I walked into my room and excitedly chose my side of the room from the remaining two spots. I was living in a quad in South Quadrangle and I was feeling uneasy about having three roommates. I had already heard horror stories online and from past students about having one other roommate; so having three could either be the worst or the best experience. I was lucky enough to be able to settle into my room without having to interact with the strangers who would be living with me for the next 9 months.

When most of my things were unpacked and I was happy with the cozy ambiance of my side of the room, I took a seat on my bed and began to imagine all of the parties that were talked about nonstop. I was interrupted by two of my roommates entering. I introduced myself and I found myself enjoying the conversation and knew I would become close with both the shy, quiet girl who was sweet and funny when she talked and the outgoing, awkward, red-head who shared my enthusiasm for various music artists. Finally, our last roommate walked in and we all began to chatter away, attempting to predict how the year was going to go and how to make "Welcome Week" the best week of the year.

Welcome Week is the most exhausting, exciting, stressful, fun, and crucial week of the year. As a freshman, the experience can either make or break you (really just getting severely sick for a week), if, of course, you feel you want to partake in the festivities of celebrating your first week by walking to smelly fraternity houses where your shoes stick to the floor and your sweat glands are always hyperactive. Welcome week, in addition to all the previous descriptions, is the one week where you have no stress about balancing your extracurricular activities with your piles and piles of studying you need to do. It's the one week where you have no worries in the world besides how you will be able to stay out all day with only a short nap in between, and how to make a close group of friends who may end up sticking by you until you graduate.

~

"Wake up, Sim! It's game day!" a not-so-quiet whisper screamed into my ear. I jolted awake and my eyes were wide open. I looked around the room and two of my roommates were already up and getting dressed in their maize and blue tailgating attire. Yasmin wore a basketball jersey with shorts, tall blue socks and a pair of maize sunglasses on her head. Caroline wore crazy maize and blue leggings with a blue shirt, perfectly tied braids and a blue bucket hat. They were painting lines under their eyes and delicately placing Michigan stickers on their cheekbones. I scrambled to my closet and threw on my outfit that I had laid out the night before and began to join them in painting each other's faces. We played loud music and opened our windows to give us the perfect view of the Big House that sat elegantly a couple blocks away. The sunrise gave the sky a pinkish look that juxtaposed perfectly with the bright M.

By the time we got to our first fraternity tailgate house, it was 9 AM and it was already packed. I was alarmed at how much energy everyone had, including myself, knowing well that this is not how people woke up to 8 AM classes. I glanced around the room and everyone looked exhausted yet there was a hint of determination in their eyes that beamed with excitement and joy.

From what I learned during my freshman year of college in my psychology class, Psychology 111, there are only 6 real facial expressions that are generally universal: anger, sadness, fear, joy, disgust, and surprise. For example, if you went out to a party late at night and threw up all over a stranger's new shirt, you would clearly be able to identify the initial disgust, and then after perhaps anger on the person's face. And while psychologists have proven through various studies that there are only 6 universal facial expressions, I have a theory that may prove that another distinctive facial expression exists; the maize&blue expression.

The maize&blue expression is generally found amongst students that attend the University of Michigan and this rare species likes to refer to themselves as the "Wolverines." The expression can be seen on someone who has bags under their eyes, possibly skin splotched with acne caused by stress or the lack of sleep, but with a glint of determination present - like they could have just enough energy to, for example, dance for 5 hours on an elevated surface on a cold day or some of them could even take hundreds of selfies while singing to one of the species' favorite songs; Mr. Brightside.

So as I stood in the backyard of a disgustingly crowded house, I saw this look in each and every student's faces and I knew that my theory had to be right. Maize&blue was a very well-known expression in the small town of Ann Arbor, Michigan.