I can't believe I finished my first year of college.
I moved out on May 4th, 2017 and I am now a sophomore!
This year went by so fast and I was so sad to leave. I cried when I said goodbye to my friends, my roommate and even when I checked out of my dorm room.
I fall in love with Wake a little more every day I am on campus.
Saying that, I miss campus and my friends very much.
As happy as I am to be home, I really miss school. It is my home and I love it immensely.
I love the people, the classes, and my independence.
Now that I am home, I can begin to reflect on all the life lessons I have learned from being away from home.
I am technically an adult and I have definitely grown into adulthood over the past year of school.
Here are some of the things I have learned over my freshman year of college:
I have learned to speak up for myself and not to stay silent when in the past I would.
Some girls were nasty and I stood up for myself.
I am also more willing to speak up about silly things. One day in October it was freezing in the library. People around me were sniffling and we all had sweatshirts on. There are signs on all the book shelves saying "text or email us at ZSR if you need help finding a book" so I used that email address instead for my constructive criticism.... I emailed saying we were freezing our butts off up on the 6th floor.... and they got back to me and then the next day the 6th floor wasn't so cold!
Here's another example of where I would normally just ignore the situation and let someone else deal with it.... but not anymore!
So the door to the stairs in my residence hall- Collins, on the 3rd floor was stuck.... so it was a) inconvenient and b) dangerous if there was an emergency..... so I called residence life and housing and filed my complaint and they got back to me and within 20 minutes the maintenance men were there fixing the door.... so many other people on my floor could have called but no one did but me.... so I should pat myself on the back.
Another example- I haven't told this story yet, but when my friends and I were coming home from spring break we got into a little bit of a situation. We flew into CLT and then had to Uber back to campus which is a solid hour and a half. And the problem is Uber drivers don't really like going all the way to Winston-Salem because it's far. But they are also getting paid for the trip.... so I really don't understand why it's such a problem. But anyway, this wasn't the first time we had a problem with an Uber driver.... except this guy didn't really give us a hard time in terms of driving the distance but I guess in a sense he did because while we were driving he kept turning up the music.... so we asked him to lower it and he ignored us. And then while we were on the road, the car kept swerving.... and then I realized he was falling asleep at the wheel!!!! We kept swerving into other lanes and other cars were now beeping at us!!! So he kept waking up and then falling asleep. So now my friends and I were all getting very nervous. So I was thinking about what I could do. So I got the balls to yell at him and ask if he was okay. He just nodded at me and woke up a bit. I yelled at him a couple of more times and then he was seriously asleep so then I yelled at him to pull over into the rest stop and that we would call another Uber. He said no he was fine, but he obviously wasn't. Thankfully we made it back to Wake in one piece and don't worry we got the trip refunded. But that was the scariest hour and a half of my life and I don't know if I didn't say anything to him, that I would be here today to tell this story.
(Maybe this story sounds a little dramatic, but ask Emily, Caroline or Kristin... I'm not being dramatic).
I have also learned to not judge people based on appearances. Sounds silly but it's true. I have so many people that I am friends with that I wouldn't think I would be friends with because of how they dress or where they are from. I know it sounds so obnoxious but it's true. I come from a very affluent town where everyone looks and acts the same. So it's very easy to get into the habit of judging people. But I would like to think I am growing out of that habit from going to Wake. Don't get me wrong Wake is just as much as a bubble as my hometown but a little less so. And slowly Wake is teaching me how to grow out of that "bubble" mentality.
I am also not as shy as I once was. I know you may be surprised to hear that. But when I don't know people or if I am not comfortable in a situation I get very shy. This includes first semester when I went to office hours. I would go see my professors but it used to be a struggle for me to go. I would get very shy around my professors. I think it was honestly because my one politics professor was kind of nasty and even told me she was shocked I could get into a school like Wake. When she said that to me, I defended myself and I was like ummmm I graduated with above a 4.0, I was in 8 honor societies, president of French Honor Society, and captain of the Varsity Badminton team. So I think she was part of the reason why I was afraid to go to seek help or guidance from professors. But second semester I loved going to my English profs office hours and just talking about life away from English class.
I have to say I also learned to go with the flow more. I am a very organized and time table driven person. But I learned that sometimes it's okay to not stick to schedule and have some fun!! For example, I went and sat in the grass for hours before finals just hanging out and it was the nicest escape from reality. I also occasionally had too long dinner dates but again it was really nice just to hang out and enjoy life!
I also learned how to loose weight in college without even trying! I have always cared about working out and feeling good all of high school. But until I got to college, I didn't appreciate how well I was fed back home. I had to finally use all the nutrition lessons I had learned over the years of being at home and put them into action to eat really well especially when mom and dad aren't cooking you breakfast, lunch and dinner. Honestly it's not hard to not gain the freshman 15 or as my brother says freshman 50! I honestly lost weight, like a lot of weight! So much weight that my boobs shrank in size..... a whole cup size!!! Sorry, that's probably TMI but I thought I would share! I wasn't trying to loose weight I just wanted to stay in shape. And I thought I was in shape before college.... lol nope. I have never been in better shape before in my entire life. I did a Pilates class 2 times a week and did cardio 2 times a week. And besides that, that was it! I had sweets here and there and honestly I lost weight and became sooooo toned from just walking!!!!
So lesson learned- WALK!
I learned about politics, history of Latin America, French, Calculus and other subjects but most importantly I learned about myself and how to be an adult. I would have never grown so much without going away to North Carolina and living on my own.
I had the best year and I can't wait to have three more years at my favorite school in good old Winston-Salem.
xoxox
-e
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