Corona Letters #43

 

Dear College Students,

I know how much you hate lectures and advice, so I will try my hardest to not go in that direction.  My apologies if I slip into that arena.

We saw how sad you were when you came home from your beloved campuses in March.  We listened to your sobs, and watched as you finished the semester on-line, chatting late at night on FaceTime with your friends and you tried so hard to keep some sense of normalcy, but nothing was normal, was it?  If we are being honest it broke our hearts that you were home.   This is not where you belong anymore.   You should be at school stretching your wings.   

As for the high school seniors of the class of 2020, there are no words to adequately express everything you lost.   Not only did you lose all those long awaited rites of passages that were supposed to be the icing on your high school career,  your decision about college was more complicated than it has been for years, if not ever.  To go or not to go?  To stay local or go far away?  These decisions looked nothing like they do during normal, pre-pandemic times, and there was very little fanfare when you did make your decision.  You got into Harvard?  Great!  Will you even get to go?  Sigh.

So now is the time that some of you are heading back trepidatiously to campus, while others of you are staying at home and continuing on-line education, or taking a year off.  None of these decisions are bad ones, and they all have their merits, but none of them are perfect either.

Everyone understands that.

We are SOOO excited for those of you who are trying to continue your college experience on campus or nearby.   No one wants this to work more than us, your beloved families that took you in with your heads down and and your figurative tails between your legs last spring.  We want you to be happy and let your wings take you to new places.

Ultimately, it's not up to us whether you get to stay or go, it's up to you and your fellow students.

We get that college is about finding yourself and what your career path may look like.  But, we also know that college is also about learning from mistakes, and making one or two bad decisions.

You know your Dad?  The guy who sits in his reclined La-Z-boy shouting at various sports teams while drinking his ice tea?   In college that guy was the beer pong champ in his frat four years running.  You know that children's book "Where's Waldo"?  Your dad's frat brothers used to play "Where's Frankie?" every Sunday Monday morning afternoon when they tried to find where he crashed the previous night nights.

You know your Mom?  The woman who is always after you to do your laundry, says your room is a pig sty, and is constantly asking you to bring down all the dirty dishes from your room?   Once upon a time she managed to go an entire semester without doing laundry once.   And, she lived in the same apartment her last three years of college and never changed her sheets the ENTIRE time.  When she graduated there was an imprint of her body on the sheets and the mattress below.  Legend is that they burned it all in a bonfire and the smell was so bad they had to evacuate campus.

Yeah. Your parents know a thing or two about bad choices.

The thing is, you are in a precarious position going back to college.   One bad decision could send you and all your classmates right back home, or to the dreaded quarantine dorm that every campus seems to have set up.  

THE QUARANTINE DORM.  How fun does that sound???????

We don't think that's what you really want. Is it?

If you're an upperclassmen, you've had ample opportunity to make bad choices already.  You've surely experienced a mis-deed or two, and if you haven't, maybe you're one of those kids who never will.  Good for you.  If you're a first year, you will have your chance to misbehave sometime in the future.   Someday soon a vaccine will be created and sent to a campus near you.  Then you will be free to proceed with the poor decisions until your frontal lobe finishes developing.

Believe me, when this is all over, there will be frat parties to go to, and strangers to make out with (or whatever your generation calls it) while you have your "beer goggles" on, there will be beer bongs and regular bongs and joints to hang out in and joints to smoke.   There will be dances with all those herky, jerky, twerky moves your generation enjoys doing.   There will be campus festivals where everyone is high (on life) and drinking jungle juice from red solo cups (but even in non-pandemic times please never give anyone else your cup or leave it unsupervised.  Ever.). 

Don't ask me how I know.  I just do.

As for your father and I, don't worry about us.  We just set up a ping pong table in the basement and bought a case of craft beer.   We'll save the Bud and Natty Light for you!

Note:  The writer of this blog does not condone underage drinking or drug use.    

Also Note:  The writer of this blog does not live under a rock or with a bag on her head

Also Also Note:  The writer of this blog did her laundry frequently in college (including her sheets) and her husband doesn't own a La-Z-boy, nor is his name Frankie.