I miss Ohio Wesleyan. There, I admitted it. I’m doing a semester in Washington, D.C., for the Wesleyan in Washington program, and I didn’t expect to feel this way so soon.
I love my school, don’t get me wrong, but I was feeling like I needed to get off campus for a bit. I guess it’s the junior year itch.
But when I check my email and see the OWU Daily, my heart races.
I need to know what’s going on on campus. I ask my boyfriend and my friends on campus for gossip, or just what’s going on. They always report back with, “There’s nothing interesting going on.”
Well, maybe not to you, but to me, even if there’s a duck in the fountain at lunch, that’s exciting to me.
It’s a weird feeling going from student to adult in a short time span. I now understand how graduates must feel. Every day I need to make my all of meals, clean and just be an adult. I can’t run to Thomson and buy food with Monopoly money; I actually spend real money on food!
I now understand the hassle of a commute, especially when your trains are majorly delayed. I also know the feeling of FOMO (fear of missing out) by seeing Facebook pictures or events of goings-on at OWU. When people send me pictures of what’s going on at OWU, I just reply with pictures of taxidermied lions at the Smithsonian.
It’s weird not being with my newspaper family, with whom I spend most of my time. It’s weird not seeing the familiar faces down the JAYwalk and seeing Linda at University Hall for my iced mocha with extra chocolate. I don’t even know who the freshmen are. I’ll arrive back in January completely clueless, like a lost puppy who just wants some guidance and a treat.
Even though I miss being on campus, I would not trade this experience for the world. It’s a once in a lifetime experience, and I love every moment of it. I love D.C., I love my job and I just like pretending to be an adult. D.C. is an amazing place to be, and I have everything at my disposal. But there’s nothing like OWU.
Come January, my life as an adult ends, and my life as a student resumes. I already know as I’m walking to classes in -40 degrees Farenheit, I’ll wish I were in D.C. But you can’t have it both ways, and I’m just realizing it now.
