Being home for the summer is great, there’s no doubt about it. It’s hard to deny that seemingly endless days on the beach and time to travel are some of the things we look forward to all year. But when the novelty wears off after the first few weeks, we ironically catch ourselves feeling nostalgic for the months spent at school. With half the summer already come and gone, the countdown to our return begins and the excitement builds because in less than two short months school will be back in session which means:

We get to live with our best friends again.

Getting to wake up every morning to their bright and shining faces­—or more realistically their puffy eyes and bedhead—is a blessing that you don’t really appreciate until it’s gone. Over the past year, you got used to seeing your favorite people every day, and moving back home for the summer unfortunately meant separating yourselves. Constant texting and Instagram-lurking only goes so far, and having to go three months away from them is a bit of a shock to the system. Going back to school means moving back in with them and also four times the amount of clothing options, always having someone to tell you if your hair is doing something funky, nightly bouts of uncontrollable laughter, and (most importantly) someone to watch Netflix with at all times. The reunion is long anticipated, and will no doubt result in overwhelming feelings of euphoria.

We get to see all our other friends who don’t live in our hometowns.

Your best friends aren’t the only people you miss over the summer. College allows you to meet and create a whole new social circle that is, for the most part, completely separate from the one you have back in your hometown. Once kids go their separate ways for the summer, it is highly likely that you won’t see a majority of them until fall. Going back to school will mean reunions with all your college friends, and the opportunity to swap summer adventure stories and get caught up.

FOOTBALL.

Need I say more? We’ve been missing this since the last game of the season and with the start of a new school year so close, you can almost feel the excitement that abounds on game day.

New classes.

The start of the semester means the start of a whole new set of classes. For some this means an opportunity to start fresh and get back on track, for others an opportunity to simply get back to a steady schedule. Regardless, new classes are something to look forward to. After all, getting an education is the reason we're all here anyways.

“We have futures to get crackin’ on.”

Finally, as my roommate so eloquently puts it, “we have futures to get crackin’ on.” Summer gives us all a much-needed break from the intensity of school and extracurriculars but it also brings our aspirations to a bit of a standstill. It is hard to be actively involved without actually being at UF, so going back to school means that we can finally get back to doing big things in all of our organizations and clubs yet again.

With so much to look forward to, who can really blame us for wanting the new school year to start?