Walking down the halls and you feel as if you own the place, the sense of home and familiarity hits you and that when you realize that these halls these buildings are soon going to be just another memory just like the feeling of leaving your old high school, except this goodbye, leaving this place is a little sadder, a little more bitter than it is sweet.
You see unlike high school, college is the fresh start where you, and you alone get to pick your own identity, it's not just thrown upon you based on who your parents are and where you came from. The person you were in high school means nothing. How you get your reputation is based solely on who you are as a person. In college labels mean nothing. You have the freedom to create the person you have always wanted to be.
Whether you live on campus or you commute, you will be spending a lot of time here whether you like it or not. You're going to get to know every square inch of this place you will someday call your alma mater. You will become immersed in your surroundings, these are truly the years that are going to fly by, you're not going to want to blink, because as soon as you do, next thing you know you are preparing yourself to graduate and to actually push yourself into the world.
You really will miss this place, you have made so many memories here, being invited to your first college party, deciding for the first time in your life to skip a class and go shopping with your best friend, to the class that made you stop and understand just how the world works, to your favorite table in the schools cafe where you and your friends would meet every other day to hang out, talk and basically lets face it, take over the cafe like you guys owned the place.
So the next time you take a stroll down the halls and you are hit with the sense of nostalgia take that second to just think of the memories you have created here, because, in just a few short months, you will no longer be a student here, you will no longer walk these halls every day. Your time has come to stand up as a senior of your college or university and say "I did my time here and I spent it well." In a few more months you will be walking the stage and receiving your degree and saying your goodbyes to your favorite professors, you will be hit with all sorts of emotions; joy, a sense of relief, excited, sad, nervous, scared terrified but you are prepared… these past few years at this place have prepared you for this, for stepping out into the real world. You are now fully considered an adult and it is your time to leave your mark on the world.