As college final exams approach us or are already upon us, our minds are experiencing many emotional whirlwinds. Whether it is your first semester of college or your last, there is no doubt that these emotions apply to all of us college students. They get old quickly, but never really go away.

1. A Few Day Before LDOC:

Feelings are good. The realization of final exams hasn't quite set in yet, but the realization of LDOC is real. At this point we are all just so excited for classes to end that we are bribing ourselves with LDOC.

2. LDOC:

We've thought about final exams, or maybe we haven't. The fun of LDOC, though, is just too overwhelming to even think about doing anything but celebrating the end of a semester, whether it's your first or your last. In the back of our minds we know finals will be here soon, so we decide to live it up while we can.

3. The Reading Day After LDOC (the morning-ish):

This is when our minds kind of freak out. We aimed to get up at 8 a.m. to study the day away, but it is now 12:30 p.m. and we've hit panic mode. Questions storm our minds about last night. Why didn't I do anything? Why didn't I study? What exactly happened? Why didn't my friends stop me from celebrating and make me study instead? These are just a few of the hundreds of questions storming our minds.

4. The Reading Day After LDOC (the afternoon-ish):

OK, after we get our lives together as best we can (aka take a shower and cry for being bad people and not studying last night), we grab our backpacks and books and rush to the library to finally start studying for that 8 a.m. exam we have tomorrow.

5. The Reading Day After LDOC/The Early Hours of The First Exam Day:

After studying all day and night, it is 2 a.m. and we decide to head back to our dorm. We do need sleep to take an exam, after all. As we walk back to our dorms in the cold hours of the night/morning, we feel awesome! Yeah, it may be 2 a.m., and yeah, we may have spent the entire day in the library, but we know we're going to ace the 8 a.m. exam we have tomorrow -- err, today? Whatever day, we know we've got this because we are awesome.

6. 7:20 a.m. Exam Day 1:

We wake up after snoozing our alarms a few too many times. Oops, it's 7:20 a.m. and we have an exam in 40 minutes on the opposite side of campus. We rush putting on any clothes that seem clean, not caring if they match, and run out the door without our daily dose of caffeine.

7. 7:40 a.m. Exam Day 1:

After practically racing to the other side of campus, we see that we have made it there quicker than ever before. Now we grab caffeine and head to the test.

8. 8:03 a.m. Exam Day 1:

We've just gotten the exam and have started looking at it. Our minds are freaking out a little (or a lot) when we see all of these questions we don't know how to do. We know we studied the right stuff. Are we in the right exam? Yes. So we start the exam and hope for the best.

9. 11:15 a.m. Exam Day 1:

Whew, we finished the exam and checked all of our answers. But it is only 11:15 a.m. and we are the first ones done. Did we do something wrong? Are we just true geniuses? We sit in our seat just staring at our exam for a few minutes and then decide to hand it in. We got this! We know we probably just aced it.

10. 2:30 p.m. Exam Day 1:

We're in the library when a friend from the exam we took earlier comes up. We get talking about how easy the exam was and how we stressed too much. Then we start to compare answers about some of the questions. We both get different answers and we begin to freak out again. Then we realize we had different tests and reassure each other that we probably aced it. In the back of our minds, though, we are terrified to get the result back.

11. Exam Days 2-5:

Repeat steps five through 10 until we are done with all exams and get ready to go home for five whole weeks!

12. First Day at Home:

This is awesome! Five whole weeks and -- wait! We have to check our exam scores! We start freaking out while logging onto Sakai. Hands shaking as we click "refresh" a thousand times before the grade finally appears. Fear ensues as the page loads. A wave of relief. Two A's, one A-, one B+, two B-'s. We can handle that. Drinking from the Old Well may not have given us a 4.0, but we're awesome anyways. Now, on to Winter Break and a new semester.