The World As I Know It Has Not Changed

...But We Can Still Make It Better

Today we transition. Just like four years ago, and the four years before that. Every day, every second, is a new opportunity for your voice to be heard. To say and describe the things you know to be true and to advocate for your passions. Today is no different.

But today reminds me of when I transitioned to college from high school. Only a few classmates followed with me from our small-town high school to the big city university. I was the only girl. The boys were not close friends, although I knew them because everyone knew everyone. Most of us ended up in the same freshman co-ed dormitory.

I was determined to explore the world. The world outside of the small-town boundaries that had suffocated me in high school. I looked to break free from the expectations and norms of the community I was raised in, where being a girl meant lowered expectations and caregiving roles. I wanted to meet new people, have new adventures. And, for the most part, that is what I did.

But being totally new in a big fishbowl is lonely and, sometimes, isolating. The risk of getting in with the wrong crowd or people is large. I found a guy I liked, and the relationship quickly crashed and burned. I was ill equipped to handle it on my own and made a fool out of myself in the second-floor boys’ hallway of my dormitory.

It was two of the guys with whom I went to high school who eventually came to my rescue. They were rooming together on the fourth floor. They saw my humanity and were worried enough to act in a way that the others around me could or did not. It was in that moment that I got to know them better and realized they were kind, caring, and considerate. They were human. They had depth I had never noticed before because at least one of them was also loud, entitled, and extremely right leaning.