Maybe I'm having the senior year blues, or maybe I'm just getting nervous, but I can't help but feel a little down that my experience here at BC is already reaching its final stages. But I don't think I'm the only one who feels this way. Some like to deal with this anxiety by partying like there's no tomorrow, maybe because they can't fathom what post-college life might be like without 30s of Natty Light or handles of cheap, nameless vodka. I personally like to mope and have depressing conversations with friends (or alone … wait, did I just say that?)
It was during one of these conversations that I came up with an analogy for our collective college experience. I present to you the candy wrapper model.
Our college experience began with us coming together, from all corners of the earth - some from down the street, some from another continent completely - here at BC. It was during this time that everyone was eager to meet everyone else - open door policies in full swing. In a way, we were all very, very close, though we wouldn't even remember the name of that random girl we met last night.
All of us came into freshman year unsure of what to expect. We had all heard stories of college, either from parents or from watching re-runs of American Pie (for me, it was Van Wilder), but now that we were here, we were about to find out just what it means to be a college student for ourselves. Kind of like unwrapping a candy wrapper for some new candy that you saw commercials for on TV and on billboards throughout the city, and, after great anticipation, popping it in your mouth.
By sophomore year, we had gotten used to the taste of that candy. No more goggling at the spectacle that is one of our football games, no more asking "where is Higgins?," and no more wandering absentmindedly into the Mods looking to take random seniors' beer. We had also found our clique in school at this point, a crew we could hang out with. But that dude we used to hang with down the hall in Keyes North? Yeah, him. You don't really see or talk to him anymore. This is the part where the contour of the candy wrapper begins to split - having established our own friendship circles, we drifted further away from a lot of our freshman-year friends.
This was even more so during junior year, especially when friends of ours study abroad - for a semester, for two, maybe even the summer. Our friendship circles continually evolved, as we had to adapt to having many of our friends abroad, who, too, were meeting new friends, and having new experiences over sangria in Spain or something equally amazing in Ecuador.
By senior year, we have come full circle. Having realized the candy is almost done, we now reach out to people who we probably would not have hung out with otherwise - people who we knew but decided to ignore and stare at non-existent text messages on our phones when we passed them in the Quad, guys from down the hall during freshman year who had disappeared since but then magically show up at your Mod during a tailgate, or even the random girl you've always seen at parties but never bothered saying hi to. In short, senior year is almost a mirror image of freshman year; just that you're re-meeting people that you've already met.
From what I gather, senior year is going to be over before I know it. In a way, it is sort of bittersweet, knowing that while it's been an amazing four years, nothing will ever compare to the sweetness we've been accustomed to. Work will be bland in contrast to the syrupy flavor of an ice cold Bud Light on the lawn of my Mod.
In a matter of months, the class of '09 will be taking off from Chestnut Hill, again, to different corners of the globe. I have no idea where I will be this time next year, and I can't even begin to guess which ones of my friends here I will keep in contact with. The one thing I am sure of is that, no matter which continent or hemisphere I'm in, I will still have the candy wrapper in my back pocket.
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