This post is about to get extremely cliché and for that I apologize…

So this week I started my senior year in college and I have to say it is much stranger than I had originally anticipated. I had a rough time moving from high school to college and on day one I was ready to graduate. Now that I am a senior, and actually on the path to graduation, I can honestly say that I wish I could go back to freshman year. I sit on campus and watch all the freshman art majors lugging their huge pads of paper and boxes of supplies, just like I used to do. They are about to enter a world of expression and will really get a chance to explore their ideas with an amazing and open-minded faculty. That—the newness—is probably what I am most jealous of at this point in my life. At the time, I was terrified and didn’t know how to open myself up enough to explore as much as I now wish I did.

Being that I am studying Art Education, unfortunately my art studio days are over which, I won’t lie, has me significantly upset. So I am now on the education side of my studies and it is strange but will be worth it in the end. All of this being said, all incoming freshman, please take a deep breath and get all that you possibly can out of your first year. Be open-minded, don’t psych yourself out (although it is very easy to do), and just allow the experience to be all that it can be. And for the art majors in particular, please please PLEASE enjoy it. Paint, draw, sculpt, and take in whatever your teachers have to offer to you. One day you will be in my shoes and miss it more than anything.