I reached a monumental milestone this past week: having to celebrate a holiday alone.
There comes a time in one’s life, which most likely occurs within the 20’s, of not returning home for the holidays. Unfortunately, due to COVID, this seems to be occurring for a lot of people right now. It’s a weird transitional period, it offers little to no lessons on life and can be dismantling to an established routine and the usual serotonin release. However, it’s absolutely pivotal.
If I can speak candidly, growing up sucks. This is not new information. I’m sure most of my fellow University of Idaho students agree. The attachment of new expenses along with the overshadowing anxiety paired with daily tasks are, quite frankly and for a lack of better word, lame.
Coming to college almost two years ago opened my eyes to a whole world of failure and success. I was eager and scared to open the doors presented to me, knowing at any moment everything I worked for could come crashing down onto me. Despite that possibility, one thing rooted me in my societal progression. The thought of returning home for a brief break.
And hey, I don’t want this to sound like I’m homesick. I hate going home just as much as I enjoy it. I hate having my newly acquired freedoms from being hundreds of miles away stripped from me and my friends. But I would be lying if it wasn’t refreshing to the smallest degree.
As a kid, I always looked forward to the holiday season. From Thanksgiving to the first snow day of the year to Christmas to New Years. It was a magical time where my 12-year-old self felt no pressure. My childhood innocence was still intact. Even today I still feel most innocent during this time period.
Returning home for the holidays was my chance to relive the blissful feeling of lying in bed all day, bored out of my mind. It was my chance to have someone else make me food with some substance. It was my chance to be sort of a kid again, just for a moment. And it didn’t happen this year.
Let me digress. This doesn’t matter and, in all reality, no one cares. But I know most students can relate. I know we all want to be kids sometimes. It’s hard not being one anymore. However, as I’ve learned this year, it’s the most logical step of progression toward inevitably becoming an individual adult. In order to make next steps into the world, I must spend a holiday alone. I must face the financial struggles of paying for Thanksgiving. I must humor the notion of pure maturity when alone.
That’s OK. Like I said, it doesn’t matter. This isn’t that big of a deal. But no one talks about it, and there’s a good conversation to be had here.
The growing pains of going to college still reverberate throughout the years, whether you’ll admit it or not. And probably throughout life, too. Who knows? I know that I’m feeling it this year. And I’ll feel it the next, and the next and probably again after that.
That’s life—I suppose.
Carter Kolpitcke can be reached at [email protected].