VALLEY can’t speak for everyone, but for most people making our parents proud is what informs a lot of what we do, the things we create and the decisions we make. The first thing most children do when they successfully build a sandcastle on the beach is plead for their parents to applaud it.
A New Era
Moving out and going to college is the first time in most of our lives that we taste real independence. When our parents drop us off in a somewhat foreign town, where you may know a handful of people and we’re left to build a brand-new reality all on our own from the ground up. It’s the first time in our lives that we come home to no one but an unfamiliar roommate and ourselves.
Freshman year is about building that foundation and familiarity; sifting through friends, adjusting to college level courses and overall becoming comfortable outside of your comfort zone. Sophomore and junior year are when we expand upon that foundation; we work to discover what our small part is in a large community. Through experiences, we’re able to begin understanding adulthood and are exposed to the number of realities childhood hid us from. As our brains develop and our perspectives widen, our innocence gradually sheds and forces us to prepare for the rest of our lives.
Change Is Good
So, we strengthen our friendships, search for love and incorporate activities in our schedule that align with our long-term career goals. Some of us travel and see new parts of the world for the first time, without supervision. We experiment with substances, encounter all the best and worst parts of their effects and hopefully learn from every mistake. We even start to take our role in society more seriously. Uphold our right to vote and look at government with mature eyes and an increasingly informed brain.
The Hardest Goodbyes
By senior year we’ve grown up and out of our innocence in significant ways. We’re able to look around from the top of the college level staircase we’ve climbed and recognize all that we’ve done since that first night in a dormitory; where we were left on the ground, with so much to learn and no idea where the journey we were about to embark on would lead us. But from a senior perspective, the college town that was once so overwhelming now feels small. Not only have we uncovered the lay of the land, but we’ve composed a metaphorical map of how to navigate it.
Senior year parents’ weekends feel like showing your family a sandcastle you spent four whole years building. You may have shown them around your freshman year foundation or teased the renovations and innovations you invited into your life by junior year, but by senior year you have a solid castle and kingdom to introduce them to.
*VALLEY does not support underage drinking. Please remember to always drink responsibly.
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