In every relationship, there is a honeymoon stage. In our relationship with Cal Poly, this stage also exists. But with the second quarter already in full gear, the honeymoon in paradise has given way to reality.
The first few months of most relationships consist of being starry-eyed, parading around with a larger-than-life smile on your face and laughing every few minutes. When I think about it, it’s the stage where we’re incredibly annoying to our friends because all we talk about is how great someone else is and how they have no flaws whatsoever. You all know what I’m talking about.
With college, it’s the same way.
During our first quarter at Cal Poly, all our conversations with friends back home were about how we loved Cal Poly, the weather, the beach and the beautiful people. Let’s not forget about how we brought up that Oprah named this America’s happiest city.
But has that time passed? We’re back here in San Luis Obispo, lovely as always, but I can’t help but feel that the feeling of being at the perfect school no longer exists among the freshman class.
We began first quarter thinking we were exactly where we were supposed to be. But now, most of us are having second thoughts.
From first quarter to second, we have gone from the honeymoon stage to the reality stage.
Our vision is no longer blurred and the fuzzy feeling we had inside has disappeared.
As I walk through my residence hall, I hear miscellaneous conversations regarding transferring to another school, changing majors and just not feeling that elation we all experienced during first quarter.
Let’s face it, we all don’t feel super giddy about every single thing anymore. What we thought were our roommates’ funny, quirky habits have now become the annoying habits we can’t stand. And the once thought-to-be-beautiful walks to our 8 a.m. class don’t really seem all that great as we grudgingly rise to our feet in the morning.
Don’t get me wrong, walking to class in the early morning and seeing those San Luis Obispo sunrises are still beautiful, but waking up early is not fun, and sometimes not worth the dreary-eyed walk to class.
I know that, as a girl, I no longer feel the need to get up super early just to take a shower, fix my hair and put on a nice outfit (rest assured, I still shower). Of course, there’s nothing wrong with planning an outfit for the day (I still do once in a while). I think we’ve all come to realize that there’s no need, especially with early classes and knowing that no one really cares.
As with people transferring and wanting to switch majors, it’s only expected among the freshman class. Most of us came into this having no idea what we wanted to do or major in, so we just chose something we thought we were good at.
Now that we’ve gone through a quarter of classes and our own experiences, we’ve discovered a lot about ourselves. We’ve realized if the major we chose is really what we want to do. We now know if we chose the right school, or if we just chose it because it was where we have wanted to go since junior high.
We’ve also realized what we can and can’t stand in a roommate, no matter how well you get along with him or her.
Reality has started to dawn on us, and it’s probably a good thing that our vision is no longer clouded with things that we only want to think.
The honeymoon stage may be over for a lot of us, but that doesn’t mean our love for this school and town is lost. It just means that we finally know what we want, in some shape or form, and that should be reassuring for a lot of us.