In grade school and high school, summer meant the beach and fun with friends day in and day out. Either you were partying on a Monday just because you can, or you were laying around all day. Laying around, that is until your parents came home and you began scrambling to finish the list of chores they left you with hours before that they “wanted done by the time they got home.” Now that you’re in college, though, summer just doesn’t have that same appeal.
College is expensive, and that’s not even taking tuition, room and board into consideration. Going out to eat at the local Wawa, Chipotle and/or Applebees whenever you’re sick of the dining hall has begun to put a major dent into your funds. On top of that, you need to consider expenses that weekend fun has thrown on you because the ability to say “no” to going out has started to ware off. What does all this mean? Summer is the time to regain those lost funds, and you'd better regain them fast. The only way to make up for lost cash is to work all the time and as much as possible, which leaves minimal time for laziness and/or fun. That is what makes school more appealing than summer; between school work, naps and the weekend eventually stretching into the week, it only seems logical that summer will be more boring than school.
The word that strikes me as the scariest to give up has to be freedom. Now we are adults and many parents understand and respect that, but still, when you are “under their roof you are under their rules”. No coming and going as you please, no saying whatever comes to mind without even thinking twice and no publicly shaming everyone you are with when you are out, because the chance that you will run into a family member or family friend is high. This means that during summer, us college kids need to somehow reteach ourselves how to act like a civilized, polite and functioning humans, which is much easier said than done.
Now comes the worst part; your college friends may not live nearly as close as they do while you are at college. The three second walk from one friend’s room to another means never being lonely and unentertained, but at home, the minimal 40 minute drive from one friends house to another is unsettling. This means when it is 2 a.m. and you want someone to just be bored and lay around with, it is just simply not achievable. The thought of being separated from my best friends for longer than five minutes for four months makes me sick to my stomach.
Don't get me wrong, summer will still be nice. Random trips down the shore, vacations with family, sudden days where you find yourself not scheduled to work so you get to lay by the pool without feeling like you are going to fall behind in every class you're taking will absolutely be nice. I look forward to summer, but I am anticipating what the fun future college years will bring that summer simply does not supply.
