My first semester of college has been a whirlwind. My mind is overflowing with facts from the countless articles I've read and the wisdom of my professors (yes, overflowing does mean a little bit has already spilled out, sadly). The academic aspect of college is definitely a whole new world, but it's really nothing compared to the life part of college. It's a whole new universe. Read on to get some insight into my extraterrestrial discoveries here at college that have not come from studying.

Four or five snacks=one meal

Some days I find myself running around (not actually running, because why would I ever have a reason to run other than if someone was chasing me?) from class to class and from task to task, not having a chance to or not wanting to break my momentum enough to actually sit down for a meal. At home, it seems absurd to eat a muffin and some pretzels and a piece of string cheese and a yogurt cup for dinner. But, when sometimes your only other option is *shudders and makes disgusted face* dining hall food, snacks for dinner makes me feel like royalty.

Small victories matter

I applaud myself whenever I do laundry. I pat myself on the back when I get up, get ready, and still have ten minutes before I have to leave for class. I basically worship myself whenever I clean my room. For some reason, simple things like these elicit major praise from myself to myself. I know that most people carry these tasks out every day, and they don't make it a big deal. I could very well pass these instances off as not being worthy of praise, but then that just reduces the amount of positive things I can tell myself in a day. When I find a reason to celebrate something I've accomplished, no matter how small the accomplishment, I look back on my day with a smile instead of a big yawn. Well, I might still yawn, but for unrelated reasons to how mundane my day was. Dealing with the stressors of college has taught me to give myself some credit, even where credit is not necessarily due, because otherwise the week becomes a boring, stressful, and tiring blur.

Toothpaste does not grow on trees

I know, crazy, right? This is one of the biggest revelations I've experienced since attending college. At home, whenever the toothpaste is getting low, a new tube always seems to magically appear before the first one runs out. This goes for other items too, such as toilet paper, tissues, snacks, etc. I've lived life with the assumption that God just sends everything down to my parents before I wake up so I never notice. I suppose I can thank my parents for this, because I know not everyone has been lucky enough to go through life living with this assumption. But, now, when I notice my toothpaste tube is almost empty one day and emptier the next day, until, finally, the next day it's empty, I'm thinking, What gives? How do I unlock the unlimited supply? After many eyebrows furrowed and constant google searches, I've figured it out. The promised land is called Walgreens, and it's a few blocks down the road. Through this revelation, I've realized how much effort people go to provide things for others, even in the littlest things. I never think about the fact that my house is always stocked with the deemed essentials, because toothpaste is such a small part of my daily life. It's amazing how much of a difference it makes when it isn't being supplied for you anymore, though. This doesn't just apply to the supplying of household goods. Professors and teachers take the time to print off long articles for everyone and grade every single paper, but we don't usually think about the time they spend doing that. All we see is a long article we don't want to read, and we complain when our grades aren't put in fast enough. The finished product is the thing we seek without a thought to the process. Now I know to appreciate the person doing the process and recognize that there is indeed a process instead of just waiting impatiently for the end result.

DO NOT run up the stairs to your seat after going to the bathroom in a full lecture hall of 200 students

Scene: About half-way through the semester, communication lecture, around 10:20 a.m. Too early to embarrass yourself, you ask? Nope. My seat is about one-third of the way up in a huge lecture hall. I decide to go to the bathroom after doing all these calculations in my head that assured me I would not have time to go in between classes. So, I casually walk down the stairs and out the door without making a scene. The problem comes about on the way back up. You know those kinds of steps that have a disproportionate amount of depth to them, and you can't for the life of you decide whether you should take two little steps on each or just stretch your stride super long so you only take one on each? These are the steps that are in this lecture hall. Honestly, I blame the genius who decided these steps could be a functional part of society for what happens next. I walk back in the door and start my ascent, deciding to go with the one-foot-on-each-stair approach. I also decide to take it at a quicker pace, which turns out to be a mistake. First step, nice. Second step, cool. Third step, great. Fourth, fifth, sixth, steps, perfectly executed. Then: the dreaded seventh step. I get stuck between a long stride and two short strides and my Converse shoe hits the vertical part of the stair, and I fall to my social death. I become all too aware of everyone looking at me, so I do what comes natural to me in an embarrassing situation: I laugh. I think about making it seem like I meant for it to happen, but everyone would've seen right through my beat-red, transparent face. I think the professor must have used her magical professor powers to trip me as punishment for leaving during the middle of her lecture. The second most important thing I learned from this instance was to not drink a full liter water bottle in 20 minutes, but the first? Laugh at yourself.

DO NOT give your credit card information to a strange woman over the phone

Scene: August 24, 2016, move-in day. I finish the grueling task of getting all of my items into my dorm room, I say a sweaty goodbye to my parents, and I'm finally relaxing. I decide to fiddle with my new laptop a bit (yes, a PC—I will NOT be a slave to mainstream Apple computer use!). I try to open up the internet, and a pop-up appears that says my computer is very much at risk because apparently it has all these viruses and the world is going to end if I do not call this toll-free number immediately. So, naturally, I call it. What happens next is a series of statements given to me by a woman over the phone that basically say if I don't pay her company $150, my computer is probably going to explode from viruses or something like that, as well as me pretty much bawling my eyes out to this woman (in my defense, my parents had just left me, symbolically starting my shift to adulthood). I know what you're thinking: "Emma's not stupid enough to actually give her credit card information over the phone to a company she's not even sure is legitimate." Or maybe you are thinking I'm stupid enough to do that. Regardless, I apparently am indeed stupid enough to do that. I call my dad after it happens, and he really cannot believe I was stupid enough to do that; I bawl my eyes out again to him. He calms me down and says to transfer my money from my checking account into my savings account, and all is well, except for the fact that I'm out $150. Anyways, I've almost got to hand it to these scammers; I mean, they decided to test me on move-in day, the day that marks me as being independent and having to make adult choices on my own, so I'm already going to be vulnerable. Well played, scammers. But, the actual lesson learned here is that college will test you and force you to make decisions without your parents, but that's the biggest way you're going to grow.