Much can be said for what one might expect when first coming to college. I know I was often told that college was supposed to be fun. Literally almost every person I talked to about college said that I was going to have so much fun and that these four years would be the best of my life.
If only they could have warned me that the best moments were limited, if only, by your own obligation.
Take for instance my social life. My social life has decreased to an almost zero since coming here. Which is hilarious since I can vividly recall being told that I will meet some of my closest friends here. Friends? Who has time for those anymore? College consists of three components: schoolwork, sleep and a social life. The amount of hours in the day only grant you time for two of the three. You can manage to get all your schoolwork done and have an amazing social life, but no sleep. You can disregard schoolwork and maintain an active social life while still getting a balanced sleep schedule, or you get all your schoolwork done, sleep and kiss goodbye whatever chance you had at being social.
Unfortunately for me, I chose the latter. Which was only debatably a smart choice. It seems that I always have something to do. At least in high school, I could breathe. Nowadays it feels as though I’ve had the breath sucked out of me. Counting the hours till deadlines rather than days, and months until the end of the semester rather than weeks until the end of the term. And even after an assignment has been finished and submitted, it’s never over. I find myself placed on a level of stress that’s too high to get down from.
It’s almost as if the idea of college has been highly romanticized within media and film, and therefore, falsely advertised to high school students… I’m sorry did I say almost? I meant college has been highly romanticized and it’s all a lie, people.
Another change has been how terribly difficult it is to get a job. Granted I don’t have a lot of experience, but I do have some good qualities. Besides, isn’t it true that we all have to start somewhere? Even despite that, I never expected job hunting to be what it is: the freaking Hunger Games. I went to career fair after career fair looking for positions who wouldn’t necessarily toss me aside at first look, looked through list after list of hiring businesses, filled out applications until my hand could no longer move and was falsely led to believe that an interview went well enough for me to get hired. There was always someone better, and always a lovely email saying how I was a great candidate, but not quite what they were looking for.
On top of all that, there’s the whole “big world, little me” thing going on here. Being in a lecture full of 500 students can really put a drag on the whole, teacher-student relationship thing. Coming from a small town, I got used to people knowing my name. Now all I can hope is that when I approach my professor after class that he’ll at least realize that I’m in it. High schoolers can say good-bye to friendly conversations outside of class.
Don’t get me wrong, the whole experience has been great, new and exciting. People were telling the truth when they said that I would make so many new friends; I swear I shook so many hands that the action lost meaning, heard so many names I stopped remembering who each one belonged to and gazed upon so many different faces that nowadays, I often find myself randomly staring at the person across the street with a puzzled look on my face, trying to figure out where I know them from. So, if you ever happen to notice that one weird girl who won’t stop staring, I apologize, I’m just 98% sure I remember you from somewhere.