College memories.

One day this week, I ended up looking through all of my pictures from college. It was fun to revisit all of my best and worst college memories, but it has me thinking about how much has changed since graduating from Penn State.

1.     Sometimes I thought college was stressful--especially when I had a lot of papers and exams and internships and committee meetings. None of that compares to my stress level on a daily basis now. I’m relatively sure I should be on some type of blood pressure medication to compensate for all the stress this job causes.

2.     I am extremely lame. There were times in college when I would go out 4-5 nights a week and not think anything of it. Now, I barely go out once a week, and I try to come home by midnight. (NOTHING good happens after midnight.) Occasionally, I’ll have a beer on a work night, and I usually only get through half of it before falling asleep on the couch. How did I become 45 so quickly? Actually, I know a lot of 45 year olds who are more fun than me.

3.     I used to be so skinny! I never thought about how much I walked in college, but sitting at a desk all day has definitely made it more difficult to be active. I’m going to need to keep trying harder at the gym to get back to that.

4.     I had way better clothes. In every picture, I was wearing a different dress or outfit. I also had 3 roommates to share wardrobes with. Now that I live alone, I’m just stuck with my same old pant suits and cardigans.

5.     I had such a great circle of friends in college. I was involved with several different organizations and had many groups of wonderful friends. There was always something going on and someone to hang out with. Now, most of my closest friends live in different cities. I’m lucky to have a few great girlfriends in DC, but our time together is much more limited because we’re all working and on different schedules. I’ve been learning to spend much more time with myself, which I think is important—especially as we get older.

In thinking about that final point, spending time with myself has really helped me to grow over the past two years. College is such a rush and passes so quickly, that we don’t have much time to really contemplate who we are and how we want to form our lives. Life settles down so quickly after college, and we’re left with all this time to think about who we are, who we want to be and how we’re going to get ourselves there. All these possibilities are scary when we’re left alone with our own thoughts. In college, everyone makes these possibilities sound so ambitious and exciting and brimming with opportunity, but when you really get down to charting your own course, it’s tough to make big decisions. Luckily for me, the path to big decisions (like moving to DC) has been paved with a lot of assistance from mentors at work and support from friends and family, so the decisions have been a little easier with their reassurance.

But for now, I’m going to bravely move forward, acknowledging that there are so many changes in our lives, that it’s often not worth getting caught up in big or little decisions. Luck, circumstance, God and our relationships guide us through life, for better or worse, one way or another.

To remembering to take it easy,

Lia