While starting the process of packing up my freshman dorm for the summer, several thoughts occurred to me.

1. “How did the year go so fast?”

While packing my room I realized how fast the year went. I started looking around my room and seeing things I said I was going to fix but just didn’t get to because this was one of the fastest years of my life. When you start freshman year you think of all the long months you won’t be home for, but when you get to college the time goes so fast. I started to think about how much my friends and I had changed in just nine months. I looked at pictures I had of all of us from our first weekend in college to now and noticed the drastic changes in all of us.

2. “I’m going to miss this place”

Moving out of your freshman dorm is bittersweet. When packing you think about all the good memories you had and how being the new kids in college is such an interesting experience. Your first year in college is filled with so many new experiences and special memories because it is your first time living alone and for most of Elon’s student body, it is our first time living 500 plus miles away from our parents. Although my room is extremely small, and pounds of dirty accumulates on our belongs daily, I have gotten so used to every part of my room and building.

3. “I can’t leave my door open”

Living alone next year in an off-campus apartment will definitely be an adjustment for my friends and I. We are used to leaving our things in the hallway and leaving our doors open when we aren’t home.

4. “I am going to miss my hall friends”

Although it is exciting to be living in my own apartment with my best friends next year, the idea of not living in a hallway filled thirty girls who are always hanging out in the hallway will be an adjustment. Our hall is very close and we all feel so comfortable just to walk in and take a nap in someone’s room. In my hallway, you always have someone in your class, from your home state, someone to go get food with or go out with. Living in a real apartment building with three other girls versus thirty will be something new.

5. “Only three more years”

My freshman dorm looks out over the area we had our freshman convocation at which happens to be where we also have graduation. While packing up it occurred to me how long I felt four years would be when I was sitting down there in August. This year went so fast that it made me think that in just three short years we will be graduating. In three years we will all be moving to different cities, some of us will be going on to graduate school, some will be going straight to work and others will be taking time off. The idea that in three short years we will be different people with new experiences, world views, motives is shocking being that less than a year ago we all so eagerly moved into our freshman dorms.