After being officially one month into the first semester of sophomore year, I’ve begun to do a lot of thinking, and I’ve queued up a lot of questions for myself and the school year ahead of me to uncover and try to make sense of.
The girl I was when I was a sophomore in high school is an entirely different beast from the girl starting her sophomore year in college. Little me was unsure of a lot, boisterous about her emotions, focused on friends, and tired of her small town.
Four years later, I do not live in my small town anymore; I live alone, and my neighbors are my best friends who are entirely different from the ones I had. I keep my circle small and my cards close to my chest, and though these past couple of years have taught me a lot, one thing little Iz and I have in common is I’m still unsure about quite a bit.
Starting off this school year comes with a tremendous amount of pressure for me. The four years filling the gap between sophomore year of high school and college have been filled with many milestones, and all the highs and lows that followed them.
Life has been so jam-packed up until this moment that it passed in the blink of an eye, and I let my first year at this school get away from me. I’m now in the year I will celebrate my halfway mark, and I have grown so much since I stepped onto this campus for the first time.
I am established, I have my own place with my own people, a sense of contentment I’ve yearned for. I feel like I am finally beginning to breathe in my own skin again and feel good about who I am. But with that, I can’t help but worry about where to go from there. I wonder sometimes if a butterfly spends all that time in their cocoon during metamorphosis just to come out and ask, “What now?”
I know that four years ago, I wanted everything I have now. Now that I have it, I’m so scared of losing it that I’m almost missing out on my own life, much like I’ve done in the past. I spent all of last year building what I have now, and up until this point, I couldn’t embrace that or let myself deserve it.
With only ten days until my 19th birthday, I am starting to ask how I could let myself live that way. I don’t let my favorite fruit sit on the counter and spoil, so how could I let my youth and all that I love do so?
With new seasons and new beginnings, I can sit in this room that only knows the me I am today and finally live my life to the fullest. I can appreciate everything while letting go of the past and the angsty girl I used to be, even learning to love the small town I was so tired of not so long ago.
I know now how important it is to appreciate everything, even when things don’t seem so great, because things can change so fast. This year, I want to honor the girl who was so unsure of everything by just living my life and appreciating every moment in whatever way I can.