By Jameson Keebler
I can’t imagine a more intense feeling of loneliness than what I felt after I said goodbye to my parents. After we parted on Forbes Avenue, I made my way back up to floor 17 in Tower A, and suddenly that dorm room began to feel more like a prison cell. It was the first time that I had been alone in the dorm. I sat on my lofted bed with the mattress pad already beginning to slip and stared at the door, waiting for someone to come in and tell me that this was all a big joke.
It was the first time I noticed the street noise from below. By the end of the year, I had found comfort in the robotic voice that proclaimed “South Bouquet Street. Walk sign is on to cross South Bouquet Street.”
When you are a freshman, it may seem that your world will collapse if you let your group drop below six friends, but I’m here to tell you that taking a minute to yourself won’t be devastating.
Whether I was in a group of fellow freshmen doing those awful icebreakers, hunting for a seat in Cathy with my group of five friends, or sitting in my towers dorm bed listening to people build friendships right outside my door, I was always wondering if I was doing enough. The fear of loneliness was something that plagued me. College is not only how we determine the success we will reach in our lives professionally, but we are also supposed to be in our social prime.
High school wasn’t for me; I was always aware of it. Especially after the pandemic and going through online school, I struggled to rebuild the social circle I used to have during my previous years in high school. I resigned to just making sure I would find the perfect new friend group as soon as I got to college.
I was already hesitant to believe this because it’s what I have always been told, only with a few words switched out and around.
“Middle school will be great for you! New friends and new teachers!”
“High School is going to be game-changing. There's nothing to worry about; everyone loved high school.”
“Well, you still have college!”
I knew that college would be different from the other times I switched schools because, at least this time, I would be outside of my hometown, where the people were outnumbered by trees.
There is an unknown physiological phenomenon that I like to call freshman blindness. In a rush to understand the new social skills in your new environment, we all experience a sudden lack of common sense built throughout our lives.
After going through an entire week of running around campus in a new city in the summer heat so I could participate in games and kindergarten-level icebreakers with the hopes of receiving a free t-shirt, I was utterly exhausted. It didn’t help that I had to go into classes immediately and then still be expected to wander campus at night, trying to find my future bridesmaids.
The answer to my distress is painfully apparent, but I was wearing my freshman blinders. I want to go back in time, grab my shoulders, and say, “You can’t expect to build healthy relationships if you don’t have room to breathe!”
If you are reading this and feeling socially burnt out, take a walk; I don’t mean flippantly. Put on whatever music you want, or listen to what’s happening around you. Get a coffee and sit in the café. Go to a bookstore and browse their selection. Every week do at least one thing that is solely for yourself.
College is hard, but in a different way than I could have expected. Even though your schedule opens and there is new flexibility that didn’t exist in high school, it feels like those old responsibilities are replaced with ones that carry much more weight. We are expected to figure out our lives and who we will be in the world while also having fun because this is the last time we will be free from the responsibilities of corporate life.
That’s a lot for anyone to come to terms with, and it’s something that I never even considered until I was already here, so be kind to yourself.
And at the end of the day, how can you expect other people to like being with you when you can’t stand to be alone with yourself?