I want to bookend this article with its main takeaway, because I think it’s an invaluable lesson: the conditions of college are, simply put, so bizarre that the concept of normal is objectively useless and should be discarded from your brain upon arriving to campus for your own survival. If you are attending a liberal arts college, bold the aforementioned. You are quite possibly several states away from the only life you’ve ever known, occupying roughly two hundred square feet of space with a perfect stranger, and on any given day, most of the people you are interacting with will be severely sleep-deprived and/or nursing some variety of a hangover (emotional hangovers definitely included).There is no real or prescribed method for navigating the newfound freedom and unfamiliar abyss that is the college experience. Embracing that has been pivotal for me, because college is weird and so are human beings—especially those of us in the eighteen to twenty-two range.
This week I realized that instead of judging myself for making some questionable, embarrassing, and bewildering decisions (and isolating myself through that judgment), my valuable, college student time is much better spent collecting stories from my fellow classmates about their questionable, embarrassing, and bewildering decisions and compiling them with my own (some more specific than others); for reference, for support, but mostly, for laughs. If I were queen of the universe, every student handbook would include the following:
1. Developing the (immensely practical) habit of carrying tupperware around with you wherever you go.
Capitalize on your meal plan!!
2. Making literally any food portable, tupperware or no tupperware.
Where there is a will, there is a way. From carrying bread pudding around in a napkin, to putting a naked grilled cheese into your coat pocket for later (having a real winter coat means pocket depths I never dreamed were possible), to spooning yogurt with a pencil, you are not alone.
3. Forgetting a piece of fruit in said coat pocket for over a week before noticing.
4. Accidentally setting things on fire. Namely (but not limited to), your microwave.
5. Marching into the woods in pajamas and teddy bear slippers in search of privacy for a phone call.
6. Putting a freshly delivered pizza (still in its box) directly into your bed for warmth.
If winter is new to you, I highly recommend this method! It’s the next best alternative to the warm bath you just can’t take at college for fear of diseases.
7. Sleeping in absolutely any public space.
8. Stumbling across people in compromising positions.
Maybe they’re shirtless, having a moment with the sunset, or maybe they’re in bed with your roommate (still shirtless).
9. Eating shit on your bike/skateboard/scooter.
I’ve seen more razor scooters in my one semester of college than all my years in combined (including the early 2000s).
10. Eating shit while just walking.
11. Pretending to be talking on the phone.
12. Being hyper aware of observing the odd traditions at your particular institution.
13. Risking the walk to the communal bathroom in just a thong and a t-shirt at exactly the wrong time.
14. Accidentally uber-ing home from a party that you didn’t realize was one block away from where you live.
Not super applicable at my small, walkable campus, but this is a personal favorite.
15. Taking online quizzes like, “What Kind of Bitch Are You?” in the front row of your lecture.
16. Accidentally calling your professors by their first names when bumping into them on campus.
17. Throwing up in your desk drawer.
18. Composing and sending emails to professors while under the influence.
19. Dropping your phone while running on the treadmill and watching it catch air.
20. Accidentally carrying a bottle of wine around in your backpack, instead of your books.
Part of me really wishes I had the backstory to this, but I also want to preserve the mystery.
Ultimately, you’ll acclimate, and some of these horror stories will become treasured memories. And those are made for sharing. Whatever strange or embarrassing things you’ve done in college, 1) I would love to hear about them, and 2) You’re definitely not alone. Do the weird stuff and don’t sweat it. Ride the wave, find yourself (with some extra help from Buzzfeed quizzes).