Ambrosia Software Web Board: Conflicting Thoughts - Ambrosia Software Web Board

I feel like throwing my thoughts down somewhere. The ATT seems like a good place to do it. I'm not quite sure why, but it just does.

This Saturday I will be moving up to college. Currently, I'm living in a suburb of Philadelphia, PA. I will be attending Manhattan College, locating in the Bronx district of New York City. I'm the only person from my high school who will be going to MC. Simply put, my life is completely changing in mere a few days.

In high school, I made many close friends. Hanging out with my friends in and out of school was great. Before high school, it was difficult for me to be close to anyone. This only changed after I met my friends and developed these strong friendships throughout the four years of high school.

This summer was the best time of my life, without a doubt. Almost every night would be spent with friends. I felt really close to all of them, and it seemed like college was still really far away. The blissful days of summer passed quickly though, and I was faced with the horrible realization that my time with my friends was very limited.

A couple friends left for college within the past two weeks. These weren't any of my particularly close friends, but I still felt the loss. My first true major loss occurred last week. My girlfriend (now ex-girlfriend, I guess) moved up to college in Cambridge, MA last week. She was my closest friend, and a major reason why my summer was so great. Neither of us wanted to leave the other, but neither of us wanted the long distant relationship or to be tied down in college. So it ended, for now.

Now I'm faced with the task of saying goodbye to my other best friends, as I will be leaving on Saturday. We'll all stay in contact on Facebook and such, but I won't actually see them until probably Thanksgiving break. These were the people that supported me in my best and worst times, and I can't imagine my life without them.

Honestly I do not know how I can handle this sort of change. Yes, it will be exciting to live in a different city and meet new people and such, but I feel as if I'm leaving so much behind. Things have been moving quickly, and I can no longer stop and enjoy what I had. I don't feel prepared for change. I know I will be able to adjust eventually, but I am perpetually haunted by the thoughts of what I will no longer have. I know I will be returning someday, but that all seems really far away.

Have any of you felt this way when moving to college? Share your thoughts, throw the topic off-topic, do what you want, etc. I just had to throw something out there.

Destroyer E, on Aug 23 2007, 01:03 AM, said:

Harvard or MIT by any chance?

Anyway, if I can put your mind at ease at all by saying this...

Every freshman in college is basically running around panicked that they won't make any new friends when they get there. I promise you'll meet hundreds of new people that are desperate to be your friend. Now, many of them probably won't end up being your friend, once things settle down, but the good news is that the friends you end up with are definitely going to be way cooler than your old high school friends, because back in high school people generally aren't themselves and doing things to be cool or whatever. In college you get a fresh start, and so all of your new friendships will be much more genuine, existing because of legitimate closeness. Chances are also in your favor because the sorts of people that are going to your college are probably a lot like you.

What I'm saying is, your high school friends will drift away because all of you are off meeting new people they like more. It's a little sad, awkward at times when you run into them when you're back home for a holiday or whatever, but basically you'll find you probably like your new friends a lot more.

Having gone through the same thing almost 3 years ago now, I actually feel that many of my high school friends weren't really friends. My first real friendships, the kind that I would keep in touch with for the rest of my life, started when I got to college.


Really, the weird change in your life will be when you go back home for Thanksgiving and see your family.

The opposite of what mrxak said. Except the last bit, while you may not notice it this Thanksgiving, in a couple years it'll be weird going back home - it'll be a different place almost.

I can't quite compare, as a bunch of my friends from high school go to the same university as I do, but you'll meet a ton of new people in college. I'd imagine the people who were really your friends in high school, but went to a different college will still be your friends when you meet on breaks, while those who weren't will drift away.

And yes, going home will be strange.

I stayed home for college and all my closest friends went away or were still in high school. You'd be surprised how tough it is to stay in touch with high school friends even in the same town. You really have to make an effort. It can be incredibly lonely, but you can also do a lot of things for yourself. For example.. I read like a fiend and did my homework (*gasp*) But yeah, college is tough. But it gets easier.

mrxak, on Aug 23 2007, 10:20 AM, said:

MIT. My other best friend is going to Harvard. I have some really smart friends.

mrxak, on Aug 23 2007, 10:20 AM, said:

It seems like our high school experiences were quite different. Believe me when I say, I know who my true friends are. Their constant support was amazing, and I doubt they were doing it just to be cool. Some of them are irreplaceable, and I hope our friendships can still remain strong. Honestly, I don't know if it'll happen, which is part of the reason I don't want this change.

Mackilroy, on Aug 23 2007, 08:34 PM, said:

Well said. I hope this to be true.

This post has been edited by Destroyer E: 23 August 2007 - 10:40 PM

I'm going to school in Massachusetts while most of my friends stayed here in Reno. After one year on the other side of the country (with a three hour time difference), I'm still very close with them. I've also made very few close friends in college. I've also stayed with the same girlfriend I've had since the beginning of senior year. This probably has more to do with me than with the transition process itself, but if you want to make it happen, it is certainly possible.

Destroyer E, on Aug 22 2007, 10:03 PM, said:

I can certainly relate- I left a truly excellent group of friends (many of whom I'd known for over a decade) and an awesome summer break last Friday to go to Berkeley. Although in my case I do have quite a few people from my high school going here, including one close friend, which changes things somewhat and makes the transition easier. But even so, it's a little frustrating at first, because everyone is getting first impressions of each other and such so I always feel a little unnatural. Ironically, I was just the opposite of mrxak- I was in such a comfortable group of people by the end of senior year that I'd kinda forgotten what is was like not to be completely natural around people.

So all I can say is that you shouldn't regret the times you could've had with your current friends- do as much as you can with them for this last stretch, and then look forward without regrets. Don't cut off contact or anything, obviously, but know and accept that you're drawing a line in your social history and crossing it. There are plenty of people here who are obviously clinging on to their high school groups, in one way or another, and all they get for it is both to not have nearly enough contact with their old friends and not have any new ones- the worst of both worlds. Don't be one of those people, even if you want to. The fact that you and your girl had the sense to break things off is a good sign, regardless of how it feels.

That's about the advice I can give from one week's foresight. Oh, and this: it will be all right. Maybe not in a week, maybe not even a month, but it will. Things change, people change, but nothing can take away the good times you've had.

This post has been edited by Veritus Dartarion: 24 August 2007 - 10:59 PM

Veritus Dartarion, on Aug 24 2007, 09:48 PM, said:

That's it exactly. There's not much you can do about it, so you might as well make the best of it. No regrets man.

-Pufer

You'll look back on yourself at this moment and realize how emo+lame your feelings were.

You'll see your friends over thanksgiving.

You have a month off at christmas

You have a 4 month vacation in the summer.

If anything, I had more fun with my high school friends after 1 year of college than in high school.

You lucky bastard...

>_>

<_<

This post has been edited by moonunit4eva: 25 August 2007 - 11:05 AM

Thanks for the replies, guys. It means a lot.

I'm up in NYC right now. I just settled in and have met a bunch of cool people. In short, I like it so far. I still miss my high school friends, but you guys are right. I'll see them over the breaks and such.

Destroyer E, on Aug 23 2007, 11:37 PM, said:

Actually thinking about it again, I do keep in touch with some friends from my high school years, just none of them from my actual high school, heh. But then again, I met those people in a completely different environment. In a lot of ways, it was similar to college, at least socially, so...

Veritus Dartarion, on Aug 24 2007, 11:48 PM, said:

Yeah, I do know some people that just went back home on weekends or spent most of their time on the phone or AIM instead of making new friends at college. Kinda sad, and quite frankly, I think a lot of them ended up leaving college within a couple quarters.

Destroyer E, on Aug 25 2007, 02:49 PM, said:

Yeah, if your people are worth seeing, go and see them if they want to see you. But you're probably a lot more likely to end up living somewhere completely far away from them, probably with or near people you met at college, and so you'll probably not be seeing them for much longer, so just enjoy while it lasts.

I sort of agree with both sides. On the one hand, most of the people I knew in High School I really don't care about seeing again but there are a small handful who I want to keep in touch with.
Actually the two I probably want to keep in touch with most would be the fellow guitarist in my band, and my girlfriend.
The bandmate because our musical tastes are very alike, but with subtle differences to keep things interesting (a good thing when people make music together), and just because our talents and musical skills work well together, and we get along real well because we were pretty much best friends too.
And the girlfriend, not because she's my girlfriend (I already broke up with one girl this year because of going to way to college and everything), but because she's the only person I've met who has almost the exact same worldview and personality and viewpoint as I do. And I mean, even someone like that you'd want to keep around as a friend, even if they're of the same gender, let alone someone you're romantically involved with. I'm not saying I want to marry this girl specifically, but I'd definitely want to marry someone like her, and there aren't too many people around like that as far as I've found so it makes me kind of hesitant to just toss her away. Not to mention I'm only an hour and a half away it's not some cross-country thing.

Of course there are a few other people that I like enough to want to see again too but those are the two main ones.

Destroyer E, on Aug 23 2007, 01:03 AM, said:

I'll keep her company for you

You're such a nice guy...

I am such a nice guy in her pants.

Stop acting like Mwalk, we only need one piece of cancerous material around here.

Hah. Malignant tumors.

Can we have some benign ones?

Absolutely!

I love(hate) how you guys can turn a serious topic into a discussion of something that's not even funny.

It's just a part of life, man. Just a part of life.

It's the expectation of every thread. If it hasn't gone off-topic by the second page, we're doing something wrong.

If it goes off-topic in that direction, we're definitely doing something wrong-particularly if it goes that way constantly.