The Best Times of Your Life

Well, as this lovely day comes to a close, I am just thinking about how everyone has always told me again and again, "College will be the best times of your life!" I wasn't sure if I fully believed that...I mean....there's so much homework, and so much stress, and I have probably shed more tears in college than I have in all of my life combined. Today, however, I think I caught a glimpse of what all these crazies mean by "best times of your life".

I started the day at the strike of midnight, decorating my boyfriend's door for his birthday with my roomie. Lemme just say that blowing up balloons and standing on your tiptoes to tape them to the door-frame (and passersby wondering, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?") seems much louder (and more humorous) in the middle of the night, when you're trying not to wake your boyfriend and his roommate. It was a successful venture, nonetheless.

This afternoon, I spent the day laughing and shopping with my three beautiful, future (next semester) roommates. You know, I would never have thought that the key to happiness might be a $12 tie-dye dress (probably worn by someone else...there's a little hole in it), a flannel shirt (definitely worn by someone else - it has quite the musk to it) for $6.50, a couple $1 scrunchies and hair-bows (....hopefully not worn by someone else), and (loudly) rapping and singing along to twenty-one pilots in the backseat with three of your favorite people....but now I'm a believer!

This evening, my boyfriend and I sat at a tiny, folding TV tray in his dorm, eating a large order of take-out wings and store-bought, frosted sugar cookies while simultaneously listening to Jack Johnson to celebrate his birthday....and it was pure glory.

So it isn't quite what I expected. I don't go to class every day and say, "Man, I'm so glad I know what I'm gonna do with the rest of my life!" or, "Gee, I sure do love my major!", but I'm beginning to think that that wasn't what all those seasoned, older folks meant when they told me that college would be the best days of my life. I think it's very likely that, when they told me that, they were time-traveling in their minds to a day when they were sitting on the stinky carpet of their cramped, crappy dorm room or apartment floor eating bad, cheap Chinese food with a few of their best friends....not worrying about their grade in calculus or their 250 word essay that was due the next day or the fact that they still hadn't the slightest clue what they wanted to do "when they grew up". They were just living.

Yep....these are the best times of your life.