Growing Up Essay, Research Paper
Growing Up
It was August 1998, a few days before I started college. I was waiting with anticipation not knowing what to expect the big college life was going to bring. Each day that would get closer would feel like I was in a vice that was getting tighter and tighter, until one day I thought my head was going to pop. But then the day finally came.
College life was, as I had expected, was full of exciting events and people. The innovative ideas and the breadth of knowledge of my instructors and classmates impressed me. The city itself fascinated me with its freedom in the atmosphere and the exchange of the newest ideas in its small cafes and coffee shops. I observed my surroundings with hungry eyes, hunting for excitement, yet something else surprised me more. I found myself getting lost and my life a little out of control. In the morning there was no longer someone watching and making sure that I got up on time for the classes. I would wake up and find that my first class was over half an hour ago. Borrowing notes and making up missed work always made me feel that I was trying to catch an airplane by riding a bicycle. I also discovered that many things did not just “happen”; they had to be “done.” At home, the only thing that I had to do with dirty clothes was to throw them into a basket. They would disappear automatically and then appear inside the drawers the next day folded, clean and with the faint scent of fabric softener. Now the magic no longer worked. The pile of dirty clothes would just get higher and higher unless I carried them to the laundry room and fed annoying machines some quarters.
At home, a cold or flu was nothing dreadful. When I was sick, I only had to transform myself into a three-year-old baby. If I needed a cold pack, it would be placed on my forehead. Now nothing could just be pulled out of the air, and the world was no different from what it was because I was sick. The rules were the rules. I still had to take tests and turn in papers even when my brain was not functioning under a fever of 105 degrees Fahrenheit and my sinuses were more congested than New York City’s traffic.
Everything had become my responsibility. I could blame the alarm clock for not ringing loud enough or accuse the flu viruses for attacking me, but the fact that I missed classes and got sick did not change. I was still responsible for everything. There was no way out.
No wonder people used the term “homesick.” When I was eating my tenth bag of Ramen Noodles, the smell of the homemade noodles, vegetables and the pepper in the soup of Mom’s home cooking and how they used to stimulate my nose and taste buds suddenly became vivid sensations. The desire to have a cup of hot tea and allowing the brown liquid to run all the way down through esophagus to the empty stomach became some unattainable dream. Where was I going to find those old memories, and when was I going to experience them again?
The only answer I could find to that question was in my dreams. Reality had finally come over me. I am an adult now; I?m on my own no one to look over my responsibilities and me.
This is my home.