The minute you hug your parents goodbye and watch them drive off into the distance, you feel it. You feel that sudden rush of emotion; you’ve never been more excited and you’ve never felt more weirded out about saying goodbye to your mom and dad. You go back up to your new home with your roommate. You guys continue to put away your things and chitchat about people you’ve met already today. An energetic short girl pops into your door and introduces herself and tells you she’s from Chicago. (Something you learned quickly is that everyone is from “Chicago.” Even if their Illinois town is hours from the actually city, they claim they are from Chicago, which is totally fine because most people do not know the little suburban towns, anyway—it’s just humorous.) The girl tells you that she lives across the hall and to find her later if you guys find plans. You go on your separate ways and head to the cookout with your seminar class.

As soon as you look out the door, you witness the closest thing to a hurricane you have ever seen with your own two eyes. The rain is coming down from every angle. You put on your brand new raincoat and pop up your brain new umbrella and begin the trek of your life. The roads have currents at every intersection. You’re running in two inches of standing water and just hoping you arrive to the right building. You begin to think that maybe this is a sign from God that you weren’t ready for school and that you should have stayed home where it’s safe with your parents. But you walk into to this unknown building with a room full of unknown faces and feel a sudden warmth of comfort that they are all equally as soaked and uncomfortable as you. You all are forced to talk to each other and exchange numbers.

You arrive back at your dorm and the party begins. You have had your floor meeting and met 40 other people. You just continue to hand your phone to folks you just met and exchange numbers. This is a process that seems completely 100 percent normal for the next couple of weeks. The amount of faces you meet and meet again is uncountable.

You and your new roomie head off to dorm storm (the process of partying in the dorms and avoiding RAs.) It is one of the most thrilling and interesting nights you have ever experienced thus far. You meet some of your best friends at these little pow-wows. You meet your people, your squad.

This group of people continues to bond over time and get to know each other better and better day by day. The adventures you being to endure and laughs shared together are unexplainable. This group of individuals might not even be that similar to one another, but all of your different personalities somehow fit together seamlessly. They become your family away from home. They care about you and tell you nothing but the truth, even if it is not what you want to hear. Especially when you are super excited about a boy that texts you saying he wanted to you to hang out with him or the outfit you think is the bomb—if they don’t see it in your best interest, they are not shy to tell you just how they see it.

That group of classmates from your seminar becomes your core group of pals. Whenever you pass one of them walking to classes, it makes you smile and feel comforted. Those classmates were your first friends at school and the only reason for it is simply that you were placed in the same class. Sometimes things fit together ever so perfectly.

These once-strangers become the people you are dying to see all summer when you're cities and states away. The reason you constantly look through your pictures and videos to reminisce on all the crazy nights and shenanigans with your crew. The people you have already decided will be in your wedding one day. Not that you will not meet any other amazing best friends the rest of your college career or life for that matter, but just finishing freshmen year, you have met your squad.