Posted by I loved college. It’s been just over 3 years since I graduated. I don’t really miss it anymore. Let me say it again – I loved college. When I first moved to Kansas City in 2003, I couldn’t do much more than think about college and look back at it.
I missed having such a wide circle of friends. I missed stumbling home from parties, walking down the middle of a deserted Forbes Avenue at 3 o’clock in the morning. I missed the food trucks whose cheap offerings practically sustained me for almost 2 years when I decided to pay my own food rather than take the ‘rents money. I missed rat-hole house parties in Souf Oakland and hiding on rooftops when the cops came to yell at us for being too loud. I missed working in the computer labs at Pitt (uhh try resetting the computer).
I missed practising for cultural show dances till all hours of the night and then having to pull an all-nighter because of them. I missed ISA meetings, desi parties, taking roadtrips to DC, Philly, NYC (and yes, even PennState). I missed the Spring Break that I spent in New Mexico camping outside, hiking 2 miles/day into the mountains to cut trail into the side of the mountain or the spring break that I visited my sister in SF/Oakland.. I missed going to watch Pitt football!
Maybe something of that has to do with the fact that I was living in KC, which is a nice town but doesn’t compare one bit to where I had initially moved after college – Washington, DC. I was with about 15 other people who were just coming out of college as well and in many ways, we still led a college life in that first year out of college – bars, clubs, keg stands, Royals games. I took roadtrips to Austin, Colorado, Washington, DC and of course went home a couple times for Steelers and Pitt football games.
But when I moved back to Pittsburgh in 2004 and looked back even on that year in KC, I realised that I was already leading a good life. And what excited me even more wasn’t looking back on college or the KC year but looking forward. College is a great four years but there’s the rest of my life. In the two years since I’ve moved home, I’ve worked in NYC, visited New Orleans, San Francisco, Washington DC, Baltimore, Philly, Chicago, Boston, Cleveland and the Napa Valley. I’ve taken int’l vacations to Istanbul, Buenos Aires, Dhaka, Marrakesh (Morocco) and been on a working trip to Abu Dhabi that included some long hours but also let me go on a desert safari, learn about the kindness of the mideastern people and take a day trip to Dubai. I’ve experienced two New Years’ abroad and saw how they do Halloween in SF. I’ve built a house. h*ll, I think I even went on a date! (or not?)
Please believe, I’m not trying to toot my own horn. But this is what happens when you stop looking back and start looking forward – you start living life. I like having these responsibilities – it’s the next challenge and you have to grab it by the (hook ’em!) horns. And there’s a h*lluva lot to look forward to. I still haven’t been to Tokyo or Hong Kong, Casablanca, Nairobi, Barcelona, Bangkok, Angkor Watt, Sylhet (Bangladesh), Windhoek (Namibia, look up the Skeleton Coast if you’re curious), Johannesburg, Cairo or Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania). I haven’t seen Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon. I still want to go ‘home’ to Nigeria.
I want to go skydiving, read 1000 books, work in the foreign services, learn Arabic, Hindi and Japanese, and become a father who can tell his kids fantastical stories of riding camels in the desert or of watching the sunset over Topkapi Palace from a ferry on the Golden Horn or of going to massive nightclubs in Buenos Aires.
In the end, it’s ok to look back but only insofar as you let it remind you of what’s still out there. If you want to get excited about life, do yourself a favor – sit down for a few hours one evening and make a Life List. Write down everything you think you’d ever want to do, no matter how impossible it sounds right now. To quote Jed Barlett from the West Wing, “What’s next?”
