Reflections on the Best 4-5 Years of My Life

I have decided to start a new series. The title is above... It will be a five part series, with each part talking about one year of my college life. I love to tell stories with vivid details, especially if people like to read them, and as you can tell I love to write. I will try to relive everything I can where appropriate, the good and the bad. I hope you enjoy the ride...

Freshman Year (2005-2006)
You always remember the first time you do something if it's a big life experience. This was the first time I was away from home for an extended period of time. I had some friends around (my roommate was a friend of mine), but I was largely on my own... I felt so alive, so free. I had usually been as independent as one can be living as a minor under his parents roof, but this was a new start for me. They say that you can be anyone you want to be when you come to college.

I can remember vividly the first morning I went to class, so I will describe it for you all. It was a Monday morning. The sun was shining and it was a comfortable August morning in 2005 (Wow that's a long time ago). My roommate and I discovered that we both had class at the same time at around the same place, so being two wide-eyed freshmen, we decided the night before to walk over together. My roommate and I had come from a somewhat large high school, but Purdue seemed very large even for us. Our classes were at 8:30 am. So we made the long walk from Shreve Hall. My class was Calculus I and it was in the Electrical Engineering Building. I remember being amazed at how many people there were just walking around, and then I got to the room where my class was being held. I was in shock at how large the room was. I am not sure how many people that room holds, but it was larger than anything I had ever seen... And of course since the class was calculus, I had no idea what was going on and neither did anyone else.

I was mainly a hermit during my freshman year. We kept the door closed, and rarely made friends or met new people. Most of this was my shy, reserved personality at the time. I was pretty scared of new people and new situations.

One of the few things I did as a freshman outside of my room was intermural sports. My roommate and I played flag football and outdoor soccer. Well actually we ended up just watching our outdoor soccer team. I couldn't play because I sprained my knee playing racquetball the week before spring break. Huge bummer because I love sports.

One thing I did a lot of was play Halo 2. That encompassed most of my free time activities. I played a bunch online, and I think I got decent at it. I would play with my friends sometimes or sometimes I would just go alone online and play. That was probably when I was having the most fun.

When I think about my Freshman year, I always remember not being prepared or ready for what was coming my way. I had cruised through high school and had pretty good grades, and wasn't really challenged academically like I was when I first stepped into school at Purdue. I was not ready for the challenge, and I think it's one of the main reasons it took me 5 years to finish at Purdue. I have a few friends currently who are extremely motivated and work extremely hard at school, and I always say to them that if I worked as hard as they do now, I could graduate with a 4.0 gpa and in 4 years. I try to encourage them as much as possible, because if you get off to a bad start at college like I did, there is no end to the climbing out of the hole. You can never really recover. They know who they are...

This particular year in my life went by very quickly I think. I wish I would have stopped and smelled the roses while along for the ride. Sometimes I wish I had a time machine so I could go back and warn myself of my bad habits and things like that. I am an experimenter at heart. I like to try things out and see what happens instead of sitting on the sidelines and watching everyone else go for it. I like to roll the dice a little bit. I guess a few more friends also would have been nice...

It is really hard to remember back that far. I guess now all I can do is thank God for the awesome ride that was my freshman year.