Senior year: It always sounds amazing. Since we were little, we’ve always been excited to be older. In middle school, the high school kids were cool, and in high school, the college kids were cool. In college, the 25-year-olds who are working, traveling and living that city life seem cool. We’re always told to enjoy our moments of youth because “we’ll never be this young again” and “we have our who whole lives to get older.” But we can’t help ourselves.
The term “senior” has come to mean the coolest of the cool to us. Senior means do what you want and don’t care about anything else. It means the start of the last chapter before the next book; the ending that makes the whole read worth it. But what does the beginning of this last chapter feel like? It’s easy — this is a time that’s exciting and exhilarating as we are about to embark on the next stage of our life. Just as understandable, it’s terrifying and sad as we say good-bye to our homes and friends of the last four years and depart on our separate ways, unsure of what the path in front of us holds. So, to bring some humor to this mix of feelings, here are the seven stages of your last first day of school.
1. First, there’s the excitement. SENIOR SPRING! Woooo!
2. Then, there’s the anxiety that comes the night before the first day of new classes.
Is this professor going to be good? Who’s in that class with me? You need a what to get an A?!
3. But you remember you don’t care because you’re a senior, and C’s get degrees.
4. As the day goes on, you learn that all of your professors are pretty chill, talk to you like an adult, and understand that you’re ready to graduate (and are excited for you!).
5. When you open your laptop, though, it’s open to that Google Chrome window with the ten tabs open of all the different jobs you found and need to apply for. AGH!
*Stress levels peak.*
6. You talk to your friends who all say that haven’t even started looking at jobs yet, which secretly makes you feel better.
7. As the day comes to a close, you realize this was your last day of waking up at 10 a.m., eating lunch with all your best friends and going out on a Monday night of syllabus week.
And just like that, you blinked when they told you not to, and *boom!* — four years went by. Now, you’re 21 or 22, looking for a job in a field you’re not even sure you love, wondering if you can just get a restart. Enjoy this last semester, senior-year collegiettes, because you’re still here now and still have the next four months to appreciate the last drops of undergraduate life.