School's Out Forever

I graduated in May, 2008. No, not with my master's (even though I'm OLD). Just with my bachelor's. In linguistics. Magna Cum Laude. From a state school, but I graduated nontheless.

I also work at the same state school from which I graduated. That means that no matter how long it is since I got my degree, fall will always mean the start of school for me. A new beginning. The excitement and anticipation of freshmen on an unfamiliar and huge campus who can be picked out of a crowd because they're inevitably looking up at the buildings, trying to figure out where they are instead of plowing headfirst into them. I try to take pity on as many as I can and direct them to their destinations. Sometimes I worry that I'm embarrassing them by offering my help, but I try to come across as kindly and motherly, so they don't think I'm trying to demean them. (Those of you who know me personally know what a stretch this can be for me).

You can usually pick the seniors out pretty quickly, as well. They're dragging themselves to class instead of exhibiting the wide-eyed optimism and anticipation of the newbies. They've been through this before. They just want it to end. That was me last year. "Just get me through this, and I'll be done."

Sophomores and Juniors are kind of lumped into a group who know what they're doing and just blend into the background. They're just going about their business because they're no longer at the beginning, but can't see the end yet.

The transfer students are an odd mix of freshmen and seniors. It's still a new campus for them, so they have that lack of confidence about them. But, they just left a community college (or in the rarer case, another university), so they're not new to bigger campuses and professorial attitudes of, "come or don't come - it's your grade."

There's a teeny, tiny part of me that is saddened that I don't have to make a trip to Staples for school supplies this year, that I don't have to figure out the best time to go to the bookstore to beat the crowds. But the bigger part of me is so relieved that I no longer have a student persona. I don't have to schedule and re-schedule my days and weeks according to the amount of studying I have to do. I can actually read a book for pleasure (which I think I'm going overboard on this summer, judging from the stack of books on my desk). I can take a freakin' vacation during the school year. That one is huge. I am finally getting to Disney World in September because I'm no longer limited to going during the most crowded (read: most expensive) times of the year (when the kids are out of school).

So I'll leave academia to the fresh faced freshmen, the weary seniors, and all those in between. And please - don't you start on me about a master's, too.