It’s that time again, when spiral notebooks still bear virgin pages and one’s planner hasn’t yet been annotated into illegibility - the first day of a new semester. Coming back to school in the spring always bears a different sentiment than returning in the autumn; after the summer’s torrid stupor I bear a striking resemblance to Simon and Garfunkel’s “59th Street Bridge,” more “dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep” than prepared to dive into a full schedule of classes. But Christmas break offers a pause - a breath! and then a healthy return to scholarship before my noodle becomes utterly useless.

Although I seem to predict the same of every semester, I’m hoping this spring will be more conducive to building a healthier self - both inside and out. I’ve already set my schedule in such a way that I can hit the gym at least twice a week, go to yoga, and still have time to fit in homework and time at the newspaper while generally going to bed before midnight. 

After last semester’s bedtime stretching into three and four in the morning several nights a week, I’m totally fine trying something new. Obviously whatever I was doing then wasn’t working. 

So that’s on the horizon. 

My first day of school isn’t technically over yet, as I have class again at three this afternoon. It feels bizarre to already be settling into a new routine. The time flies in college, if only because you’re required to focus so steadily on assignments and hour blocks and lectures. By the time you raise your head up from the books, it’s May again. 

One thing I wonder as an apparently perennial student is what life will be like without the pleasant markers of progress that are inherent in the passing of semesters. Even in grade school there’s a sense of advancement in the ticking off of grades - first, second, etc. What happens when you’re my age and about to graduate? After this semester, I’ve only got a year (and a stint in Italy) left. 

Then real life, big adult problems. No financial aid - which, perplexingly, is probably my greatest fear. Although the loans are technically my money (and things I’ll pay back over a very long time) it always feels like a Fairy Godmother drops those coins into my piggy bank. 

And that same Fairy Godmother retires after I graduate. 

Perhaps not the most optimistic thing to think on the first day of school? I suppose the lesson to garner from that tangent is the simple appreciation of the present.

No bills today; no full-time job with benefits. No car payments, cell phone bills or student loan payments. No 401K or retirement fund. No graduate school applications, engagements, or job interviews.

There is only now. Only the glass of pomegranate juice beside me and a temporarily empty planner. And that, my friends, is a thing of beauty.  

• Tags
• growing up
• college