Looking at my graduation cap and gown hanging in the closet in front of me, I feel a lot of things.
There’s a slideshow in my head of the past four years. Of how my freshman year self feels like a different life time, yet my college career flew by in a blink of an eye. Can’t say I loved every minute of college. I’m not sure anyone can, but I wouldn’t change any of it to become who I am and where I am.
The best friends who were strangers from all over the place are now like family. My boyfriend who I met the very first day of sophomore year in that algebra class has stuck by me to this day. They’ve been my best friends, my roommates, my rock, my shoulder to cry on, and my happiest memories.
To them — thank you for being exactly what I needed and for helping me become who I am.
Every part of this town turned into home for me. From living in Montour Hall to living by the downtown fountain, to living in my sorority chapter house. The coworkers at Steph's Subs and Aramark who I shared dreadful shifts with, yet loved where we were. The peers in my major who started as someone to ask a question turned to someone to call a friend.Home isn’t a place but a feeling, and Bloomsburg has that feeling. I’m sad to leave, but I can begin to grow a life based off of what it gave me.
Looking at my cap and gown, I think of my high school graduation — the girl I was then, starting out in the world not knowing where I’d end up.
Now I think of the girl I am now. Completing my biggest accomplishment in life thus far. Making my family proud as a first-generation college student.
I can say confidently now I'm the girl who knows exactly what she wants and has what it takes to see it through. Looking at that cap and gown, I’m proud of myself. It’s bittersweet; I’m sad, I’m happy, but most of all I’m excited for what the next stage of my life is going to bring me.
And I can thank Bloomsburg for that.
— Drew Hess, a graduating senior communication studies major and emergent media minor, interned with the Office of Marketing and Communications this spring. She is a native of Stowe, Vt., a town of 4,472 people in northern Vermont known for its trails and ski slopes.
#BloomOnward #HuskyLife
