Give us bread, and give us roses, and us Bryn Mawr women are content. Our days consist of a little bit of feminism, food and friends, and we wouldn’t have it any other way. Traditions feed the soul of our community and are an excuse for a campus-wide pajama party.

Four enriching years in this tight-knit community have gone by, and for the members of the class of 2016, it’s almost time to say goodbye to the comfortable bubble Bryn Mawr has been. In small, but noticeable ways, we already have begun that process.

Traditions vary in popularity, but Hell Week (as it will always be called), is my favorite, and always will be. No other tradition unifies the community, creates an electric energy on campus and brings out the most spirited (and most comical) side of every student on campus, in quite the same way as this one. Freshmen are welcomed and bond with upperclassmen. This tradition is the reason I felt included in the community my first year, the reason why I didn’t start any transfer applications and the reason why I used to look forward to every spring semester, every fall.

Hell Week this year came with an extra dose of emotion. *Graduation approaches*- everything seemed to scream. You’re a Senior now. You’re not making a hell schedule or running around like crazy with hell babies to mother. You’re going to act cool and watch from the sidelines. Sit on the Senior Steps. You’re going to cheer your class at performances, because it’s the last time they will all be on that stage at Goodhart together. You’re going to watch hell week happen like a crazy roller coaster for the other classes, and try to savor the moment before its gone.

Also, you’re going to take your first real step towards saying goodbye to the school- the Bedtime Story (Seniors read a story of their choice to the Mawrters in their dorms). And I did. I read mine with a friend who became something like a sister over the past four years. It was close to 9:30 pm, on the Friday of Hell Week, with a sea of teary-eyed freshmen surrounding me, swathed in blankets and alcohol-induced euphoria. I got up on that ancient flea-bitten couch on Pembroke East Second and read a passage from Lord of The Rings, Return of The King, with my best friend.

I said goodbye to the community for the first time that night. I read the story, and bade the freshmen, the juniors and sophomores goodnight, knowing that while I may leave in a couple months, this tradition will carry on and make every student like me feel like they were part of something special. I know someday, this experience and everything about it will be a dusty memory, and I will only recall it with that nostalgic fondness we all recall our school days. But the people I met here, and the person they have molded me into, will endure.

I thought I would be in tears, because goodbyes are emotional. But emotions don’t work how we think they’re supposed to. I was just too happy. Happy I chose to stay at Bryn Mawr, happy I was with the best people in the best place, and happy that I had survived college- survived the four years and managed to reach a very important personal goal- reading the bedtime story. Goodnight, and almost goodbye, Bryn Mawr.

Thesising awaits me still. And Graduation. And so do the horrors of the real world. But, Anassa Katta, Class of 2016. We got this.

My Bedtime Story (for the curious):

And thus it was. A fourth age of middle-earth began. And the fellowship of the ring... though eternally bound by friendship and love... was ended. Thirteen months to the day since Gandalf sent us on our long journey... we found ourselves looking upon a familiar sight.

How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on... when in your heart you begin to understand... there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend... some hurts that go too deep... that have taken hold.

Bilbo once told me his part in this tale would end... that each of us must come and go in the telling. Bilbo's story was now over. There would be no more journeys for him... save one.

My dear Sam.

You cannot always be torn in two. You will have to be one and whole for many years. You have so much to enjoy and to be and to do. Your part in the story will go on.