I have watched the sunset almost everyday as a college student, I always take a moment as the sun dips below the mountains as I look out the library window. I just didn’t realize how soon the last sunset of my sophomore year would come, the sunset that marks that I am halfway through college.
As a college student, I have grown in ways I never thought of as possible. My understanding of the world and my passions have completely changed. I am at that strange part of college, the one where I reminisce about my life before college, but also look forward to my life after graduation. I am the person in between, but everyday I am getting closer to the person I will be after college, and become less and less like the 17year old who had no idea what her path would be.
Throughout my first two years, I have switched majors, presented research, and discovered my passion for women’s health. I have become a lover of Noah Kahn music, who encompasses St. Bonaventure in a way my words never could, and discover my favorite romcom, How to lose a guy in 10 days. Now, it’s time to see what I do in the next two years.
This past week, I have spent time thinking about what 17 year old Julia would think about me now. Here is what I came up with: Julia would be shocked I switched my major, she really thought she was getting that physics degree. Julia would be really proud of me for really being a math major. She wanted that so badly in high school, and the fact that I am taking complex math classes, she would be so happy for me. Julia would be sad that I don’t get to talk to my sister every day, but would be very happy that my sister facetimes me sometimes instead of calling on the phone.
I think that overall, Julia would be so happy for me. She would honestly think the math classes I am taking are so cool. She would be over the moon that I am the calc 1 SI, and that I get to work with calculus almost every day.
In the next two years, I predict that I will graduate with my double major and be attending medical school, but the journey I take to get there is yet to be unveiled. I just hope that Julia looks back on this Julia with the same joy that I look at 17 year old Julia, and I hope that I become the person that this Julia would be proud of.
Every year of my life I grow just a little bit, each sunset may seem like just one day that passes, but they add up, and sooner than you know two years have passed. If this is how quickly I made it halfway, I hope time slows down. As much as I am excited for my life after graduation, I want the opportunity to live and to experience life in my last two years of college.
At 21 I will be a different person than I am at 19, and at 19 I am a different person than I was at 17. In the future I may not remember everything about 19 year old Julia, I may skip from pre to post college, but I, 19 year old Julia, and doing everything I can to make 21 year old Julia really cool, and I am looking back at 17 year old Julia, letting her know that you’re gonna go far.