With Thanksgiving Break coming to an end, it’s time to come back to school for the last two weeks of the semester.
Hopefully, we’re full, happy and ready to take on exams and final projects before the end of 2013.
Then we’ll have a couple of weeks to regroup, enjoy some holiday festivities and start working on those New Year’s resolutions for the next semester.
But for some of us, this might be that last hurrah. As I say goodbye to the structure — albeit chaotic — university life offers, I’m looking forward to the next chapter and whatever it has in store for me.
Graduation means more than putting on a cap and gown and walking across a stage. That piece of paper, which I will proudly frame and set up in an office somewhere someday, is a testament to more than grades, classes or even a college degree.
Professional competition is fierce right now. Once upon a time, getting a bachelor’s degree was enough to guarantee a good job. Now, going to graduate school is almost a given. Being hyperqualified is the norm.
Let’s not dismiss the weight of the four years we’ve spent here.
There are a few experiences that most of us can relate to: the unproductive all-nighters at Library West, happily subsisting on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches freshman year in the dorms and Krishna Lunch on the Plaza of the Americas on beautiful Florida autumn days.
But the truth is, we’ve all had unique experiences at UF.
Reflecting on that has made me nostalgic and, all the same, excited to move on.
Learning never stops. We are constantly studying the people and situations around us. We take notes on what we want, what we don’t, who we want to be and who we shouldn’t be. Life is a series of exams, except cramming is not an option. The test comes when you least expect it, and if you’re not prepared, you have no choice but to fight through it.
Personal growth isn’t ceremonious. There’s no stage to walk across every time we pass a hurdle at work, no diploma for “a bachelor of science in personal relationships” waiting for us when we go through a breakup. There’s certainly no dean smiling, shaking our hand when we get over our quarter-life crisis.
We’ve been conditioned in school that, when the test is turned in, we can make room for new information, that everything comes to an end nicely — that we can start fresh every semester. But life doesn’t offer deadlines or final grades. There’s no real closure. So when some of us graduate in a couple of weeks, let’s cherish that it might be one of the last times we get to close something with fanfare.
As I look back at these four-or-so years that I’ve been a student here, I feel grateful. I took creative liberties by taking a year off for some traveling and work, which is why I feel my upcoming graduation is my second time going out into the real world, without an institution to go back to.
While I’m officially closing this chapter, it’s important to note I’m opening another. A diploma shows what I’ve accomplished in my academic life so far, but more than that, it’s a passport to the rest of my life — our lives. We’ll cross into territories that still remain unexplored, and those are some of the best lessons we’ll get.
And no, there’s no Smokin’ Notes or TutoringZone for that, but really, that’s OK with me.
Daniela Guzman is a UF journalism senior. Her column runs on Mondays. A version of this column ran on page 6 on 12/2/2013 under the headline "Goodbye to all that: On entering adulthood"
