In a few weeks, I will be a Neumann University graduate, and that means I may never step foot on this campus again.
Family, friends, staff, basically everyone keeps asking me how I feel. I wish I had a better answer for them.
Honestly, I am not sure if I feel anything. I expected this moment to be bittersweet, to feel both accomplished and a little heartbroken. That is how my fellow seniors feel anyway.
Maybe it is because my college journey did not start with Neumann, because I once imagined a different ending. I thought I would be graduating somewhere else, as a Husky, not a Knight.
Since transferring, I have been fairly involved at Neumann, helping with NeuMedia and joining the admissions team as a navigator. But as much as I have immersed myself, Neumann never truly felt like MY school.
There is a difference between belonging somewhere and learning how to exist there comfortably. I did the latter well.
I learned how to move through this place while I was still figuring out who I was within it. And now that I am finally starting to recognize, and even like, the person I am becoming, I am already on my way out.
People tell me it has just yet to hit me, and I will miss being here when I leave. I do not doubt them. I am sure nostalgia will come for me eventually, just as it always does.
But nostalgia is a mind’s trick, presenting the past through rose-colored glasses. It is not representative of my actual time here. It softens the edges and fills in the gaps.
Make no mistake, there are plenty of people I am glad to have met here. And Neumann has presented me with opportunities that I am grateful for.
But gratitude does not always come with attachment.
Some places shape you deeply. Others simply pass through your life. For me, Neumann was somewhere in between, and I think that is enough. Maybe more than enough.
So with that, I say goodbye, Neumann. I am not sure we ever fully understood each other; maybe that is why letting go feels so easy.
