Senior week mimosas and takeaways

There is something very special and sentimental in getting to experience senior week the year before you become a senior yourself. This year, as my junior year was wrapping up, I decided to extend my stay and work on campus for senior week, mostly to get the final stretch of joy and closure from my friends who were about to graduate and leave.

When you enter college, you can't always imagine how much of a home a place can become. What will I do in a small town like Oberlin? How will I fit into the campus culture? Will I get along with my randomly assigned roommate? As I think back to first-year Maja, I can't help but giggle at each question. You never know what life will throw at you or how close you'll be with your roommates, but I'm happy to say I finished this year's senior week with so much gratitude for how special that uncertainty and change are.

When I started working at the Cat in the Cream in my first year, a lovely coffeehouse and event venue on campus, I didn't imagine becoming work besties with the staff working there. I couldn't have guessed that after the commencement ceremony in my third year of college, I'd be on one of their porches eating tacos, talking to their family, and celebrating the big graduation. I couldn't have imagined an incredible brunch on the grass in one of their backyards, laughing about all the memories made throughout the year. More importantly, I wouldn't have guessed that these coworkers would accompany me in testing out how delicious the mimosas and the champagne at the senior garden party were.

When I casually started hanging out with fellow international students during international orientation week in my first year, I couldn't have guessed they'd be my friend group. I couldn't have envisioned the amount of naps this group would take on the couch in my house, and I couldn't have understood my sadness in saying goodbye to that house anyway. More importantly, I couldn't have dreamt that on the final day of my junior year, I'd be saying goodbye to two of them, sending them off to 3-2 engineering. After many brunches, Stevie lunches, birthdays, some bike rides, and many movie nights, I couldn't have felt the love and joy I had through each memory.

That's why college is so special; that's why experiencing senior week was so special. You don't know where and with whom you'll end your junior year, but the goal, regardless of the uncertainty as you start, should be to finish college with the deep gratitude that you made the most of it – that college surprised you to the extent you could not have even pictured. I watched my senior coworkers graduate and hugged my to-be engineer friends. Through it all, I hoped from the bottom of my heart that, as I approached my final year, I would remember to try all the mimosas at all the garden parties, eat all the tacos, and organize all the picnics at whichever porch I find, and walk the commencement stage with so much love for a place I once wondered if it would ever become home.

To all of you rising freshmen, I hope you walk into college ready to embrace all the uncertainty so that when your senior week comes, you can't even fathom how you once wondered certain things about the town, your roommate, and your home. As I spend the summer preparing my Honors Projects and wondering where life will take me a year from now, I want to remember one thing: the pressure to make the most out of college shouldn't be only during senior week but throughout the whole time. I saw all the recent graduates look back at the memory lane of Oberlin and smile, and if you have any goals for college, I hope you join me in making this ours.