Friends, the family you choose

Friends, the family you choose. At least, according to Ikea’s Thanksgiving Day commercial.

This couldn’t be more true, especially when you are away at college. I have met so many amazing people during my time at Stevens, each of them having their own importance to me. I remember my first Friendsgiving, held in the large Jacobus Lounge. It was a fun time filled with laughter and lots of food. We took a video of what everyone was thankful for.

Even though the friends at my Friendsgiving table have changed over the years, I am still so thankful for each and every single one of them. The experiences we shared together not only shaped my college experience, but also me as a person.

I am so thankful for my freshman year friends, for us trying to navigate college together, whether it was the classes, the social life, or dating in college.

Now, to the current freshmen, I’m not going to lie — I am not close to everyone I met freshman year and you probably won’t be either. People and situations change. Just enjoy the time you are spending together; you will get closer with some older friends and make some great new friends.

Actually, I have gotten closer with some friends in their senior year. Having a lot of friends who are graduating this spring and starting their lives outside of Stevens has made me very nostalgic. It has made me want to be better with keeping in touch with people.

I have made some really strong connections, even in just the last year, with new friends and gotten closer with older ones.  The realization that I won’t be seeing these people, who have become so important to me, as much has made me determined to spend more time with them.

I had a friend say to me, “I’m so glad we met. I just hate that we didn’t meet earlier.” I have come to spend so much time with this friend in the past year, learning more and more about him every day and there is still so much we have yet to learn about each other. It’s friendships like these that I am going to try to fight to maintain and continue to grow (even if him being emotional makes me want to cry like every other week).

I am in this weird limbo of having graduating friends, but not graduating myself yet. I watch them go through the job hunt process, we study together, we go out to brunch. Yet, all of this is going to change next year.

Maybe we won’t stay in touch or we’ll stay in touch briefly and then just send each other holiday cards. Either way, whether it was class struggling or college firsts, we share something that is unique to us, to our college experiences, and nothing can change that.