So. Here we are again.

It’s three a.m. and you’re staring at the shadow-darkened ceiling, not sure what to do. You need to study for the AP Tests which are in two weeks … you haven’t even started. You need to do that one assignment for history which was due three days ago. You need to type up your entire second semester journal for creative writing. You need to actually remember the day of the week. But it’s when you close your eyes and try to sleep that you think of the things that really scare you.

In just a few weeks you will graduate from high school. This you are undeniably happy about. Excited, elated and not a bit scared. Two and a half months later you will leave for college. Your eyes fly open and stare your bedroom ceiling. There isn’t panic, not yet, quite fear … but something is stirring. An ache in your chest you’ve never really felt before. Your wide-open eyes shift from the ceiling to the dark outlines of the walls and furniture. You memorize it, though you already know it by heart. This is home. And yet, soon you will be living in a different city, in a different building, in a different room, next to a stranger.

You toss and turn, upset with yourself for thinking these annoyingly striking thoughts. When you toured the campus you were ready to pitch camp on the lawn and start your new life right then! You wanted to study Biology, Psychology, Astrology, Philosophy, Anthropology and so much more! You were ready!

But now you can’t help but think about what needs to be done before you go. You remember the advice that your older friend had given you; take with you things that will remind you of home. But when you start to make that mental list you find you can’t fit everything in your suitcase. How could one fit their entire life in a single suitcase? Posters, drawings, books, journals, knick-knacks all take precedence in your mind over clothes and shoes and textbooks. But the later objects are things that you really need, and room for the former dwindle until you are left with nothing but difficult decisions.

There is so much that you planned to do … You were going to start running every day. You were going to try and find a way to love your job. You were going to spend all your free time with family and friends. You were going to re-read the Harry Potter series. You were going to go see so many movies. You were going to fall in love. You were going to have my heart broken. You were going to have more confidence. You were going to have more bravery. You were not going to be scared.

But how could you be anything but scared in the situation you’re walking into. This is going to be the first time in your life that you make all your own decisions. You will be alone in this new world, choosing classes and friends and futures. This sounds exciting by itself, and yet you remember that you’re not ready to makes these choices. You are a child. To your parents, to your family, to most of society in the long run. And now, to yourself. You see it in the over-protective eyes of your parents. You see it in the mirror every now and then. And you really see it in the shadow of those great scholars that you’ve always wanted to be. They have years of experience that is both academic and personal. You are just a little eighteen-year-old trying to spread your wings and make all the right decisions. All the wrong people tell you that you’re ready, but when it comes down to it you realize that you are definitely not. What if you mess up? What if you make all the wrong decisions? What if your world crashes and burns and there’s no one to pick up the pieces but you?

Then you’ll pull yourself together and begin again.

Those idols of yours had to start somewhere, and many of them burned up completely before reaching glory. And while you may be young and unprepared, you have to start making decisions for yourself sometime. There has never been an easy way to leave the proverbial nest, but in this case, the sooner the better. If you wait it will only be harder to leave it all behind. You will miss your home and family and friends and life, but you have new adventures to begin elsewhere. Adventures you’ll remember for the rest of your life if you do it right. As for that list of things you were going to do – life is short! Half that stuff you were never going to do (Running? Really?) and the other half you can start this very second. A small percent will come in time. Don’t rush the time you have left, but don’t stretch it out too far. Enjoy it while it is here and wave good-bye gracefully as you face the future. Besides, you’ll always be back next summer.

It is three-thirty a.m. and you’re staring at the ceiling. You close your eyes and will yourself not to begin tossing and turning again. Everything will be fine.

And yet you know you’ll find yourself awake again tomorrow.