I am writing this letter to give all of you the recognition you deserve.

I would like to start by saying that you have all shaped my life, and helped me grow as a person more than you know. As I walked into Tyson Hall on August 26th, I was overwhelmed with feelings of anxiety, excitement, and confusion. I worried that I wouldn’t make any friends, I would get lost trying to find my classes and embarrass myself, or I would be eating alone in the dining halls. Upon meeting every single one of you early on in the semester, I knew I had found my forever friends. However, I was wrong. Over time, you all became my forever family. You hold a special place in my heart, and you always will.

Thank you for encouraging me to go to the gym after eating 3 too many cookies from Lawrence, or balling out in Larry’s market a little too hard. Thank you for putting a smile on my face on my hardest days. Thank you for encouraging me to go to class even when everything in me was telling me to stay in bed and watch Shameless. Thank you for showing me that it really is okay to be myself. Thank you for being yourselves and for letting me into your lives and sharing your stories with me. Thank you for the adventures into town, at the parade, the food festival, cold walks to get dinner, couch potato dates, and the urgent trips to rite aid. Thank you for seeing me at 10 am Saturday morning in my ‘I slept in this’ outfit, and still going out in public with me to get food.

I will never forget the times that we all found each other during the early hours of the morning on the very familiar street corners or waiting in front of Chris’s pizza. I will never forget the very distinct smell of our second floor, burning hair and marijuana. I will never forget the laughs we shared at the scent of Nick’s room, Brendan’s darkness, and Julia’s roast sessions with Andre. I will never forget watching the horrible scary movies on Netflix in John and Andre’s room, tucking Russell and Zachary into bed at night, and waking Nick up from his daily naps before we got lunch together. I will never forget the long, cold, treacherous walks to Sykes, just to find that all of the food stations decided to close two hours early. I will never forget the new language you have taught me. I now use “oh nah, dark, extra, drawlin” and so on, in my everyday vocabulary.

As the semester comes to a close we have lost some of our original family members. And as the end of the 2016-17 school year is slowly approaching we are going to lose a few more. Myself included. I just want to reassure you all of a few things. You will all find a new family at the new school you attend, and you will make new memories with a new group of friends. You will laugh at new jokes, and enjoy new adventures with a whole new family. And that’s okay. It is okay to move on. It is okay to say goodbye to certain parts of our lives. Just remember that we were all a part of something special together. We were present for many of each others’ ‘first times’ for a lot of things. Our first college semester, our first college dorm room, our first college class, our first college grades, our first college friends and our first college roommates. We have made memories that will last us a lifetime, and have impacted each other’s lives so greatly that we are all unforgettable. Our lives will continue, and we will move past these years but we will always be a family, no matter what. So, thanks for the memories, thanks for the laughs, the tears, and the many meals. You made my freshman year as memorable as possible. You’re an extraordinary group of people.