People say that your college years are the best years of your life and you know what, in a way, these people (whoever they may be) are right. You'll never get back those years of drinking until three in the afternoon before passing out in a pile of your own vomit. You'll never have more terrible sex with more greasy partners and you'll never eat so many packets of crisps for breakfast. Though I'm not that long out of college, it seems as though it happened in or around ten years ago. It's now but a fond and blurry memory. What have I learned from my college years, you ask? Well, let me tell you...
1) Money Isn't Worth A Shit
My parents used sarcasm on me a lot as a child. Maybe they thought they were being completely hilarious but I spent a large portion of my young life being really confused when they talked about the money tree in the back garden. It's only now, aged twenty four and with roughly enough money in my bank account to buy nothing larger than a small packet of chewing gum, that I can appreciate what they were on about. Money is shit. Unless you're born rich and therefore inherit a massive salary ridden job, then most people will know what I'm on about and never is this as true as when you're in college. From searching for bus money under the sink, to ringing home for 'book money', I've done it all and learned absolutely nothing from it.
2) No Matter How Many Times That Alcohol Almost Kills You, You Will Never Learn
My first true drunken experience resulted in me vomiting purple all over myself and then having to fake car sickness to my mother in order to fool her. It worked a treat by the way. If only I was intelligent, that experience alone would have put the fear into me and I'd have sworn off the drink for the rest of my life. No. Instead, I now spend entire weekends suffering for nights that I can't even remember. I have vomited from windows, into many toilets and in public bins and yet I still crave a good pint from time to time. Pub?
3) People Are Mean
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Stupidly, I thought that once I left school, I'd be leaving behind the crowds of hell-raising bitches too. How wrong I was. Sure, it's on a much lesser scale, but you still need to accept the fact that some people are dicks. Plain and simple. Whether it's some loud mouthed society twat who comes in at the start of lectures and tells (yes, tells) everyone to vote for him (not a hope mate), or your passive aggressive housemate who creates tension for three months if you eat a slice of toast anywhere that isn't out the window, accept that it's ok to hate some people and life will be so much easier.
4) Getting Up In The Morning Never Gets Any Easier
I am not a morning person. I never have been and never, ever will be. For as long as I can remember, my least favorite part of the day was dragging myself from my little nest of heaven. This was bad in school when it was my mother waking me, but when you're in college and it's your tinny alarm going off ahead of Philosophy or some other made up module, then it's a whole other ball game. At one stage, when I was living in what was surely the worlds shittest house, I used to get dressed in bed and then regularly fall back to sleep, which, somehow, defeated the purpose of waking up at all.
5) Pasta Every Day Is Not A Substantial Diet
This may come as a shocker but yes, really, pasta is not a real and substantial diet. After spending between three to four years surviving on pasta and cereal alone, you will never again want a plate of some fine dried penne. You may think that you're the next Jamie Oliver because you lobbed some vegetables into your sauce but here's a reality check, cop the fuck on and make yourself a salad. I've hardly looked back, it's cereal only once a day for me now.
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6) Lecturers Can Be Wankers Too
In school, teachers fell into three categories. The ones who hated you, the ones who loved you and the ones who weren't all that sure whether you existed or not. So you bid them farewell and look forward to general animosity and not being pinned down, until you discover that lecturers couldn't give three toots about whether or not you fall down the stairs. Still, at least they won't tell the parents on you. Hopefully.
7) You Have To Live In Your Fair Share Of Shitholes
You really don't realise what you've got until it's gone. As in, until you leave the safe and comforting recesses of your home. Of waking up to warm radiators, boiled kettles and clean sheets. Then you jump headfirst into the first moderately roofed building that you lay eyes on and you discover a newer, shitter way of life. Mould, cold water, bin stains, dirty floors and an ever lingering smell of food is your life now. Going home to 'see the family' is really an excuse for proper food and feeling clean, if even for two days. Not to worry, after college you'll just progress to something slightly less shit. My house now, for example, is barely mouldy at all. See? Progressing.
8) You Have No Idea What Cold Is Until You Go To College
No really, you don't. I honestly, hand on heart, used to think that my home house was cold. Then during the coldest winter this country has ever seen since 1947 or something to that effect, I thought about it again and decided that I was talking bullshit. Going to bed wearing full scale snow fight gear constitutes it being cold. Going to bed at 8pm to warm up, means it's baltic. Sprinting from the shower to the radiator? Yep, it's cold. So very cold....
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9) There Comes A Stage Where You Realise That You Can't Ask Your Parents For Money Any More
And this is a very sad moment indeed. Some parents are fantastic at helping their kids through college (mine included) but then, usually one month after final exams, you start getting bombarded with questions about 'where your life is going' and 'when are you moving out'. No pressure there. They're just subtly suggesting that you get a real job, move out, stop badgering them for money and grow up, all within the next month, preferably. It's a sad time for us all (all but your parents).
10) Relationships Plus College Can Be Tricky
It's a time when ninety percent of people are telling you to go out and have a great time playing the field but then, probably when you least expect it, you'll meet someone that you'll actually kind of want to be with. A lot of college life lends itself well to being single. Piss ups, lie ins, banging your housemates, going out on the pull, bored nights in with Facebook....Get into a relationship if you HAVE to, but you might be missing out on bucketloads of fun. Just saying....
11) All Nighters Ruin Your Life
There's no two ways about it. All nighters will genuinely ruin you from the inside out and make every single task far more difficult than it needs to be. Your brain will feel as though it's on fire, your body will hurt, you'll feel more tired than you ever thought possible. Nothing good ever comes from pulling all nighters, apart from catching up on that entire series on Netflix, that is. The moral of this story is that all nighters ruin your life, multiple times over. Don't do it.
