The Original Second Home

This past summer I traveled from my home where I lived during my first year of law school back to my hometown. On the 10+ hour drive I passed the exit to my undergraduate university. I couldn't resist making a quick pit stop at my original second home. I remember when I graduated two years ago I really felt that I would never have an educational institution hold the same feeling of community to me. I had listened to Vitamin C's Graduation Song throughout the majority of that two and a half hour car ride home. I had cried throughout the majority of that two and a half hours. You can call it melodramatic. I call it cathartic.

Yet, my law school truly has become my second home in ways that my undergrad college never was and never will be. In some ways, I value my law school so much more because I feel it is where I have truly come into my own person. But, they both are my second homes for special and different reasons. College will always be the place where I had some of the best years of my life thus far. It is where I started to figure out the person I would be to later come into my own person. And besides that, who doesn't love their undergrad experience? The stresses were really minimal in comparison to the fun and carefree times I had, especially now that I have the perspective of a 2L law student. Living with your best friends, staying up late, and making memories you are bound to forget by the time the morning comes... My undergrad will always be the first place I could call that second home where I had a second family. And for that reason, I will always have a sense of comfort there and an immense feeling of loyalty to my alma matter.

That day I wandered its small campus, took a few pictures, and took a stroll in the picturesque downtown neighborhood. I bought a pinny at the bookstore and ate some fro-yo at the new ice cream place on the main street.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. This place will always be my home. The people it brought into my life will always be my family. I know this may not be eternally permanent evidenced by every passing expansion that brings change to the campus landscape or by the ease in which people you know become people you knew because sometimes falling out of touch is just so much easier than making the effort to stay a part of each others lives. But, no matter how much that all may change, for me this place will still always stay the same: in my memories and most importantly in my heart.