Almost everyone I knew from my high school days (myself included) thought college would be all about going to parties, making friends with everyone in all of our classes, and having a date with a new boy every week. My senior year of high school was spent daydreaming about all the flirting I would do and wondering if I would be the cool girl that’s able to hold her liquor or not. And then, at orientation, before my first semester had even started, I met the love of my life. By the time I moved out of my parents' house we were dating and by the end of freshman year, we were inseparable and looking for a house of our own.

This life I have now is certainly not what I envisioned for myself in my teens, but it has made me realize that the cookie-cutter experience from the movies isn't the only path, and it isn't even that common.

As a college senior, I've never been to a frat party (or any party with more than 10 people), I'm not the cool girl that can hold her liquor, and yet I feel confident that I've made the most of these years. The media never represents the couples that just want to get a degree so that they can better support one another and grow a family. There's no scene in any college classics where two people sit down to their dining room table and work on a jigsaw puzzle while they talk about what kind of dog they'll get once the yard is fenced, but the reality is that these people are out there and we just want some peace and quiet.

It is never easy to explain to new friends and classmates why I don’t want to cram at the library all night before final exams, “just in case,” and instead opt to get to bed early so I can make breakfast in the morning. The look on their face isn’t dissimilar to the ones I gave my mom as a kid, and with that, I become the boring mom friend. But through all the noise of life, I know that when I go home at night things will be consistent and calm and that’s what makes it worth the looks I get.

Look – in the end, if people don’t like your narrative, that’s their problem and not yours.

If you don’t want to be the life of the party then you don’t have to be! Just keep on watering your plants and buying art for your walls and when your peers catch up they’ll be jealous that you’ve got a leg up on them in starting your adult life. Forget about the boys that are sure your relationship is just a phase, even after living together for years, you've moved beyond them and into a new realm of "young adult" that they won't see for years.

As for me, I'm happy to come home to my two cats and my boyfriend at the end of a long day. Even paying bills feels kind of fun when you know that you're leading a life that others are still waiting to find.