After almost three weeks of being home for the holidays, I am sitting in my room with my bags packed, getting ready to head back to college. It's bittersweet for me, because I always enjoy getting to spend time at home with my family. At the same time, I am ready to be back to life on my own.

When I was in high school, I had lunch with a good friend who was in college. He said to me, "It's so hard to keep your high school friends. Your first time back home, you all are really excited to see each other, and then, the longer you're away, you realize how different those friends become."

I thought that there was no way that my friends and I would ever be like that.

College friends and high school friends are so different. I've only known my college friends for a few short months, but I feel like I've known them a lifetime. I've shared a lot of experiences with my high school friends over my four years with them, and I will always cherish our memories. However, college friends become your support system as you all ease into the transition. You face these new challenges of living on your own, becoming independent, and discovering adult life. These things become 100 times easier when you have good friends by your side.

My high school friends and I thought we'd be friends forever, but we rarely talk since we went our separate ways. We only saw each other briefly while we were home. It is hard to see yourself drift away from your best friends, but as we grow up, we become very different people than we were in high school. While I hope that I keep my wonderful friends from high school, I understand that life gets in the way. It is especially hard when you all live miles and miles away.

Sometimes, I feel like I live a double life. There is the person I am with the friends I have in college and the person I am with my childhood friends at home. I think there's a little bit of that in all of us.