A year ago as I write, I arrived on campus at Yale after my first ever camping trip. I was grimy, bruised, tired — and nervous. I had met eight other Yalies on the trip and heard their life stories and told my own, but I had no idea how I was going to present myself to my roommate, my suitemates, or whoever else I was going to meet. We dumped our stuff in the middle of Old Campus and began to scatter, and our goodbyes had a feeling of finality uncharacteristic of a new beginning. Everyone found their parents and started off, but mine were yet to arrive. Finally when they did, my mother saw at once the exhaustion on my face.

Now I see only snippets. I had a lot of boxes in the car, then on the sidewalk, then being lifted by some red-shirted sophomores up the stairwell of my new entryway. One guy was nice and asked if I were interested in intramurals, but for some reason I don't remember us walking up, only down. We left all the boxes outside my door on the fourth floor. I walked into the room eventually, and it was bare except for a pile of cardboard boxes. I'm not even sure who I saw first but I think it was my roommate. I introduced myself and remember getting really frustrated when I promptly locked myself out of the room after going to the bathroom. I wasn't used to automatically locking doors.

Then there was the cripplingly awkward conversation between me and my roommate in the bathroom when she was taking a shower after her run. I had taken my own shower sometime before. When I tried to speak to her, I was too tired, and the words came out jumbled in incomprehensible fragments. Not exactly the impression I'd wanted to make. I don't remember my first impression of her anymore, but I can hear her voice in my head now clearly saying, "Hi!”

My parents drove to Ikea later for me to buy a bookshelf and because I wanted to take a breath. I remember being barely able to stand up straight in the fake bedrooms.

Then the afternoon was gone pretty quickly at least from my memory, and we met our freshman counselor groups in the evening and crossed the street to Berkeley. My first impression of the dining hall was that it wasn't as pretty as the best college dining hall should have been. We sat in one of the furthest tables from the food area even though I didn't know so at the time and listened to our dean talk to about generic things and art history, which she teaches. I tried to talk to my two other suitemates and felt intimidated.

Our group went to a special wooden Swiss Room after the large meeting for a smaller one. We introduced ourselves (again?) and maybe said what our spirit animals were, as well as two truths and a lie. I don't remember the main topic of the meeting, or walking back, or the rest of the evening.

So that was my first day of college. I don't remember much of it. The things I do remember are from later, and they are beautiful: the time my roommate and I climbed up to the highest floor of the biology building, the time my friends and I played catch all the way home, the nights during finals week second semester when we clung onto the last hours of our freshman year friendship.

I can't believe it's been a year. I can't believe it's only been a year, and I'm ready for another.