The anticipation would nearly kill me each spring as I’d count down each month, week, day, hour and even minute. It seemed my whole existence as a child was to live for summer.
There were baseball and basketball camps, fishing and beach trips, lemonade and sun. It was almost as if the sun had only shown during the summer because school was such a bleak and miserable thing to a boy that wanted nothing more than to be outside, sweating and getting dirty.
But those times are gone.
I came to the realization fairly quickly upon the commencement of my first summer in college that summers as I knew them had changed for good. It was not the freedom of summer that I longed for, but the rush of college.
It took less than a week roustabouting offshore for me to figure out that there is hardly anything that lives up to fall semester in Baton Rouge.
Summertime in college is work time. It is a glimpse of what is to come with post-grad life. For most of us, it is the only chance we get to put some work experience of real value on our resume.
And ironically, it’s a much more sober three months than the nine spent enrolled in classes.
Hangovers are seldom high-fived in the office and there are only so many sick days one can take.
I spent my first four summers working outside of Baton Rouge and Louisiana. These jobs have taken me to far places, introducing me to people I never would have met. Hearing about other college experiences from co-workers — at least those who were afforded the opportunity — was a delight. I daydreamt often of what life was like at other campuses, though all else pales in comparison to football season in Death Valley.
This summer, I decided to stay in Baton Rouge and take a break. This old college town certainly slows down when June rolls around. It sure is nice to slow down with it, but it’s saddening to see how busy campus isn’t as everyone returns home or goes off interning with some corporation in some concrete jungle.
Returning to school has really become my summer. We come to school for two-thirds of the year to do some activities that require some effort, but we are constantly with friends with little to no adult supervision. Four years away at camp is basically what we’re doing here. Each fall, your compatriots reunite from their city-slicked, corporate-cubicle internship and their livers are fresh. Free Speech Plaza is loud, hipsters are throwing Frisbees on the Parade Ground and tree-huggers are napping in their hammocks in the Quad.
Magnificent, I say.
I pity the poor soul who is ever bored on this campus.
In reflection, middle and high school graduations were bittersweet. For the most part, we yearned for what was on the horizon much more than what we had just experienced. However, college summers have led on that this final graduation will lack much of that sweet and include a handful more bitterness.
Seeing that this will be my last fall as an undergraduate at LSU, I do not intend to take one second of it for granted. Perhaps, it may be the wildest one yet. I am one of the trending nine-semester graduates who are privileged to have five fall semesters under these stately oaks.
To those with this opportunity, I say seize it.
To the many of you who may be anxious to wipe your hands and be done with academia once and for all, you should remember that while you’re in college, all you have to do is just make the grade — the rest is a big party.
So enjoy school while you still can.