When I graduated from high school, I thought I knew the answer to every question in the world. What I wanted to do with my life, where I was going to school, and who I would still be friends with once I went away to college. I began my first year of college at Wright State University, completely lost and realizing I didn’t know the answer to any of life’s questions. Sure, I had a great time, my roommate became my best friend and I was able to maintain friendships with my girlfriends from high school. However, once school began, I felt even more lost and considered whether or not I really wanted to be a nurse. So, I changed my major and decided I was going to do Rehabilitation Services. My first year of school came to a close, and I was excited for summer to arrive.
I had a summer job as a lifeguard at Cedar Point and I was a new member of the Wright State University Cheerleading Team. While at Cedar Point, I (somehow) caught the eye of the most attractive lifeguard at the water-park. As we fell in love (I know, this sounds cliche), we decided we wanted to continue our relationship through the school year. He went to Miami, I went to Wright State. We talked about it and decided that I was going to transfer to Miami starting in the Spring of 2010. I got so much smack about transferring schools for a boy, but it was something I knew I wanted to do and something I wasn’t going to regret. When I started at Miami, academics were much more difficult than my first year of school. Interestingly enough, I found these challenges to be encouraging and pushing me to do the best I could. I began trying harder in all my classes and received a pretty hefty scholarship for my academic success.
Not only did I find success in my academics, I was finding out who I was as a person. I went from wanting to be a nurse to being an English Literature major and Women’s Studies minor, which was something that I would have never seen myself enjoying or wanting to do for the rest of my life. From then on, I loved everything about college and Miami: classes, friends, weekends Uptown–all at the most beautiful college campus I’ve ever seen.
Somehow, the fall semester of my senior year is coming to a close and I’m starting to become very nostalgic and wanting nothing more than to be a freshmen all over again. These last three years of college have been such a blur that it seems like there is no way it could be coming to an end. Of course I’m excited to go out into the “real world,” get a job, make money, make new friends, and start the rest of my life, but I’m also extremely sad to leave this bubble that is Oxford, Ohio. Oxford has become my home and I have absolutely looked forward to coming back each and every fall. We have, in my opinion, the best professors in the country who want nothing more from you than to perform your best academically.
I’ve become a role model for everyone in my family. I’ve done things no one in my family has done and have shown them that getting out of the socioeconomic background that my family comes from is possible. As my last fall semester comes to a close and my last spring semester begins, I will be sure to cherish every moment of Miami University and Oxford, Ohio. I’ll go out with my friends, do stupidly obnoxious things, and take every last breath with a sense of gratitude from where I’ve come from and where I’m going, all thanks to Miami. I still haven’t figured out the answers to all of life’s questions, but I’ve become much more capable of being able to answer those questions.
As those of you who are freshman and are just starting to figure out who you are, enjoy it all and take it in. If you are also a senior and reality is beginning to set in, enjoy every moment you have left. Not everyone has the privilege to get the education we will be walking away with. As they say, “dance like there’s nobody watching, love like you’ll never be hurt, sing like no one’s listening, and live like it’s heaven on earth.” Miami is an amazing place to be a student and to discover yourself. Love & Honor.