Being a college student is a weird limbo of being an adult but not really, not completely. I mean, yes, you have freedom but also you are living in the bubble of college life. It is hard to comprehend that there is another life out there, where you need to pay bills and work full time and not take classes that stress you out completely.

Another part of being in college is missing your friends and family back home and it's a familiar feeling that settles underneath your skin and becomes a part of who you are. There is no question of are you missing them. You are constantly missing them and that's who you are now: a UCLA undergraduate student who misses her friends and family back home. And the food, oh god, the food.

But it's ok, you learn to live with it.

The weird thing is missing your college friends.

I mean, it's not weird because they are amazing and obviously you miss being near them, but the fact that most college friendships were forged and continued during high-stress situations and I thought that missing them would, even if it is true nonetheless, be lessened if I am not under that stress.

I was wrong.

I forgot that college isn't just classes and clubs and dumb responsibilities that give way too much stress than they should. College is also about forging bonds and realizing who you are and making a friend circle who knows your college self: a person who wears way too many sweatpants and never does laundry until absolutely necessary and stresses a lot.

Really way too many sweatpants. My Dubai self is terrified of the attire I choose to show up to classes in and frankly, my Dubai self is right but does my college self-care? Nope.

Coming back to the topic at hand, college is about meeting people who are as stressed as you and bonding because of it but staying bonded because you realize being around them makes you less stressed.

So, this is to my college friends, I miss you and I can't wait to see you again.

To my high school friends? I miss you terribly. I can't wait to see you again.