As I near the end of another semester, I feel a pit in my stomach, and not just because my grades are borderline. I'm over the college hill. I'm on my way out. I've completed five semesters, and despite trying to prolong my college career by double majoring and minoring, somehow I only have three semesters left.
The friends I've made who have become my family will, in a year and a half, inevitably be spread out all over the world, chasing their dreams, me included. And while of course we all want each other to succeed, I don't want to have to start over again. I don't want to be too busy to see each other, then too busy to call each other, then too busy to message on Facebook once a year for their birthdays. But isn't that the sad joke about adulthood? Losing tough with people and becoming antisocial?
We're going to have significant others and children and our jobs. The reality is, two years from now, my life is going to begin again. I try not to think about it too much now, but it makes me realize that I can never become too dependent on someone. I will always be the only constant in my life. It's both terrifying and empowering, something I would not have been comfortable with when I first started my college career.
This spring, I am going with my best friend to visit a law school in Austin that she really wants to attend. She jokingly says that I'll have to go to business school there too or get a job there so we can share rent. In the back of my mind though, I know that I can't sacrifice my own dream of living on the east coast just to accommodate our friendship. And as a true friend, I'll know she'll understand.
As much as the future is inevitable, I have learned that I cannot live waiting for a friendship to die on the vine. I know hurt and disappointment are a part of any relationship. And I know from experience that I will be ok. I believe that in some way my college friends will never leave me, because in some way they've shaped the person I am now, and forever impacted the person I will be in the future. And that is something that no distance or time can take away from us.
*This post is the first in a series of discussions on the changing role of friends in adulthood.