It's senior year (or semester) and the past few years have been some of the most challenging and some of the most rewarding of our lives.
We've met some of the greatest people of our lives, and some of the worst (don't pretend like you haven't). We've been lucky enough to share some of the best moments we've yet to experience with some of the greatest people we've yet to encounter. We've also been lucky enough to share some of the worst moments with those same people.
I think we can all agree that college wouldn't have been the same without those people next to you. Maybe it was those older friends who have already graduated but really showed you the ropes. They showed you all the best places to eat in town, informed you about what teachers to take and which ones to avoid entirely, and encouraged you through your first couple years.
Maybe it was the people who came after you, who will still be here after you graduate. You thought you had all the friends you needed, and then they showed up and now you can't think of a college career without them. They allowed you to pass on the tradition of being able to show them the greatest places to eat in town, telling them who to take and who to avoid, and allowing you to encourage them the same way you were.
No matter if it was the first friend you made, who stuck with you through all the bad decisions and terrible mistakes, or the last friend you've made who gets to see you take the plunge into the real world. These people have made the last few years everything that they were.
I look back on the last 4 years and my heart swells. I see the friends who were there for only the beginning, the friends that have been there since the beginning, and the ones that came around in the middle and stuck around until the end. I'm so lucky and so blessed to have had them. I can't think of better people to spend my college life with.
As we become (somewhat) functioning members of society, we will discover new people and bring them into our lives and one day we will look back and think, "how did I ever live without them?" much like the people we have in our lives now.
We don't know who was meant for this part of our lives, and who is meant to be in the next part. We're closing the pages of this particular chapter. But we're opening up a whole other part that can be anything we want it to be.
So as we roll through to graduation, and the hard days start coming, and they seem to keep coming, keep this in mind: there hasn't been a day yet, that you haven't made it through. So hug your friends a little tighter and a little longer. Things are starting to come to a close, but it's been the best so far and greater things are still to come. So to all that have contributed, a big thank you, and I wouldn't ever want to do college, or life, without you.
