The beginning of the end...but not the end of the world

So this sucks.

One semester left, seniors, and judging by the slim number of "last first" away messages I saw on move-in day and the first day of class, many of you haven't realized the true extent of the suckage we now face. This is really, truly, unfortunately it, and something about it sucks extraordinarily.

(You know it's bad when you have to change into huge sweatpants, light six illegal candles, and pop a delectable $3 bottle of red wine on a Friday night to make your reflections even bearable.)

If you happen to be one of those seniors who has a job lined up -- who can't stop talking about how many thousands of dollars you're going to make, who has an apartment and an M.B.A. package and a future fiancé and a farm animal border picked out for your child's nursery room walls -- put down the paper and walk away. Please, for the sake of my undeveloped potential that wants to puke all over your contract, stop reading now.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

The reality of this last semester seems to have put a slight cynical damper on my sense of humor. Sorry.

There are pressures for you guys, too. There are pressures, and bittersweet moments, and belligerently drunk moments in absolute desperation to hold on to "Now" before "The Future" abducts your life, just as there are for the rest of us underachievers who experience heart palpitations every time someone asks, "What are you doing after graduation?"

The fact is, future plans or no, seniors one and all are facing a crossroads. Come May, our lives will be infinitely changed, and we will never have the opportunity to relive the flee-ting moments that fill the few months ahead.

You've spent your college career building to this last hurrah.

Will you do something worthwhile? Will your memory last on this campus the same way the campus's memory will last in yours? Will you look back in contentment, having sucked every juicy morsel of life out of each fading moment of your college career?

And will you throw this newspaper out the nearest window if I feed you another graduation cliché?

Good.

I think I'd throw you out a window if you bought anything I just said.

But ultimately, as a "journalist," I do have some obligation to tell you the truth, especially under the dire circumstances of this second-semester senior year.

The sad truth is that every one of these clichés is true.

Straight from me to you, from one scared- s--less senior to another, we really do only have four months left. These are the last days of life as we have known it from 2003 until now.

For me, this means I'm going to take more pictures.

I'm going to call random friends to grab food, especially the ones with whom I've only just begun to feel close. I'm going to remain conscious of the fact that no matter how you slice it, I will never see most of these people again.

Depending on the person in question, that may be a blessing. Think about that kid who lived on your hall freshman year, who finds you every time you're alone in the Boulder line for lunch and follows on your heels up to the Reading Room. Good riddance, man.

But for other people, the prospect of a permanent parting sucks pretty bad.

However, if I may begin to feed you some of the very clichés I mocked moments ago, everything will be all right in the end. The people we have in our lives now are here for a reason, and if they happen to still have a reason a year from now, or five years from now, that would be great. But if they aren't, their presence will remain in our memories and personalities, having taught us something or changed us in some way.

Ultimately, what I'm saying, (begrudgingly, being a devoted pessimist, though let that go to show you how important this is), is don't waste your time dreading May 19. Don't count down the days or lament every "last first" that comes along. Instead, celebrate how many days we have left, because each one is its own snuggly bundle of undergraduate joy.

So yeah, graduation sucks bad.

Leaving our friends and the lives we've built to brave the great unknown called "the real world" sucks pretty bad.

But what doesn't really suck much at all is being here now, so why not milk it?

Do great things, do stupid things, do memorable things, do anything to make this last semester your best ever.

Because then, thanks to your efforts, it will be.