the best 4 years of my life

Sometimes I get bored with life. The routine of class, microwavable dinners, homework, etc gets old. I enjoy my routine, but it's a routine (they can be a bit repetitive). The newest addition to my routine is not sleeping. For awhile I had been going to bed at 10:30 and waking up around 9. Then one week I just couldn't sleep, I tossed and turned in bed until I got out of bed and stayed on the computer until 2am or so. And so it continues.

So life... I should be graduating this week, but I'm a bit behind in the whole college time-line thing. That's ok with me, I guess. The economy sucks anyways, my school wont even hire me to file papers or sort library books. The real world can wait (even though I want to get married so bad, but I know I should wait just a bit longer).

I like college, despite the routine, and the effort, and the time.

Sometimes I think about all the people I know back home who never went to college, or just went to community college while living at home (or even the people who looked forward to each weekend just so they could go home again).
And then I think about how much I have changed since I've left home, and how much those people are the same. When I think about that I'm ok with my routine, because I've made it what I want it to be.
Those people still in Katy never ventured out on their own and got the chance to become someone other than a copy of their parents. They think they've grown up, but I think I've experienced something they never have, and possibly never will experienced by going to college and truly living.

Sometimes I want to ask those people who stayed behind if they have regrets about not leaving. Don't you wish you got out on your own with no one looking over your shoulder, asking where you are, telling you to wake up, and feeding into you only what they want you to hear? What about going to a town where you know no one? How will you ever hear a point of view other than your own if you don't get out there? Maybe you could surprise yourself by finding something you didn't even know existed, or learning something your parents never knew. I know I have learned more and changed more than I would have thought 4 years ago when I was graduating from high school.

The excitement, the unknown, the experience of it all (the good and the bad) are so valuable to who you are, that if you don't get a chance to get out there and live, you might never see who you could become.