Half and Half

At the end of my first year at William & Mary, I had this strange realization that I had completed half of my time in Williamsburg. And as this year comes to an end, I am starting to get that same strange feeling that I am going to turn my last essay for St Andrews and it will be my last international flight when I fly back to the States in May. Suddenly all these firsts have turned into lasts, and beginnings have become endings.

This was taken outside our holiday social first year, please note how absolutely young we look.

I have lived in Scotland for the last two years, and now suddenly I am coming home for my final year of undergrad, to a place I haven’t been to in what feels like forever. The Programme gives you this strange sense of change and motion that is hard to explain in so many words, but it feels like sometimes you’re in limbo, caught halfway between the UK and the US, but then sometimes it feels like it’s moving so fast, one minute you were a freshman living in Yates and the next you’re applying to grad schools and looking for jobs beyond the confines of the Historic Triangle.

This was from last year around the end of the spring semester, featuring Hamish the cat!

I got some advice from my intern supervisor the summer after my first year, where she told me that when they tell you it’s the best years of your life, they’ve never lived your life for you. So do it your way, don’t conform to what they tell you is what makes up your college experience. And hey, Stephanie, you may have a point there. The only people who get the Programme, are the people who go through it. There is such a bond between me and my classmates because we all just get it. The hard things, the fun things, the unique parts of our degree that we get to share all together. And while it has been hard at some times, it has been an incredible experience I don’t think I would ever give up.

And this was taken this past winter! Note how old we all look.

So for all my lasts I am going to have this semester, and next year, I am both excited and terrified, as I was for all my firsts.