so this is it.

Life after college, real life I guess I mean, has been so much harder than I expected. There's a lot of ... settling, a lot of best-outcome-given-the-shitty-circumstances rationalization, and a lot of tallied losses, including 1 best friend, 1 boyfriend, and 25 cent beers at dive bar near campus.

What I think I miss the most about college life is the knowing what's to come part of it. Dates on a calendar. Seasonal breaks. Trips that I didn't have to pay for myself. There were so many things to look forward to. And now? I feel there are no such things as evenings - the after-work hours fly by until I'm sitting in a subway car on my morning commute, nodding off and slamming my head into the window.

But college isn't something you can go back to. I know this because I'm writing this post on a computer in my university's library. Really, I'll never belong here again. Sad, because unlike any other place I've called home, it was as if I was forcibly ejected after 4 years and have lost it forever. As an undergrad, I never completely understood why all these old ass people kept invading my campus, why they took up all of our parking spots, and why they'd want to come all the way to Rochester of all places, just as the city was getting gray and cold for the winter. My senior year I remember thinking it was sad, for even recent graduates, to come back and get wasted like freshmen. Why couldn't they move on? So yes, I felt strange about coming here for my first alumni weekend, called a friend and asked if booking a Thursday flight was too over-eager, and spent all of Thursday wishing there were more 09 graduates here. Strange strange strange, but also so nice to be here. I don't know how long it will be before I feel that safe again.