"So, Vivian, are you excited for college?"

The answer to that question is yes...and no.

During Spring Break, my dad and I visited six colleges all up and down the Eastern part of the country. I flew out to Washington, DC (where my dad lives) on Saturday, and on Sunday we drove down to North Carolina. We stayed overnight in Davidson, North Carolina, and on Monday, we visited Davidson College and then drove over to Wake Forest University. After that, we drove to Chapel Hill, and visited University of North Carolina on Tuesday. After the tour, we drove back up to DC. On Wednesday afternoon, we drove up to Pennsylvania to visit Bucknell University. We did the tour on Thursday, an continued north to upstate New York. On Friday, we did tours at Hamilton College and Colgate University. On Saturday, we drove back to DC, and on Sunday I flew home.

Was that a hectic paragraph? Yeah, well it was a hectic week. And I was sick (I even woke up with a fever on Saturday) the entire time. While I would like to bemoan my crazy week, I don't. Aside from being a little uncomfortable from coughing and sneezing, I had a great time visiting all of the schools and getting a better idea of what I'm actually looking for in a college. There are so many things to consider, and while it may seem overwhelming to visit so many schools in such a short amount of time, and have so much information thrown at you, it was actually really helpful. Of those six, two of them are out for sure, and two more are on the maybe list. By seeing the schools that I didn't like, I now know what schools to stay away from, which was very helpful.

I learned two things during all of the visits: 1) That I am ridiculously excited and ready for college. 2) That I am ridiculously scared and under-prepared for college. At one point, my dad asked me, "So, Viv, does all of this touring and seeing colleges make you wish you were already in college?" And my immediate reaction was one of hesitation. My response? "Yeah, but it also makes me wish that I didn't hate high school so much."

The truth was that seeing the colleges did make me wish I was there, because they seemed so much more fun than what I'm doing now. You get to pick most of your classes, so that you're actually studying things that you're interested in. You get to have *gasp* free time, and join clubs and participate in intramural sports and other fun things like that. That all seems really fine and great to me. But by wishing myself away to college, that means that I'm not living in the present, not savoring the time I have left at home with my parents. College signifies a completely new stage in your life, one where you have to figure out how to live on your own. Once you graduate, it's not like you can say, "Well that was fun, time to go back to normal life now." and go back and live with your parents.

I suppose what I actually learned was that college is going to come anyway. I can't just plant my feet in the ground and hope that I can stop time (because technically, that's not physically possible). So, though it's a struggle to get up in the morning and come to Uni, I'll appreciate it in the end, and when it's time to actually go to college, I'll be ready and excited.