On the trip back to college for the second semester your freshman year, the nervous butterflies that you had in August have now been replaced by anxious excitement. The thought of leaving home and all that has been familiar to you for so many years is no longer frightening because you now find familiarity in the place that was once a mystery to you. And the dreams you had over the summer about what your first semester in college would be like have now all been lived out.

As you walk around campus again for the first time in weeks, you know which buildings are which and where to go for all of your classes. You’ve figured out your favorite places to study by realizing where you are least distracted, and you’ve mastered staying in bed for as long as possible while still arriving on time to those brutal 8ams. And it comforts you to know that when classes start, instead of looking around at a ton of unknown faces, in most of your classes you will recognize at least one of them.

Over the course of last semester, you met hundreds of new people and made so many new friends who were once complete strangers just a few short months ago. But somehow out of that huge group of strangers you and your best friends have found each other. From hanging out in your rooms to going out on the weekends, you already have so many stories and memories together that you will cherish forever. And instead of the housing emails for next year scaring you, you can’t wait to finally be able to live with them. You’ll never have to fear meeting a new roommate again, and you won’t have to walk all over campus to another dorm to meet up. Though in addition to all the excitement, you start to realize that the end of freshman year is coming faster than you think and the comments you’ve always heard about your years of college flying by are true.

On the trip back to college for the second semester of your freshman year — because you’re on your way back — you know you’ve made the right decision in choosing the place you call home for the next 3½ years.