You always thought you wanted to get away when you went to college. Find a new place, become your own person. And while the freedom is great, there are definitely some experiences you're guaranteed to have when you’re living several states away from where you grew up.

1. Skype/FaceTime become your best friends

Really, any technology that allows you to connect long distances. You’re actually not sure how your parents made it through college without Facebook and texting.

2. People constantly ask you how you heard about the school from so far away

There's this nifty thing called the internet.

3. You find your "on campus Mom"

Whether it’s a professor, a supervisor at work, or a nurturing upperclassman, she’s there to check in on you beyond school-related stuff. She can’t replace your real mom, obviously, but she’s there to make sure you’re eating more than tortilla chips and M&Ms.

4. Regional differences quickly become apparent to you

I mean, seriously. It's called a shopping cart, not a buggy.

5. You fully appreciate home cooked meals

As a kid you always complained about Mom’s meatloaf. But now that the cafeteria is your main source of food, you’d give anything for that home cooked goodness. Likewise, if you don’t have a meal plan and have to make every meal yourself, you long for the days when dinner would magically appear on the table.

6. As a result, you discover countless new favorite restaurants

Nothing But Noodles, Mugshots, Doodle's...where have you been all my life?

7. It feels weird when friends from back home come to visit

Worlds...colliding...

8. You become a pro at road trips and/or the airport

Going home is not as simple as hopping in the car for a couple of hours. It requires either a full day on the road or boarding an airplane. Luckily, after the first semester or so, you’ve got both down to a science.

9. Which means you're a master at packing, too

You can’t take several trips to and from your dorm, and you can’t casually come back if your forget something. You’ve learned the art of figuring out exactly what you’ll need for when you’ll be home, and what to put into storage.

10. You adopt a local family

Okay, technically, they would be adopting you, but whatever you call it, your friends who live locally end up being more like a brother or a sister. Whether you need their cable-empowered TV to watch the latest episode of your favorite show, or just need a place that doesn’t smell like a community-style bathroom, they’re always there with open arms.

11. ...and you also adopt their pet

When your dog is several states away, sometimes you just need a stand-in to cuddle with.

12. Your closet is stuffed with clothes for every season

Run home on the weekend to grab a jacket if it gets unseasonably cold? Nope.

13. You get really excited when you meet other people from your state

Finally! Someone who understands exactly how boring it can be to drive through Kansas multiple times a year. Speaking of which, road trip buddies?

14. You become an expert in off-campus hangout spots

Sometimes you need to get off campus. Since going home isn’t an option, you’ve learned the ins-and-outs of nearby coffee shops, libraries, and parks to take a break.

15. Your friends become your pseudo-family

You eat meals with them, spend weekends with them, go to them for advice—it doesn’t take long before you’re basically siblings.

16. You also get used to spending the shorter holidays with them

Whether it’s because Thanksgiving break is too close to Christmas, or Easter break is too short to drive home, you make your own traditions with your other out-of-towner friends.

17. You learn to appreciate the breaks when you do get to go home

They don’t happen every other weekend, so when you can go home you relish the chance to spend quality time with family (as well as some quality time with your own bed).

18. You come to enjoy the quietness when everyone else is off campus

Whether it’s Saturday morning when everyone has gone home for the weekend or a fall break that everyone has left for, you’ve learned that the campus is a much different (and often nicer) place when you have it to yourself.

19. People treat you like the resident expert on whichever state you're from

No, just because I'm from Texas does not mean I know the exact date of the Battle of the Alamo. *sigh*

20. You realize how much you can do on your own

Sure your parents are a phone call away, but there’s still a lot you have to figure out by yourself. Finding directions to new places, getting your car’s oil changed, knowing how to take care of yourself when you’re sick, remembering appointments—all things you used to rely on your parents for, but now that you can do them on your own, you feel a newfound sense of independence.

21. But, you still love your family and learn to appreciate them even more now that they're far away

You never thought you’d miss how your sister gets goofy when she drinks Dr Pepper, or how your brother can make the most mundane story funny, or binge-watching HGTV as a family. But now that these aren't everyday occurrences, you’ve learned how special those moments are. It’s true what they say: absence makes the heart grow fonder.