Just writing to let you know that you have a lot of pressure on you. You are the crescendo of my college career, the final countdown, the final drunken breath before the plunge into the real world.

See, the reason you have so much pressure is because you have quite a bit to live up to. These past three semesters have been the best years of my life. You know, some say that college is the best four years of your life. I mean, where else can you wake up on a Saturday and get wasted before 9 a.m.? Honestly, on day-drinking days, my biggest responsibility is to not break a bone and not get arrested. This is my last semester of such easy responsibility. In five short months I can no longer schedule no Friday classes. I can no longer wake up five minutes before class and and stumble in with an oversized sweatshirt and leggings and last night's makeup.

Gone are the days of presenting my student ID in exchange for food. I have a feeling I'm going to end up handing my ID to a Starbucks in the city and say, "Yeah, just put it on my dining, I think my dad just deposited some money." Once you're done, second semester of senior year, my whole lifestyle is going to have to change. Somehow after this semester, I'm going to be even more broke than I am right now. Forget about Starbucks; I'll be lucky if I can afford Folger's instant (no hate to Folgers).

You're kind of the elephant in every room I go into actually. Conversations revolve around the present, careful not to say anything about the fact that we're not going to be together in five months. At every pregame, I have to resist putting on "Graduation" by Vitamin C and drunkenly crying to people, saying, "You better stay in touch! H.A.G.S." or if I'm feeling risky, "H.A.K.A.S."

Something that's strangely comforting is the fact that I've had this feeling before, during my senior year of high school. I, like any other teenager ever, could not wait for college. I think my exact words were, "I can't wait to get out of this place and out of this small town." (Ironically I ended up going to a college in an even smaller town.) But as bad-ass and over it I thought I was, I felt like I was leaving a part of myself behind in high school. How would I cope with parting with people and places I've known my entire life? Surprisingly, "Graduation" by Vitamin C was still the song that would play when I thought about leaving everyone.

Looking back on it now, high school seems so long ago. I want to go back in time and tell high school Marissa that she had nothing to worry about, and the best years were still ahead of you. I would also tell her to take it easy on the dinning hall food freshman year and to stop thinking that you're above the freshman 15.

I have a feeling that future successful journalist Marissa would come back and tell me the same thing. You see, I don't agree that college is the best years of your life. I think you really can't know what years are the best until you live them all. From my standpoint, I still feel like the best has yet to come. Nothing will ever compare to college, just like nothing compared to high school.

My plan for you, second semester of senior year, is this: I'm going to cram as much action into these five months as I possibly can. Themed frat party in a dark frat basement? I'm there. Staying up all night to see a sunrise, of course. Happy hour every weekday from 5-9? I'll be there too. 9 a.m. class on Monday's? I'll try my hardest to be there. I'll eat at every dinning hall, go to a sporting event, I'll even pull some all-nighters just to sit in my favorite chair at the library.

So cheers to you, and get ready for an action-packed, alcohol-flavored couple of months. I think all of the semesters before this was training for you.

Love,

Marissa