“Growing up is never easy. You hold on to things that were. You wonder what’s to come. But that night, I think we knew it was time to let go of what had been and look ahead to what would be. Other days, now days, days to come. The thing is, we didn’t have to hate each other for getting older. We just had to forgive ourselves for growing up. ” – The Wonder Years

Four years ago…

We opened our lockers for the first time, looked at our schedules, thought about how great it was to finally be in high school.

Four years ago we met our best friend, we went to our first school dance, had a crush on a cute senior. Four years ago, we couldn’t wait to get older.

Three years ago…

Three years ago we stepped into high school believing that we owned the place. No longer the lowly freshman, we had a new attitude. Still individuals searching for themselves, looking to fit in, wanting to achieve something. We followed our daily routines, expanded our circle of friends, and talked about parties. Three years ago we made a new best friend, went to sweet sixteen’s every weekend, thought we were too mature for school dances. Three years ago we couldn’t wait to get older.

Two years ago…

Two years ago we became upper classmen. We began to realize that we were growing up. We got our licenses, started driving out on weekends. Two years ago we realized who our true friends were and cherished the times we spent with them. We found where we fit in, yet still seemed to be looking for something else. Two years ago we started talking about college, thinking it was still so far away. We had our junior prom, got our rings, realized that time really does fly. But two years ago we still couldn’t wait to get older.

One year ago…

One year ago we entered the school as seniors. We had senioritis before classes even resumed, we got to leave school early and come in late. Everything we did was the last … our last homecoming pep rally, our last season in a sport, our last birthday at home. One year ago we took our time together for granted, we went to party after party on the weekend, we rebelled, and we learned. One year ago, we still had the same best friend and cherished time spent with them. We started applying to college, far and near. We got accepted, we got rejected, we found exactly where we wanted to go. We realized that we would no longer have the comfort of home within a year.

Now…

Now, we finally realize that we could have waited to get older. We realize that time has somehow slipped away and soon we will be saying good-bye. Saying good-bye to our friends, our family, our home. Maybe for a short time … maybe forever. Soon we will go to our senior prom, graduate, sit for the last time with everyone. It is the last time we will all be together, recognized as the class of 2003. Now we are getting excited about starting over, getting sad about what we will leave behind, getting anxious to move on. Now we realize just how important our best friends are, how much fun we really did have in the four years. Now we wish we could be younger. We wish we could have taken the time to appreciate every moment . . . to slow down time. Now we face having to say good-bye. In one year we will return as different people. We will have experienced dorm life, ate campus food, met new friends. We will have joined a club, maybe a sorority, done something new. In one year we will be new people. We will still be searching for our identity…to find our niche. We will have picked majors, changed majors, passed and failed at things we tried. In one year we will know more about ourselves and what we want to become. We will remember the past times and look fondly at the memories, although we will have created new memories. Yet one thing will still remain. In one year, we will still have that same best friend. Maybe since kindergarten, maybe since high school, maybe a college roommate. That person can be found in new friends and old. Without them, we would have nothing. Four years brought change. Friendship held us strong when things were shaky, in good times and bad, in laughter and tears, through boyfriends/girlfriends, bad grades, family problems, and love . . . our friends showed us that life was worth enjoying. With them, we wanted to grow up so quickly. Now, they are the only ones with whom we will remain forever young.

For the In-College or College-Bound

Maybe the time has gone, the faces, I recall. But things in this life change very slowly, if they ever change at all….The scary part being that we’ve all been hit with change lately, and it doesn’t seem to have come slowly at all. Do you remember the day you left home? I’m sure that you do. But I’ll bet that what you remember even more clearly were the days in the week before you left. You know……the days that you spent getting addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses and trying to figure out how to say good-bye to everyone that you’ve loved for as long as you could remember.

Do you remember standing by your best friend’s car one night, after midnight, trying to sum up the meaning of a friendship you’d managed to maintain through thick and thin for years? Do you remember how hard that was, to think of how to say good-bye to that one person? It was nearly impossible, wasn’t it, to give them that one last hug and turn around and walk inside?

I’ll bet the part of what you remember was the night before you left, kissing your boyfriend or girlfriend good-bye one last time. Just knowing that you’d have to turn around and walk back inside was almost motivation enough not to leave. Stepping back to take one last look at that person you love–it’s really scary. And you go and you tell yourself that you won’t ever find someone new. You won’t ever replace your old friends. You’ll never falling in love again.

It’s really crazy,what kinds of things can happen when you don’t mean for them to. You get to a new place full of strangers. You meet people who forget you. You forget people who you meet. But sometimes, you come across some extra ordinarily special people. They have tears to shed, too. They also left people that they love behind. They’re still in love with that guy or girl back home where they used to live, and they all want someone to talk to. So you talk. Talk is good. You form bonds you never thought you’d form. You call your old friends and tell them about the new ones. Sometimes, they don’t understand. Sometimes, you hurt their feelings. Sometimes everyone is a bit jealous. You miss your boyfriend. Or your girlfriend.

One day you’re sitting in the park, thinking about all that stuff you didn’t want to leave, and a stranger sits down near you. Sometimes that person stays a stranger. Other times you talk to him or her. Sometimes you experience things you didn’t want to ever happen. You become interested in a person that isn’t your boyfriend or girlfriend at home. Sometimes college is really complicated.

Sometimes you stay together, other times you break up. Sometimes you think you’ve done the wrong thing by coming so far away from home. And sometimes when you start thinking like this, it’s time to make a change. So when this happens, you sit down and turn on your stereo, and that song “Leaving on a Jet Plane” from the Armageddon soundtrack is on, or The Eagles “Sad Cafe” song, and you wonder if you can still recall all the faces from your past. So, you pick up the phone and you call them all just to say, “Hi, I love you, I’m thinking about you.” And then just as an after thought you say, “You know, I’m really learning a lot from college. I wish you would visit all of my friends. They would love you. And you would love them. They’re very important to me.”

Because, after all this is college. And college is a growing experience. Growing experiences cause change is hard. But whatever doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger.

So call your parents. Call your siblings. Call your best friend. Or your boyfriend or girlfriend. Or even your ex, if that’s how it worked out. Tell them hello. Tell them that you miss and love them. And then, turn off your stereo, walk out of your dorm room. Go to a new friend’s room and give them a big hug and say, “Thanks so much for being here. I love you.”

You learn a lot when you go to college. You learn that pulling an all-nighter means staying up all night to study for a test you will then sleep through. You learn to appreciate the taste of beer-the cheapest of all alcoholic beverages. You learn that you can roll out of bed 10 minutes before class and go to class looking like shit-and no one will notice or care. You learn youreally can do things for yourself without your parents looking over your shoulder–but you also learn you never realized how nice it was to have them there, just in case. More than anything, however, you learn how much your friends really mean to you. College friends come to mean a lot to you, but they can never compare your friends from home. Your friends from home teach you the meaning of friendship during your college years. Because you are apart from them you tend to express your feelings more — you learn how much these people truly affect your life.

You’ve got your best friend who exemplifies friendship-she calls at least once a week, sends email every day, and even sends you real mail. You feel like you never left each other…she still knows everything about you, and even over the Internet can tell when something is wrong. She teaches you that distance doesn’t have to change a friendship at all. Then there is your other best friend. She rarely calls or writes and she doesn’t do the email thing. At times you think she has forgotten about you…until you hear from her. You hear from her for the first time in almost two months-and nothing has changed. You are still you and she is still her –even though you never talk you are as close as ever, you are still the best of friends. You find yourself expressing to her just how much she means to you — because you realize it now more than ever. She teaches you that true friends are friends in the soul…separation can tear them apart.

Then there are those friends that you sort of lost touch with those last few months of high school and during the summer. You were busy, they were busy…but somehow, the magic of email has brought you closer together than you ever were in four years at the same school. You share secrets, heartache, and joy…it’s another person who cares about you as long as you will care about them too. Away from all the pettiness of high school, you’ve finally formed an adult relationship…and you realize just how great a friend this person is suddenly, the people that you thought for sure you would lose touch with in college are the ones you’re keepin closest contact with–and you miss them more than you ever thought possible. Sadly enough, there are also the friends that you were closest to in high school who drift too far for you to hold onto. You’ve both changed and suddenly you don’t have much to say to each other. But these people teach you a lesson too they make you value the others, the ones you have stayed close to, that much more. These distant friends, though you miss them when you rarely think of them, show you who your forever friends really are-and they make you appreciate those forevers much more than before.

College is rough. College severs some bonds and solidifies others…it puts a distance between you and the ones you love. But it teaches you so much. It forces your real friends to come to the front, while the rest take their places in the shadows of your memories. In college you lose some people — but through real friendship and the strength of the soul (which is where real friends join as one) you keep the ones you will need most in your life. You learn the real meaning of the quote: “If you press me to say why we were friends, I can say no more than it was because she was she and I was I.” The people who fit that mold are your forever friends.

For the In-College or College-Bound

“You start out life with a clean slate. Then you begin to make your mark. You face decisions, make choices. You keep moving forward. But sooner or later there comes a time where you look back over where you have been…and wonder who you really are.” – The Wonder Years

“All these places had their moments, with lovers and friends I still can recall…in my life I’ve loved them all.” – The Beatles

“I’m down for whatever, no matter how you act. You never gotta worry, cause I always got your back! Our memory lasts forever, and never does it die! True friends stay together forever, and never say goodbye.”

“We met as total strangers and ended as lifetime friends, we shared a season of our lives, but every season has to end.”

“Are you freakin’ NUTS?!?!? Where is your soul, man!? You just gonna cast me aside like an old pair of shoes! We have to say goodbye for an hour!” – Boy Meets World

“Here’s to the moments where we didn’t think about right and wrong, where we just lived, crossed our fingers and hoped for the best.”

“In seventh grade you are what other people say you are. When it comes down to it, you don’t remember the people you tried to impress. ” – The Wonder Years

“We had many laughs over the years, a couple of good stories, I hope no one hears. It’s great together, the time that we spend. I’m lucky to have you as my best friend.”

“No one can look back on his schooldays and say with truth that they were altogether unhappy.” – George Orwell

“A lot of people think the purpose of school is for students to learn how to function as a community. How to get along. Assimilate. It’s not. You are here to discover and develop your strength as an individual. That strength comes from within you, from facing your greatest fears and from not backing down when no one listens or cares or agrees. When I look at this crowd tonight, I see a room full of people who have chosen to harness their power as individuals. And regardless of the outcome of this fight — I thank you, all of you.” – Dawson’s Creek

“It was the end of something simple and the beginning of something else.”

“I remember a place. . . a town, a house like a lot of other houses. . . a yard like a lot of other yards. . . a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is. . . after all these years, I still look back. . . with wonder.” – The Wonder Years

“And so our adventure ends. And some of us found our heroes, and others unconquered their fears. And one might even say we’ve triumphed. I’m not sure if it happened that day or that summer but somehow, we all felt older and different. I knew I’d never forget any of it and I decided I wasn’t gonna let it end because I realized we’re not just given life experience, we’re given the experience of life.” – Young Americans

“I’m gonna stay eighteen forever, so we can stay like this forever. And we’ll never miss a party cause we keep them going constantly. And we’ll never have to listen to anyone about anything, cause it’s all been done and it’s all been said we’re the coolest kids and we take what we can get.” – Brand New, “SoCo Amaretto Lime”

“Well I guess this is growing up.” – Blink 182

“You only have a once in a lifetime buddy, once in a lifetime.” – The Little Rascals

“Looking back on all these years, all the smiles all the tears, I never want those memories to fade.” – MxPx

“Your whole life is about to change in a way that it will never be the same again. You’re opening a new chapter, and you have to give a proper goodbye to the old one. You don’t want to miss these moments, even the sad ones, because you’ll never get them back again.” – Dawson’s Creek

“She’s had eighteen years to get ready for this day. She should be past the tears, she cried some anyway.. oh, letting go, there’s nothing in her way now, there’s room enough to fly.. and even though, she’s spent her whole life waiting, its never easy: Letting go.”- Suzy Bogguss, “Letting Go”

“The most beautiful discovery true friends can make, is that they can grow separately without growing apart.”

“There are some things from our high school experiences that we will carry with us for the rest of our lives and some memories that we chose to forget. But when we look back at those experiences, we’ll see our friends, the ones who got us through everything, and we’ll realize how lucky we are to have them.”

“So the only thing I could think of that unites us all, that we all have in common, is that we all start out in kindergarten thinking we can be anything we want to be. And by the time we get here, we’ve all lost that feeling. We’ve all started to believe whatever our friends or our parents have told us about what we can achieve in life and who we can be. And we’ve forgotten about the possibility we had when we were younger. That’s the one thing we all have in common, so that’s what the symbol on this mural means: possibility. I painted it because I thought we all could use a little daily reminder of the fact that if you believe in yourself, even when the odds seem stacked against you, anything is possible.” – Dawson’s Creek

“One day we’ll wave ‘hello’ and wish we’d never waved ‘goodbye.’”

“Goodbye yesterday, now it’s over and done. Still I hope somewhere deep in your heart, yesterday will live on.” – Journey

“The years go by. The time, it does fly. Every single second is a moment in time that passes oh so quick and it seems like nothing. But when you’re looking back . . . well, it amounts to everything.” – Catch 22

“I never thought those times would last forever, but now that they’re gone, I’m pretty sure we grew up too fast.” – The Ataris, “not a worry in the world”

“Crazy friends provide for crazy times and what crazy times we’ve had.”