Chicken Limbo

Hey ya’ll, so it’s currently 5:25 a.m. and I am just beginning to write my blog post for the week. It’s dark, cold and my 12:30 p.m. test about contemporary environmental issues which most definitely is not at the top of my give a fuck list is just looming over my head. Either way, I will be prepared for the test while simultaneously completing my blog post all before 11:30 a.m.

For those of you who don’t know me very well, I am a senior at the University of Iowa meaning I am graduating this upcoming semester. Unlike most seniors, I actually have a clue and am familiar with what the next steps I am going to take in my life will look like. This past year (junior year), I randomly decided to apply for early admissions as a core member for Teach for America. I applied with the attitude of “If I get in, great. If I don’t get in, well, this wasn’t my ultimate goal in life.” The application and interview process turned out to be a 5 step process ranging from a simple submission of an online application to a full blown interview requiring you to teach lesson plan and do a little teacher-principal role play.

Well, oddly it turns out that I apparently have this natural knack for teaching orrrrrr I’m just really good at acting. I guess that’s something that I won’t discover until I actually have my own classroom full of kids with legitimate lesson plans posted on the chalky blackboard. Anyway, after spontaneously going out on a limb and applying to teach for a nonprofit organization that advocates for equal education for all children around the United States, I was accepted as a 2015 upcoming core member in May of 2014 and officially accepted my position with them in October of 2014. I am currently assigned to teach in Memphis, TN and could teach a variety of subjects K-8 grade or teach Spanish for grades 6-12. I will not know the actual grade, subject or school I will be teaching at until after my 8 week certification is completed this summer. Either way though, folks,  I better get used to corn meal and southern accents because come June I will be saying goodbye to the only state I have ever known and saying hello to a very exciting, strange place that I will call home for at least the next two years.

Senior year of college has been one of my favorite and least favorite years in college. It has been my favorite because as always my friends and I have mastered the art of being able to “YOLO” and still get our shit done. The friends I have made in college have been an awesome support system for me the past four years; have seen me cry, laugh, throw tantrums, and release bodily functions, etc. I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to go through a time of instability and growth with. On the other hand, senior year has been my least favorite year because it’s as if I am constantly on a giant rollercoaster of emotions and the ride worker forgot about me while taking a smoke break.

Senior year of college is exciting, terrifying AND most importantly confusing. It is exciting because it is your last year at a school you have so much pride for and the day which seemed forever away on your first day of chemistry freshmen year is rapidly approaching. It is terrifying because most college seniors have no idea what they’re going to do after college and living with Mom and Dad for a few months after escaping their reach for four years is the last thing anyone wants to do. It is also terrifying if you do know what you will be doing after college because it only makes your entrance into the real world more absolute. Finally, the emotion I struggle the most with this year, confusion. Senior year is confusing because one second of the day I literally am thinking about how much I cannot wait to graduate and move on to the next exciting adventure of my life and then another second of the day I’m crying because a time in which I have learned so much about myself and others around me, experienced great and awful experiences and met some of the closest people in my life, is all coming to an end. It’s like you have the door to the future halfway cracked open and can see the amazing view in which it leads to, but can’t seem to find your shoes to actually leave your front door step. This feeling of being caught in between two places is transition. You’re working on taking a leap from one stage of your life into the next and this is very, very uncomfortable for a majority of people.

I struggle with this time of transition because a part of me wonders how invested I should remain with my current life as a last semester senior in college. Is it worth it to go to school activities and meet new people or get coffee with that cute boy who sits next to you during class when in 4-5 short months all of this will be a distant memory? Then the other part of me wants to take it to the opposite extremes and doesn’t even want to think about the next steps in my life and only focus on the present. I want to spend quality time with the people who are close to me, drink way too much alcohol, try some things I wouldn’t normally try and simply enjoy the little time I have left here because once again, after 4-5 short months all of this will be a distant memory.

As graduation literally tugs at my shoulder, I have gotten better and more comfortable with both of these dissonant emotions and that I do not need to separate one from the other and in fact, when in a period of transition, the two feelings of wanting to let go and not wanting to let go are not necessarily distinguishable from one another. I have accepted this feeling of being in the middle of two life points and with talking to other people who have experienced this and are going to experience this, I understand that it is normal to feel happy, sad, afraid, uncomfortable and every other feeling in between.

I think the most uncomfortable feeling about transition is not knowing what exactly is going to happen. What if I move to Chicago and absolutely hate my new job? What if I lose touch with some of the greatest people I have met so far in my short life? What if I can’t pay off my student loans? How do I deal with and approach this new relationship that recently developed? The questions people ask themselves during a period of transition are all legitimate questions and ones that are appropriate to be concerned about, however, the answers are unobtainable until you quit actually asking the “what ifs” and just live and do. You won’t know how you will like the new job until you do it. You won’t know if you like a new city until you move there and you most certainly won’t know about how change will affect your relationships until the change actually occurs.

And college seniors let me tell you, this is all OKAY. We don’t have to have everything figured out by the time we walk across that stage and receive our diplomas. My eldest sister told me that there are times in our life for answers while some are for questions and when it’s time for the questions, we have to get okay with sitting with them and not knowing. The unknown and vulnerability of what we are experiencing and are about to experience is absolutely terrifying and extremely uncomfortable, but it is also in these moments that the best things come out of.

So, college seniors or anyone currently going through a period of transition, my advice to you as well as me is to enjoy the ride. Enjoy every moment you have left of the life you currently know with the attitude that the next phase in your life will be just as great, if not better. Think when it’s necessary but try not to over think. Live and let life direct you to where you need to be for it is in this journey that you will often find the answers. <3