When the whole year is completed, and the worst of it (finals week), most college students feel as if they're finally free. They feel like Frodo in Lord of the Rings after dropping the ring into Mordor; it's an inevitable feeling of accomplishment, relief, and peace. Along with these feelings, we might also have strange states of remorse, exhaustion, sadness from leaving friends behind, overwhelmingness, or even an extreme desire for home cooked meals again.
From all the workload we just did, and the amount of effort that culminated into our maximum studying overdrive, most of us are off into an eternal summer of no more 8 a.m. classes, homework, or tests, and many college students have an array of thoughts towards finally being free from another year. Below are some thoughts we have, that seem to linger with us as we leave for summer.
Trying to be excited about summer, but secretly worrying about final grades.
I will be extremely jealous if future generations get to experience new technology that can grade finals the very next day and before summer. Let's face it, entering summer is great, but would be so much better without the weight of unofficial grades on our backs. Trying to be excited about summer is hard when you're also frantically waiting for final grades to be posted. Especially those with parents who continuously ask what were our final grades, while we helplessly stare at our class postings that have the annoying empty blank that seems to taunt us amongst the surrounding other grades. It's even worse when you get so lost in being back for summer, you almost forget that grades were posted, and realize when everyone posts on social media about their grades.
Wondering how much of what we learned, we'll actually remember.
All the information we cram into our brains for finals is pretty mind-boggling, and we can only hope from it that we'll be able to recall information when we come back to our families and get interrogated on what we learned. From all the effort we just put into classes for months, it's worth at least trying to keep the information we learned, especially from the classes that specifically relate to our major, or the classes that truly fascinate us. I know, I for one, will wonder how much astronomy I will be able to recall when star gazing this summer.
Trying to get rid of the leftover finals stress.
Unfortunately, no matter how relieved we feel after we walk out the door of our last final, walking into the start of a free summer, the crazy anxiety-filled attacks we have studying for finals, sometimes linger after finals. It's even weirder that we are excited, crazy from exhaustion, and anxious about going home altogether. Maybe that's why our parents bombard us. And it seems once we finally get back into our totally summer ready state, parents bombard us with the last question we want to hear upon arriving home: "how did finals go?"
Realizing we will be under parental authority again.
Speaking of parent's bombarding us with all kinds of fun questions about school that we don't particularly want to be asked, we are going back to having curfews and not being in charge of just us anymore! It is the weirdest transition, even weirder for anyone who lives by themselves at college, to be completely in charge of yourself for months on end, and then come back to "where are you going," "who are you going with," and "what time will you be back?" Unfortunately, we can't try and go back to being just on our own, but at least it's only a few months before we can, right?
Worrying we forgot something in the midst of finals week.
If anyone's like me, you pack after the chaotic week of finals. Packing anytime before is usually a huge distraction, or possibly another bad way of trying to avoid studying. I feel so mind-boggled during finals, I'm pretty sure if I tried to pack anything before finals were over, it would unintentionally be all my study materials.
The end of the year is a dilemma, not only with finals but also with having a big majority of our things in two different places; here and at home. While we have most of our stuff here, we always have to decide what to bring to either store at our parent's house or have over summer. And it's only so easy to pack when you have finals in the way and are trying to see all your college friends one last time before summer.
Missing our friends at college, but feeling excited to see those at home.
Speaking of friends, you will either be thinking about the people you won't see until next semester, or for a very long time if you have friends graduating, or you've been thinking about the friends you haven't seen in what feels like forever. Having so many friends graduating, I got so lost in reminiscing on all the memories I have had with friends here, I forgot how many I haven't seen since last summer. It's such a strange feeling since we all miss our family as well. It's a sad feeling of leaving people behind until the fall while going back to those we had to leave behind for even longer.
Realizing we can finally sleep again.
Most college students have such an out-of-whack sleep schedule, that they forget how luxurious it is to be on a semi-normal one again and actually be able to take naps whenever we want. Back at home, we can finally sleep until lunch, and it doesn't matter who thinks we're being a lazy bum! However, for a while some of us will probably wake up late thinking we're somehow late to something, specifically the kids who had to withstand the dreadful 8 a.m. classes over the semester. Even if you are working over summer, you are still able to sleep much better than at school, have fewer responsibilities and no studying or crazy projects. Hopefully not too many of us will have nightmares about finals or being late to class, for too long after we get home.
Two words: home-cooked meals.
Props to anyone that somehow manages to find time to cook, but most of us have gotten so used to the limited food selections on campus that are not usually healthy, or eating the same food over and over, we forget how amazing home cooked meals are. My mom always asks me what I want when I come home, and I blank out, having completely forgotten dishes that aren't the mundane college food I've been eating for months straight. But best of all, and on top of home cooked meals, coming home to seemingly unlimited junk food with no one to judge us for stuffing our faces whenever, is the greatest.
But most importantly, we did it.
We survived another semester and have wrapped up another great year of college. We don't realize it now, but we are a different person that has obtained new sets of skills over the past year at school. We have grown one step, and one year, closer to becoming an adult, and towards our career choice. Over summer, we can reflect on the seemingly millions of choices we made this year, how we've changed, and what we can improve on. We can also relax now, while preparing for another new semester, or a new life, for those who graduated.
