Written by Mateo Biggs
I know I should be vibrating with excitement about graduation– the home stretch! Yet…as the date creeps closer and closer I only feel more and more anxious. The job market right now is a mess– and I feel so old saying that but everyone else around me seems to know what they are doing and they seem to have their lives together as well. I’m lucky enough to have a place to live lined up after graduation but beyond that?
Every professor seems excited for me to graduate too and that’s so nice but it just further cements that this chapter of my life is almost over. I have made so many friends with many underclassmen and all the people I know who are graduating with me are scattered to the wind with their plans once we are done with college. Honestly, I’m terrified to graduate. I’m terrified to start paying off this mountain of student loan debt and I’m just in a weird state of limbo where these nerves aren’t just anxiety.
I am excited, I’ll be a first generation college graduate of my family and I’ll be living with someone who’s like a sibling to me, but sometimes as I doom scroll instagram at night, I wonder if I’ve lived my life enough while at Roanoke College.
I understand that I’m not the only one who feels this way either– plenty of my graduating friends also feel the way I do –but there’s always those groups of people on campus who seem to have everything together. Their LinkedIn is absolutely full of job offers and they seem to be living their best life on social media (which I know is probably like 65% a lie sometimes).
Although I’m full of these anxieties and fears, I’m generally also excited to start my next journey in life and see where this all goes. I can’t wait to have my own place where I can decorate it how I want– and to cook meals in my own kitchen.
Well, that’s just some thought I’ve been having as a graduating senior. I think these last couple weeks are just going to be the strongest I’ll have to push myself.
