The chill air has begun to whistle through North Carolina’s trees and a season filled of stuffy noses and never ending coughing has begun. There seems to be a plague that overcomes almost every stereotypical Wake Forest student. No one is safe; not the student who innocently swipes his card at the Pit or the more adventurous deacon, who attend that late-night DKEs party. However, being a somewhat innocent freshman, I often find myself under the belief that I am invincible to almost every single sickness. I keep pushing forward, trying not to miss any social event – I mean, hey, I need to make friends, right?
*Image from transgriot.blogspot.com
As I stared at my desk filled with prescription bottles and an asthmatic inhaler last week, I realized that my whole body ached for a home-cooked meal and my own warm bed. I had dragged myself out of bed and straggled into every class (not to mention, I almost choked on about five cough drops in the library all in the past week). It was so strange feeling deathly ill with my only source of comfort coming from my mom through the phone. She insisted that she could fly all the way down to Winston-Salem, but in this moment of sickness, I took pride in the fact that I was all alone, enduring the sneezes and sore throat, and persevering.
It was at this moment where I felt, for the first time, I was making my own decisions. I asked myself the large question, “Am I supposed to rest up and feel better or rally onward through the weekend?” I was so indecisive and was not sure what I should do, but I realized this is what being on your own is actually all about: making decisions. I chose to rally onward and, by some miracle, I swear I actually feel so much better than I did earlier in the week. I have no doubt my mother would not have approved of my decision to rally, but I took the initiative and understood what my body could handle and was able to survive. (With an inhaler in the bottom of my shoe, of course!)
*Image from wakeforest.tumblr.com
Never-failing to be the clumsy freshman that I am, I am truly enjoying this liberating independence. Class of 2017, we have made it through the first three months of our first year and we are continuing to move forward. We made the decision to attend Wake Forest University and we are now fully on our own making even more decisions. Decisions like: staying out an extra hour later (because we can), what time we put ourselves to bed on school nights, and when we want to change our sheets. All of these decisions encompass the larger theme at hand: as freshmen in college, we now have the power to choose what we do with our time.
As these three months have quickly gone by, almost all of us (or, at least me for sure) have “coughed up a storm” in our dorms, stayed out a little too late, slept through a class, or have simply made a poor decision. But, I have realized that although I may rant about wanting to go home, constant late-night studying, or the struggle to rally for a tailgate, Wake Forest has become a part of who I am now and is another place that I can call home. I have learned that I may not always make the best decisions here, but choosing to attend Wake Forest was my greatest decision thus far. And if I can succeed in the monumental choice of finding what the best college is for me, a little cold has no chance of keeping me down. I am so happy with what has come about in the last three months and I am proud to call myself a Demon Deacon.
Xoxo,
Brooklyn