Freshman year, where do I start? It's such a wonderful time where you are free to make many good, or even terrible decisions. It's a time to start anew. One second you're a high school graduate who has rules to follow, a job to maintain and your hometown to deal with. There’s so much old that still follows you. When you get to college and you see those blue FDU letters become someone new. No old drama holding you back, no annoying ex-girlfriends no rules to keep you in line about school work. You are free and it's surreal when you spend the first night at school awake to odd ends of the night with people you just met. You are eating in a crowded place with a bunch of people who, just like you, don't want to eat alone. You pretend to like things you don’t really like, you try things you’re not really comfortable with and you go out of your comfort zone to meet new people.
Even as a shy kid from Pennsylvania, I went out of my way to meet so many people and get involved with things I really didn’t have time for once classes started to get hard. It's a weird but enjoyable time of uncertainty, and for once in your life that's okay. You go into school with a major in mind, go your first class realize, “Wow, why did I ever think I’d be good at this?” Honestly, the people that go into school undecided are the most honest people because they go into school thinking, “Hey, I have no clue what I want to do in life and I’m not afraid to let literally everyone who asks me for a major know.” Everyone is on the same boat, but are generally too afraid to admit it.
Then there’s the awkward change of friend groups after a few months when you realize that the people you’re with aren’t the people that you actually want to spend your time with. You go around seeing these people everywhere and awkwardly say “hey,” and make small talk here and there but slowly you stop really talking all together. It happens to everyone freshman year, whether it's with one person or a whole group of people. Its a harsh reality that every freshman has to deal with.
Then once you get used to all the partying and friend drama, you get class. Class starts to get really hard at times and it can catch you off guard and really mess with you. Sometimes you get used to skipping class or not studying for hard exams when you really should be taking an hour out of the day just to hit the books and brush up on some algebra instead of playing video games with your roommate.
Freshman year has a lot of ups and downs, but once you get through it, college only gets better. I’m only a sophomore, but school is already better than living in those crammed halls of Florence. Freshman year is just the beginning of something better. It's the beginning of your life as an individual.
