I think I'm getting too old for college. This phenonomia seemed impossible just three years ago, when I skipped bright-eyed and bushy-tailed onto campus, in constant awe, just pleased to be allowed to grace the hallowed bricks. Now, I only curse when I trip on them.
The first sign was when my new suitemates moved in. My former suitemates--who'd I lived with for the last three years--all decided to abandon me for the greener pastures of illegally living in the basement of a ramshackle duplex and paying for their own toilet paper. So my roommate and I were forced to co-habitat with a cohort of plucky sophomores.
One by one, they moved in. Each carried more suitcases than I'd owned in my life, all matching and monogrammed. The bathroom filled with the stock of a Bath and Body Works, and the hallway seems permanently scented by a mixture of "sexy seafoam" and "seductive orchid" body sprays. The rooms filled with such glittered radiance I wear sunglasses to go the bathroom. Every surface shines, or else it's adorned with huge scripted initials, in case somebody tries to steal all the linens, I suppose. The hot pink of the room reminds of the Claire's I worshipped in late elementary school, including the One Direction poster with its place on honor in the center of the back wall. I feel sixty-five every time I sneak a peak inside.
In just three years, my decor has lost whatever matchy matching charm it may have once possessed and has wheedled down to pure functionality. My bedspread is not cute, but it provides the optimal temperature in conjunction with the ancient window air conditioning unit. My dishes do not match like my grandmother's fine china, but they are microwave safe. My purses are not hung in adorable formations on the wall with $10 command hooks, but I know where they are all located. With such old age, interior design seems hardly worth it.
The schoolgirl shrieks and giggles that are now the soundtrack to my evenings are not the only reason I feel too old for college. Various collegiate spectacles, that used to make me feel happy to be alive, now just make me want to go back to bed. While people run over each other for a Dixie Cup of free ice cream, I walk to Walgreens and buy a whole pint to myself. Free doesn't really taste better anymore. Even Senior Bar night could not unglue me from binge-watching the Sopranos. Too many crowds. Too much sweat. Too many drunk people; their behavior is no longer cute.
I circumvent the crowds advertising their various passionate causes. I used to admire these people, appreciate their dedication. I imagined them as experts in their fields, working hard to work their way up to gain the respect of their peers. Recruiting passionately. Being that all-important world all the brochures tell you makes college worth doing: involved. Hell, I even became one of these people, though temporarily. Now I see them all as annoying resume-padders who stand between me and dinner.
My friends call me crotchety. Maybe I am. I'd like to think this is just nature's way of preparing from the propulsion of the insular life of college into the real world. And I think maybe, just maybe, as I stand up in my cap and gown at the end of this year, I'll feel a little flutter of the awestruck youth I once was. Until then, I'm going to bed at nine.
No comments:
Post a Comment