“Final Boarding Call For Flight 946 LeMans Hall…”
At least, that’s what the airport PA sounded like on Monday morning. The last time I will fly from Sanford, Florida’s International Airport to South Bend. Of course, I’m sure I’ll fly back to the Bend from somewhere, someday, but it probably won’t be from lil ol’ Sanford. It may not even be from Florida. Who really knows, but right then, sitting in that airport chair, I knew this was my last flight as a student. And it didn’t hit me until it was time to board. During takeoff, I leaned back into my seat and cried as I watched my hometown disappear beneath the clouds. I always cry when I leave home because #mom, but this time was different. With each turbulence bump, with each weird sound the MD-80 was making, I was one step closer to that thing my friends and I have been successfully ignoring since the semester began. The thing that I’ve personally been avoiding since freshman year. But once I landed, it became time to face the harsh reality of its existence.
Yep. It’s actually happening. The inevitable G-word.
It’s exciting, of course, but when you’re leaving a place as special as Saint Mary’s, it doesn’t exactly make a Belle giddy and smiley. Tuesday morning’s social media feeds were full of photos featuring last drives and last flights to The Bend. Pictures of homes from car rearview windows, pictures of the dome from the sky, pictures of the Notre Dame exit sign. “One last time, South Bend”, the caption. Not just of the Instagrams and Snapchats, but the caption for the time left in this place. Saint Mary’s, Notre Dame, and even South Bend, the town we hate to love.
Coming back to school from Easter weekend means a whole lot of change is about to occur. One minute my friends and I were sitting in Argumentation class (on our yoga mats, just another one of those #SaintMary’s things), repeatedly saying to each other, “Ugh, you guys! One more week until we are laying on the beach in Cancun!” And then it was five more days until the Mexican rays, then two more days, and then, next minute, we were there. Drinking strawberry daiquiris out of coconuts and babbling on about spring break things. And then the next minute, before we knew it, the classic college trip was over. We survived our senior year spring break and we flew back to the Bend slightly tanner and slightly chubbier. And then, it all becomes real. And quickly real at that.
Suddenly, you’re congratulating friends on job offers, successful interviews, and grad school acceptances. You’re sitting in the Overlook café writing essays and drinking coffee as the April snow (yep, April) falls down outside. Looking with your friends at potential apartments online, watching Marine Corps fighter pilot go-pro videos. As if it’s the simplest, most casual thing in the world. We’re all about to be real people, in some way or another, and so, the most important thing in the world seems to be to hold onto these next few weeks as tightly as possible.
Spring break was over in a flash and then it was Easter. Then that was over. Then we’re buying senior week tickets and formal dresses and then there’s this “grad fair” thing. The place where you buy your G-word items and figure out if you’ll fit better into the 5’0-5’2 or 5’3-5’5 gown. Factoring in the wedges you’ll sport, you choose the larger one, and then you’re like, “wow, I just bought my cap and gown.” I watched the bookstore guy cross my name off of a list comprised of my classmates’ names, and almost cried as he handed me my “Bachelor of Arts hood”. K, bye.
One minute, I was being dropped off at McCandless Hall as an intended nursing major. Then I blinked, and I was walking through the halls of LeMans, holding a cute tassle with a French cross emblem, and a Saint Mary’s blue-colored hood and I wasn’t happy about it. I thought about all the things LeMans had been to me, and how college in general, has been a series of ups and downs, most of which were dealt with in LeMans. I thought about the days where I had intense feelings of motivation when I finished assignments ahead of time, had an organized, clean room and all my S together. I thought about other days, where I literally had to be kicked out of bed by my roomies, and then wondered how I’m expected to live in a world without them a mile away, at most.
The stress of being an adult and entering the real world where life isn’t planned out is really scary, but also really exciting. It’s brand new, and out of the routine we’ve been living for the past fifteen plus years. We’ve been in school for basically our entire lives, nineteen to be exact, if you’re counting Pre-K3 and Pre-K4. That’s a heck of a lot of class. And suddenly, unless you’re headed to grad school (which is like, totally different than normal school), it’s coming to a close. That long chapter of our lives is ending, and whether you’re prepared for it or not, it’s just around the corner.
So let’s dance on the Finni’s dancefloor as if no one is watching, let’s embrace class with the professors who care so much about us, let’s gaze at LeMans for as long as we’d like. It’s the final boarding call, so let’s make it count, babes.