimes when you're at school, you'd love nothing more than a homecooked meal and a night in your old bed.
All of this is entirely okay.
If we stayed in one place for the rest of our lives, we would never grow as people. We wouldn't grow up if we stayed at home for the rest of our lives, and we wouldn't have all of the values, lessons, and memories we have based ourselves on if we only lived at college. Someday, we will each find our own "permanent" home, but until then we must get used to this home crisis. As I learned before graduating high school, we have to "keep our roots and grow our wings." College is a journey, and while we are here to get our degrees, we must remember to keep those home roots while still growing our own set of wings so that we may fly.
