The One Where I Get on an Election Soapbox.

For starters, I am not thrilled about the way this election played out. I would not have been thrilled if it had gone the other way. I couldn't vote for either of the candidates in good conscience, for a variety of reasons that, frankly, are completely irrelevant now, as the future looms in front of us.

Elections, particularly those of a presidential nature, bring out the worst in everybody.

"Everybody is entitled to their own opinion," we say, with a muttered "but your's is wrong and I'm right" following closely behind it. 

Insults are thrown left and right in an attempt to "agree to disagree" and "explore the other side!" 

Here's the thing. 

Anger-fueled remarks are less than likely to convince somebody to see things your way. 

Removing people from your social media feed because you don't agree with them makes you as closed to their viewpoints as you accuse them of being to yours. 

To those of you that are "scared," this is not the first time a leader who doesn't support your personal beliefs has been elected, and it certainly won't be the last. 

To those of you that are "angry," you can't win them all. If you were happy with election results all of the time, someone would feel like you do all of the time. Think about it. 

To those of you wondering "how will I teach my kids about hatred, racism, bigotry, after this election," you should do it as you would if things had gone differently. You have a more direct influence over your children than anyone in the White House will--so change your house. 

To those of you that are "ashamed," you should be, of yourselves. Yes, this was an ugly race, and (at least in my eyes) neither of the candidates were good options--but that should not make you ashamed to be an American. Just because you don't agree with something does not make it shameful. Our country was built on innovation, progress, and change--and this presidential term will be a continuation of those. Change is not easy. It's not comfortable. And it's not something we agree with all of the time. But your reaction to this change says more about you than it does about the change itself. 

The President of the United States does not have any easy job, and that's without factoring in the reality that half of the country, and maybe more, hates them and everything they stand for. 

You may not agree with who is in office, but the office deserves your respect, as long as you are an American citizen enjoying the freedoms and liberties that come along with it. 

I may not be thrilled with the way things turned out--but I am grateful I have the ability to speak my frustrations, enact change, and live how I wish...and I'm still proud to be an American. 

Personal time machine.

*shuffle songs*

A couple chords, the all too familiar "oh, her eyes, her eyes" and it's junior year all over again, from the front seat of a blue Mazda listening to the boy you like talk about hockey and tease you about failing AP Biology on our way to another hockey game.

*skip*

"Some songs will always be better live," you think as What if You Don't comes on and you and your best friend are hearing it for played live for the first time and you get the same goosebumps you did then.

*skip*

It's the one you played on repeat the night he broke your heart.

*skip*

It's the middle of August, but Jay Z and JT will always feel like the Fourth of July and pulling into Huntsville with Nan and Hillary after Holy Grail played on the radio for the first time.

*skip*

Jon Mclaughlin sings "You're in my arms, and all the world is calm" and that same boy is dancing you around the parking lot in the rain and those three minutes and 52 seconds are the sweetest thing your 17-year-old self has ever seen and six years later you hope he's happy.

*skip*

"Tonight! Tonight! There's a party on the rooftop, top of the world" and you crack a smile that's partially a wince because this one feels like running 11 miles and you'd like to get it over with.

*skip*

A foreign rhythm starts playing and now it's 3 am on the Devil's Backbone and you and your best friends have your Pussycat Dolls parts down cold and can perform them on demand months later even though you still don't really know what "Jai ho" or "Baila baila" mean.

*skip*

You laugh out loud when Enrique tells you he can be your hero because you remember the boy who sang this one to you over the phone when you were in ninth grade.

*skip*

It's the one you played the night you broke his heart.

*skip*

Your hidden love for Avril Lavigne doesn't hide very well while you yell about how you still think you would have been a better girlfriend, despite the fact that you were in 8th grade then and being his girlfriend probably would have made it hard for him to still be your friend after almost 15 years.

*skip*

You catch your breath as the Dirty Guv'nahs sing about meeting her halfway to Birmingham because those words feel like leaving what you love, and when Spotify put it on your Year in Review as a "You ventured into the unknown with this track," you couldn't help but think that's exactly what it had felt like when you met the boy who showed it to you.

*skip*

A new favorite comes on, with lyrics you can't sing all the way yet and key changes you don't quite know and you let this one play through, because right now, it's just a song, not yet a part of the time machine.

The highlight reel.

Four years ago, walking across the stage with 980 other students in brown and gold was the biggest thing I'd ever done.
Four years, and what seems like a lifetime later, I'm beginning to realize how incredibly wrong I was.
Since the second I set foot in my dorm-room apartment in Snow Hall my freshman year,  I've heard echoes of neighbors and friends and family members telling me how I was "doing college right," and just how fun everything looked.
They're right.
Some days, it was the worst and I just wanted to go home to my mom and I won't deny that, but for most of the last four years I've been spinning in this state of wonder at the things that were happening.

Tomorrow when we wake up, everything is going to be pretty much exactly how it was today and completely different at the same time. Today, we're part of a special group of people, a community, an Aggie family if you will. In Marina Keegan's speech/essay "The Opposite of Loneliness," she puts into words the feelings I can't quite wrap my head around. "[USU] is full of tiny circles we pull around ourselves. Acapella groups, sports teams, houses, societies, clubs. These tiny groups that make us feel loved and safe and part of something even on our loneliest nights when we stumble home to our computers--partnerless, tired, awake. We won't have those next year. We won't live on the same block as all our friends. We won't have a bunch of group texts. This scares me. More than finding the right job or city or spouse, I'm scared of losing this web we're in. This elusive, indefinable, opposite of loneliness. This feeling I feel right now." 

For the last three years, I've hated being the one that got left behind. Now, I'm scared to be the one leaving people behind. 
I'm that nervous kind of excited that twists your stomach in knots and makes you bounce up and down with anticipation, but I'm equally as terrified. I'm walking into a new house, a new job, and a new city, and leaving behind a place that holds four years worth of magic and memories and heartbreak and love and a large part of who I am. 

Because college for me was a dream, but it was so many other things too.

It was all-night study sessions and endless amounts of brownie batter and popcorn with "Call Your Girlfriend" playing in the background.
It was saying goodbye to the first boy I really loved, and watching his truck pull out of my driveway while the realization that I didn't know if the goodbye's we'd just said were for two years or forever.
It was sending my best friends on missions, holding down the Single Snitch fort, and watching old friends meet new friends.
It was the sound of the Sweetheart song, the sound of Logan Canyon's wind, and the smell of Charlie's seven minutes before close. 

It was countless ice cream runs when things didn't work out, and dancing like fools at wedding receptions when they did.
It was ethnic hair care products, Nutella Banana Bread, and heading to the Lonely Bench with the Snitches when things got overwhelming. 
It was waiting for P-Day, waking up for pre-meeting, and Monday's pin attire.
It was jumping--not just stepping--out of my comfort zone and trying something everything new: kissing a boy in front of 200 freshmen in the name of student orientation, putting stereotypes on hold for sorority recruitment, and giving a thousand new friends a chance.

It was a boy I fell in love with, a girl I learned to live with, a professor who changed my mind, and several dozen people who changed my life.
It was giving up old dreams and setting out after new ones.
It was refusing to join a sorority, and not being able to stop the tears three years later as I said goodbye to the house that had become home.
It was moving in with strangers, saying "yes" to everything, and dyeing my hair purple.
It was breaking rules and making rules and speed-walking away from hot-tub-rule-enforcing landlords in the middle of the night.

It was paint-fight Twister, Tuesday Tacos, and $1 movie theater popcorn without the movie.
It was watching my best friends fall in love, fraternity formals, and being the only real winners during the world's longest game of hide and seek.
It was midnight drives through the canyon and more spoken word poetry than I can fit on a single playlist.

It was peachy dews and peachy penguins and not nearly enough dollar nug nights. 

It was "family dinner," and Strata [almost] all-nighters and mission farewells and wedding receptions.
It was Snow 102, Pineview 35, and everything that happened in Room 22. 
It was SOAR days and burrito truck runs and falling in love with a little town with bad air and too much snow.
It was worlds colliding, and hearts breaking, and new beginnings. 

Today, we walked into a new chapter of who we are, but I found a lot of who I am in this little town.
I fell in love with a place where the sagebrush grows because of the things that happened here.
I discovered a sense of adventure in it's nooks and crannys and all of your canyons. 
I found my best friends, an education I'm passionate about, and a real idea of who I am within this little valley. 
I made it through eight hellish finals weeks, two dramatic breakups, three incredible summers, and four of the most challenging but rewarding years of my life. 

Here's to you, USU. Thanks for everything.