When I was a freshman, a very important friend of mine who was graduating wrote me a letter before she left.
It detailed the ins and outs of college and gave insight on how to navigate through the highs and lows I'd inevitably face. She stressed the notions of spending time with friends and of truly making the most of every second as it passed.
To be completely honest, I didn't appreciate it when I read it then. It seemed like advice I'd heard a million times in the past about any experience - people have been telling me to "make the most of " things since I was old enough to understand what that even meant.
Yet, three years later, when I have only a smidge of time left in Buffalo, I finally see the true value of her words. My friend's letter holds some of the same secrets I've learned throughout my time here, secrets I planned to share with any youngins who might read my farewell column.
But though hindsight offers the best advice you can give a person, without that hindsight, it's hard to appreciate the advice when you get it. So instead of wasting words and excellent,expert advice on those who won't appreciate it until it's too late, I'm just going to say ... thank you.
Thank you to every professor who ever held a lecture I didn't have to fight the urge to sleep through.
Thank you to the kind women who work at Berts, who've endearingly called me "baby" each time they rung up my food and even once let me slide when I didn't have enough campus cash to pay in full.
Ironically, thank you to the people in charge of the infamous anti-abortion display, not only for curbing my excessive appetite for a couple of hours, but also for enabling me to watch my peers protest and actually give a damn about something real - an experience that restored my faith in our generation, if only for a couple of days.
Thank you to the amazing people I've met, whose relationships made my time here worthwhile. Thank you to my sorority, and to my coworkers at The Spectrum: You've proven to me that life is much more rewarding with a diverse social circle.
And thank you to the ridiculous and horrible people I've managed to stay away from, too - if nothing else, you've provided me plenty of entertainment from afar.
Thanks to all of you, I'll leave college feeling fulfilled and more prepared for the real world than I ever thought I would when I entered school. And though I may not have been able to treasure each moment of college as it occurred, because of you all, I have reasons to wish I had.
Email: lisa.delatorre@ubspectrum.com
