Next to dates like your wedding, your senior prom, and your twenty first birthday there aren’t many moments that can be claimed as the absolute best times of your life. Freshman year of college easily tops the charts as one of the best years of your life. This year will go down as one of the most carefree, exciting, and sometimes insanely wild times of your life so if you’re a future wildcat or if you’re a graduating one, take a moment to look forward to or to look back at these historic moments.
Your freshman year roommate.
That creepy stalker-status moment when you scrolled through the future class page looking for a normal enough girl who you could color coordinate your dorm room with. You could relate to her “I like to go out but sometimes I just want to stay in and watch movies” post.
Or if you were feeling risky you took the route that I did and just prayed for the best when you filled out your random roommate questionnaire as vaguely as possible. Stalking their Facebooks (yes plural because almost everyone was placed in a forced triple in X-Sen or Willy if they chose this course) after you were emailed their names was an absolute necessity to ensure that you wouldn’t need to transfer to your bestfriend’s school.
No matter the route you chose, this girl became your bestfriend, boyfriend, and most importantly sister. Even if the two of you aren’t close anymore she will always hold a special place in your heart as your very first roommate.
Living in Christensen or Williamson with all of your best friends.
Living in Christensen or Williamson had plenty of downfalls as we all know, but there were also so many hidden benefits that we just didn’t appreciate as freshmen. Philly being literally twenty steps away, for example, was a major perk. It also doubled as the hotspot for every single Freshman on campus. Entering with the plan to grab a quick breakfast sandwich and leave proved to be unsuccessful every single time. You were bound to run into at least seven of your friends and stay to chat for a bit. Eventually you ended up leaving two hours later smelling vaguely like a dining hall.
And living in the same building as every single friend you have on campus? When in your lifetime will you ever be able to do that again? Running down the hall or even down a few stairs to watch a show or borrow a shirt is just so convenient. It was a real buzz kill when you were actually forced to plan out times to hang out because everyone began to separate and spread out after freshman year.
Attending your first frat party (and enjoying it).
This was nothing like the chaperoned high school dances you attended or like the basement “ragers” that one kid in your town always threw. This was a party with grimy walls to match the grimy boys. Yes, the walls were literally sweating and so were the hundreds of people jam-packed into the impossibly tiny room.
You had to bring five of your girlfriends for every one of your guy friends to even be able to enter the party and occasionally you all had to rush into a frat brother’s room to hide out for a while until the fire marshals cleared out. But there’s no denying that it was always a blast and the pit stop for DHOP on the way home made it even more worth the trek.
Your first Homecoming & Cinco.
If Umass Amherst is famous for Blarney then UNH is famous for Cinco De Mayo. These days were the craziest most unreal days of the entire year. You woke up at the crack of dawn like all the upperclassmen encouraged you to and somehow managed to stay awake until 3 am the next morning (save for that one 4 o’clock nap).
You eagerly made your way to the tailgate on Homecoming, only planning to stay for an hour so you could watch the game the rest of the time, but ended up losing track of time and stayed for the entire time. The game was over before you knew it and everyone was trekking to Hoco for celebratory snacks.
Cinco was an entirely different celebration in the best way possible. You followed the masses all the way to Young Drive and then back towards campus again as soon as the police showed up. The trees purposely knocked over by the landlord stopped no one and you all energetically crawled up and over them.
Experiencing the Weekend Connector.
You had all finally decided on an outfit and a hairstyle and were on your way to a Gables party hosted by a boy that your roommate somewhat knew from high school when you encountered the Weekend Connector bus for the first time. No experience in your life could have prepared you for the overly patriotic and passionate chants of the bus.
All of a sudden arms were being thrown around each other and numbers were being exchanged. You had just made six new friends who you were bound to forget about in the morning but at that exact moment in time they were your new best friends and it didn’t matter.
Meeting your future bridesmaids.
“College isn’t about looking for your husband, it’s about finding your bridesmaids.” Freshman year, this was exactly your thought process. You weren’t searching for a boyfriend let alone a husband; you were searching for the ladies who would toast you at your wedding. So when you stumbled into room 315 one night and bonded over how hot Tim Riggins was, you knew you found them. These are the girls you lived with for the rest of college, they will be the girls you will graduate next to, and they are the ones who will proudly hold your bouquet as you enter a new phase of your life.
That feeling of freedom.
This was the first time in your eighteen years that you had tasted freedom and it had never tasted so good. Nor will it ever taste so good again. There’s something about the first time that never really measures up to any other time.
You were in a new place with fresh faces and a clean slate for the first time in your life. No one knew your awkward stage of frizzy hair and braces and no one ever would. But you came to realize that these people would see the best of you and they would see the worst. And they would embrace you despite all of it and that realization was an entirely different and better kind of freedom.