Thinking of the next four years of my life kind of scares me a little bit. They will be so different from the life I am living here in Greene County. For the next four years I will be living in Tennessee and will be going to college for Intercultural Studies. I feel that it will take me a little while to get used to living in a new city in a new state. Getting used to living somewhere completely different from what I am used to will definitely be interesting. There will not be many differences living down in Tennessee than there are with me living in Greene County. One of the major differences is I will be on my own without my parents and will be going to college. There are many differences between college and high school too. It is both scary and exciting to know I will be graduating from high school and will be off to college next year.

One difference between my siblings and I with life after high school is I will still be living with my parents in the summer. Both of my brothers joined the military whilst still in high school. They left for basic training after they graduated. It has been eight years since my oldest brother JR has joined the military and four years since my brother Matthew has joined the military. We rarely see either of them because of their jobs. We see them about twice a year, sometimes only once a year. My sister got married at seventeen years old. Once she got married she moved out, had her first kid, and almost a year moved down to Florida. We rarely ever saw her either. Even though I will be going to college in Tennessee, I will be living with my mother and my stepdad in the summer. I like that I am going to be doing that though. I know there will be times where I will feel homesick and will want to come home. The closet family I will have whilst living in Cleveland, Tennessee will be my Aunt Darlene who lives two hours away from Cleveland in Georgia. Whenever I cannot come home to Pennsylvania for holidays or anything I am welcome there at her house. It is a nice feeling knowing family is so willing to welcome me into their home whenever I cannot make it home to Pennsylvania. It is scary to know I will be on my own whilst going to college, but it is reassuring to know I will be home with my parents and family during the summer time.

Managing a job whilst going to college seems like a nightmare when I think about it. Thinking about having a job whilst attending my college classes is an overwhelming thought. One thought I think about a lot is “How will I ever be able to do it?”. Even though I will not be having a job for full time, it is still quite a scary thought to know I will have all my studying to do, all my classes I have to worry about, and then I have to worry about the job that I will be having a few days a week. I know that I will have to do it and that it probably will not be as difficult as I am making it out to be, but it is still a thought that overwhelms me quite a lot at the moment.

One thing that I am both excited for and am not looking forward to is the weather down in Cleveland, Tennessee. I do not like hot weather. Summertime is my least favorite time of the year. But I do not like really cold weather either. Winter is tied with summer for my least favorite time of the year. I hate when it is extremely hot, and also when it is extremely cold. I hate when it feels like it is 100 degrees outside, and I hate when it snows. What I am looking forward to with the weather is that there will not be as much snow as we have here in the winter. Here in the winter it is below zero, snow of the ground comes up above mid-calf, the cold wind nip so hard at your face, ears, and every piece of exposed skin. Knowing I will not be here between January and March fills me with joy. It will be different to endure Tennessee weather when I am so used to Pennsylvania weather. I think it will be a good change though.

I am honestly quite scared for my life after I graduate from high school, but at the same time I am a little excited for it. So many things will change when I go to college in Tennessee. I am going to try to prepare myself for all the changes in any way that I can.