Senior Year. Spring Break. Will I Survive?

By the time you read this column, I will have embarked on my journey.

Nothing like scaling the Himalayas or wandering through a desert with a single water bottle and a compass. Or fighting off wild lions on an African safari, for that matter. I am most definitely unqualified for any of the above.

I’ll be in Florida—with six girls who have been my best friends since we started seventh grade. We’ll be taking spring break together, as seniors. That’s right. Senior spring break.

Those three words sound a little strange, at least to me, for one of two reasons. First, I still can’t grasp the idea that I’m a senior. What? I vividly remember my freshman year, looking up at all the old seniors and wondering if any of them had wrinkles yet. They were so old. So scary. I would never be that old. (A word of insight for all you freshman out there, there is absolutely no way I am anywhere even relatively close to getting my first wrinkle, grey hair, or any sign of aging, for that matter. Just to settle the question.)

But second, senior spring break? What a term. A term that in this society, we seem to accept as, well, tradition. You and your best friends take this fancy trip to end the year off right. It’s the final hoorah before we’re all going our separate ways to college, promising to call each other every night while in reality, we’re scraping the time to get in a five minute video chat at three in the morning (and this I take from .) Oh dang, I’m going to lose it.

The “future” has been a common topic of discussion for us. But it’s something none of us truly wants to discuss. We were frustrated with the college decision questions; annoyed with the complexities that came along with college decisions; but we’re completely and totally peeved with “what now?”

My friends and I, we’ve been best friends since seventh grade. Yes, you read that right. We fought through the storm of freshman year, the scandalous formation of new cliques, and have memorized the insides of one others’ refrigerators—hey, it’s more important than one would think. But what now? What do we do when we’re all heading off to different colleges, alone, lacking a support system, and did I mention...alone? While we all have distinctly different personalities and hobbies (the key to a friendship) we’ve interlocked as one. And college is tearing that all apart. Now don’t get me wrong, I speak for all of us when I say we are completely psyched for college. Ecstatic. Let’s get real, who isn’t’? It’s the best years of your life. Or so I’ve heard…

Our “senior spring break” is significant in the sense that it’s allowing us to open a new book—and maybe close, or at least put down, an old one. Enjoy our final times together, reflect and create new memories, and take those with us as we embark on our new experiences. That’s why I’m considering this a ”journey,” not just a trip. That, and the fact that we are living together, 24/7 for 7 days straight. We spend an unhealthy amount of time together as it is, but a complete 24-hour cycle, 7 days in a row? Let’s review that in our heads for a moment. I’m praying I come back alive.