To the Class of 2016,
You did it. You officially made it to your last semester of college. It's the home run and all you have to do is ride it out for 15 more weeks. You have survived 7 finals weeks, 4 homecomings and 3 St. Patty's Days, if not more. You learned things that you never thought you would learn...or need to learn. You have changed a lot over the past four years of college and the crazy, socialite life you have been living has been the best. Crawling out of parties and bars at 2 in the morning, waiting until last minute to start papers that you had the entire semester to finish, staying up until 4AM with Netflix marathons, knowing that you have to be at class at 8AM, and making regrettable decisions on fraternity row that only your friends know about....or so you think...college has been the life.
Living in the fast lane is finally coming to an end. With one week left until the spring semester starts, you probably haven't realized that you will have a big kid job come fall. You will not be returning to your college or university to start tearing up the town during Welcome Weekend, You won't be able to wake up at 5AM for kegs and eggs on homecoming and continuously drink all day OR wear questionable costumes for Halloween.
The weekends will turn into the days that sleeping sounds better than going out for a drink with friends. Blowing money on bar tabs will be highly frowned upon and your parents will not support your drinking habits you developed in college but hid from them all these years. It is that unfortunate time that we must move on from our college years and start the rest of our lives.
I Don't Want To Grow Up
It is totally fine to be afraid of growing up. Our parents said growing up was not going to be easy and they were right....despite never wanting to admit they were right. Yes, we must tell our parents that they are right. We actually do not know everything. It is a sad thing to admit, but we have to.
However, we are about to start our lives. With all of the nostalgia we are going to face this semester and being sad of leaving the place that built us, we start our lives. There is one thing we all forget that we can do after graduation. We can literally do whatever we want now. We can live where ever we want. Well, we can live where ever we want depending if we get hired. We will never again have to stress out about professors who wait until the last minute to give us a huge assignment; we will never be faced with trying to find parking in the commuter lots; the financial aid office will no longer determine our fate and be the biggest problems in our lives; Parking Services can hop off because we won't be racking up the countless parking tickets that we sneakily have our parents pay for. We are free.
It's The LAST Semester, Though
It is the last semester of college, ever. For those of us who go onto grad school, it isn't the last semester. It's the last semester of undergrad, though, and you still need to be an adult.
Live this next semester like a freshman.
1. Be Cheap, Be A Freshman
You'll need to save money for whatever move you decide to make after you leave school. Buy those crappy gas station drinks you were prone to drink freshman year because you had no clue where to go and how to get proper weekend beverages. You will never again get the experience of going crazy with friends, so might as well do it the way you came in: a freshman.
2. Relive 18
This pertains to the first tip as well. You are going to want to save money for the home run of your college career. Bring back the days of Tour Dé Frat. Relive the days of being at Delta Chi and getting nasty with friends and good music then do the same thing at FIJI the next night. Save yourself from spending way too much money at the bars. If you didn't have your Frat phase, then grab some friends and go to the 18-and-over bars again. You spent the first half of college getting dirty on the dance floor to Flo-Rida. Why not bring back the same dance moves with Fetty Wap?
3. Mend The Bad Blood
What people tend to forget to tell freshmen is that college is all about networking. In the grand scheme of things, the real world is all about who you know. How do you think that Donald Trump is able to run for president when different branches of his company files for bankruptcy? Yes, he was making intelligent business choices...however, he also had to know a guy to not tarnish his name.
You have probably developed enemies. End the feud. It is pointless and leaving on bad terms is never a good choice. It could bite you in the butt in the future. Grow up and just settle the beef.
Here It Is...
The last three and half years of college have been great: we made our friends, joined our organizations, had mental breakdowns on the Sunday nights of finals week and robbed the store of all of their Ben & Jerry's stock, got on a first name basis with the Jimmy Johns delivery guy, spent too much money, slept less, partied too hard and asked our parents for too much money...that we all spent on alcohol instead of school supplies. We somehow survived college to make it this far and we're expected to be adults in less than four months. We will have our first adult jobs with our crappy apartments that we live in by ourselves with the option of getting a dog or cat.
Live this semester like you're forever young, be "young, wild and free" like Snoop Dogg, Wiz and Bruno Mars suggested. Go out on the weekends responsibly; I mean, don't put off homework because you can't do that as a senior. Do the things you never got to do or that you loved to do. We deserve this and it'll be the best memories of our lives.
Congratulations Class of 2016,
We came...we lived...we laughed...we conquered.
