Making the transition from high school to college can be one of two things: smooth and quick or difficult and slow. One can only hope for the former. I surely do. It is so funny and ironic how anxious and nervous I am whenever I think about this impending change. I will no longer be a teenager. I will officially be a young adult. Being negligent (while never good to be) is no longer an option; I must take care of business and myself without always depending on my parents. No matter how many places I have traveled to alone or with friends or with strangers, or how many colleges I have been to and studied at, this feeling is still here. Because I know that once I graduate, I can no longer go back. This change, from teen to young adult, is only the beginning.

I know that simply going off to college is not an "end-all-be-all" to my youth. I will still have my parents and their support and my family's support. It's just the knowledge that this change is permanent that is getting me. By "permanent", I am referring to being an adult. You go from infant to toddler to child to pre-teen to teen to young adult and then what? Adult. Granted, you will be an elder later in life, but you live most of your life as an adult. And college is  one of the paths to being a real adult. After it's over (unlike high school),  I cannot not get a job because I will have to support myself. I cannot bum around the entire summer because, well, I'll have a job that 9 times out of 10 will not allow me off during the summer. {Teachers are so lucky!} Friends that I'd automatically see because of school - nope, a genuine effort will have to be made to meet up and stay connected. {I am not complaining about this because real friendships are made from effort.}

I am a thinker. I think about the future a lot - not the small things, but the overall picture. But I honestly do not know how my future is going to look right now. I do not know whether I will love Iowa and want to stay after college, or if I will feel an ache to return home to Michigan. Maybe I will want to move to Florida or Texas.  What job will I have? All of these are ambiguous.

But what is clear is that in a month's time, I will be walking across the stage at Ford Field, receiving my high school diploma. And this fall, I will officially be a first-year student at Iowa State University, Class of 2020.