Day 48 Question 48:

What was your college Experience? What stands out the most? Did you find it difficult? Did you get good Grades?

There is absolutely no way I would be able to summarize my college experience in just a few pages.  I would need to publish a book or two to get all of the details I remember out of my system.  College was one of the best experiences of my entire life.  I now meander through Facebook and I see all of the friends I made back in the college days and memories immediately start rushing through my head.

I started college in the fall of 1996….I cannot believe it has been 16 years…where the time goes I do not know.  I came from a really small town (and I went to college in another small town about 40 miles away) and it was a completely different world.  I stepped on the campus feeling overly nervous and absolutely intimidated.  It didn’t take long for those feelings to cease.  I started my freshman year living in a dorm with all freshman…it was nice because we were all in the same boat.  I made friends with the people on my floor almost immediately.  I don’t want to give you a play by play of my entire college experience, I figure it would be much better and probably far more amusing to share the memories that flood through my head almost instantaneously.

Let me answer one question though, did I get good grades?  I ended up on academic probation after my first year at school (as did a majority of people in the freshman hall did).  It took me a little time to get out of party mode and realize that college was actually there for me to learn.  After freshman year I got my s**t together and my a** was found in the library quite often.  I  was never a 4.0 student (I still like to have my fun) but I balanced my time and priorities better.

I must admit that the memories that stick with me the  most are the one’s of wild parties and surroundings of new people almost always.  The amount of people I met and befriended in college was absolutely crazy.  I met people that came from all over the state and even some that came from out of state.  It was obvious that some kids were going to stick to their inner nerd and maintain that 4.0 no matter what (I should have followed their lead a little bit more) while others introduced me to all of the social aspects that college had to offer…they were the free spirits…the lovers of life (they seemed to figure it out way before I did).

I will go in no particular order here, because let’s face it I am lucky to piece anything together when it comes to college…chronological order is just not on the agenda.  As stated, I came from a small town and I admit to living a pretty sheltered life.  My parents were protective and I never was the kid to push the limits…until college that was.  I didn’t drink many times before going to school and I surely didn’t do anything else (i.e. smoke pot, do any hard drugs).  I never got into hard drugs during my college years but I will admit (yes pause for gasp) I smoked a good bit of weed back in my day.  I can still recall the first time I ever got high.  I had smoked a couple of times after parties my roommate and I would go to but I didn’t feel anything.  One day a ton of people (I cannot even recall who in all was there) all piled into our dorm room (yes we were geniuses and smoked pot in our dorm room all of the time—this is where the term paranoia first evolved—haha).  I was sitting on the end of my bed with 2 other people and other people were spread out throughout the room on chairs and on my roommates bed.  We were smoking a bowl just passing it one by one.  I remember thinking that I wasn’t feeling anything until all of a sudden I leaned back and this goofy ass grin came across my face.  I knew in that moment I was stoned.  My eyelids felt like they weighed 1,000 pounds and everything in the room just struck my interest.  I sat there in silence just watching and listening to everyone in complete awe.  My heart was pounding pretty hard but I was trying to ignore it (luckily I was able to).  The guy sitting next to me cracked some jokes and I laughed so hard I had tears streaming down my face.  Under normal circumstances I would have never found these jokes this funny but everything seemed to be more interesting and way more amusing in this stoned state.

My freshman year I spent a good deal of stoned.  I was by no means a pothead (smoking weed morning and night day in and day out) but I definitely enjoyed smoking a bowl or a joint on occasion…and finding weed in college was not difficult by any means.  After freshman year, failing grades and going on anti-depressants I just had to get rid of it (I would smoke once in a blue moon after that but never to the same extent).  I have no regrets though.  I will even admit to having a blast while smoking weed with good friends.  I experienced something in life and I took chances and tried something new.  I had what I believe is the college experience and luckily I was a smart enough girl to prioritize (unfortunately some people are unable to).  I could go on a rant saying how bad weed is and how it ruined my life but I would be lying.  Smoking weed was part of my college journey that has allowed me to have hilarious stories that I will be able to share with old friends for many years to come.  No, I do not smoke pot now and I have no desire to.  I don’t condemn people if they do….smoking weed is judgment call for everyone individually.  I am too nervous of a person with too much at stake now to take the risk.  I did it before, I had a lot of fun, I got it out of my system and I moved on.

Boy, this entry so just went in a direction I was not expecting it to go at all.  Not in a million years did I think I would reference pot this much in any of my blog entries.  Ha Ha!  I believe it makes me a little more human.  I tend to go on positivity and inspiration rants and I don’t want people to get the wrong idea about me.  I am not Mother Teresa by any means.  I am this person that has gone through a lot of different experiences and has had this amazing journey to learn from.  I have made A LOT of mistakes and made A LOT of poor choices and those days will never be done because that is what makes us grow and learn.  I guess I chose to share some of my college tales to let everyone see that I am a real person.  I love to have fun (the ways I have fun now are considerable different than they were back in my college days-but fun is still fun).  I absolutely love to laugh until it hurts and I believe in spending as much time smiling as I can.

I love thinking about college.  I love thinking about the people I met and those that I still keep in contact with.  My junior year of college I became friends with a bunch of rugby players from the other college that was in the same town.  Two of the guys were from my hometown so it was easy to meet a lot of people through them.  Rugby guys are a whole different breed of guys.  All I can say is there are absolutely no limits and no boundaries.  5 of these guys lived in a house that was an old church that they converted into a house—yes it was creepy and to top it off there was an old gynecologist table in the front hallway—I never asked questions.  These guys had parties all of the time and it was never unusual for holes to be made in the walls and people to be squashed in a room like sardines drinking beer.  It was the beginning of finals week and I was in the computer lab in my dorm.  During this week the dorms had what they called “silent hours”.  During majority of the days, there was to be no excessive loud noise.  I was working on one of my final papers when 3 of these rugby players come trotting into the computer lab (how they knew where I was I have no clue).  I was chillin in my pajamas just working on my paper when these three guys surround me, pick me up out of my chair and carry me outside throwing me in their car.  I am screaming and yelling telling them that I have a final to work on and everyone in the computer lab is just staring but no one decided to get up.  After being thrown in the car we headed in the direction of their house (no I was no scared or anything-I knew they were up to something-they were good friends).  We were driving downtown and got to a stop light.  I thought I would be brave at that moment and get out of the car and just start running back to campus.  My plan was botched pretty quickly.  I got out of the car and started running….seriously, I was trying to outrun rugby players (GENIUS) and my friend tackled me to the ground and threw me back in the car.  We finally arrived at the house and I was escorted in to find about 10 other girls hanging out there in lounge clothes looking all disheveled.  I laughed my ass off.  These guys went from dorm to dorm kidnapping all of their female friends in order to have a party.  I ended up saying screw my paper (so did all of the other girls because how could they pass up this story-telling opportunity) and played many rounds of beer pongs with new and old friends alike.  While everything was happening I was confused and all I could think about was my paper and all of my stuff that was sitting in the computer lab (I called a friend in the same dorm and asked her to get my stuff and keep it in her room).  Once I arrived and everything became clear I could not help but think what a genius plan this really was.  This was one of the most fun days I had in my entire college experience and it is a story that will stay with me forever.

I could go on and on and it is so fun to revisit my college years in my head right now.  College was a rollercoaster ride with many downs but the majority of my time was amazing.  I learned so much about who I am as a person, I learned about independence, I learned a lot about boys, I learned that this experience was going to leave me with stories that will always make me smile.  I made some great friends during these years and I realize that college is not for everyone and it is important that if you do decide to go to remember why you are there.  I would recommend college to ANYONE simply for the experience.  If any of my college friends are reading this now I would love for you to share a story or two (I know you have them—wink wink).  It would share with my readers what our college experiences were like as well as allow us (us as friends) revisit a time in our lives that now seems so far away.  And to my readers, what was your college experience like???

The video below was not my personal college experience but if you experienced college and you watch this I bet you could find a lot of the clips relatable.  I got a big kick out of it so I thought I would share.  :0)