I Graduated Last Month and I Still Can’t Bring Myself to Put My Gown Away
The crumpled navy blue fabric’s been slung over the arm of my couch for 28 days, if you’re counting. I count, most days. It’s not that I’m clinging to some big nostalgia kick—it’s got a coffee stain on the sleeve from the after-ceremony party, and the hem’s still caked with mud from standing in the rain for two hours while they called 800 names. Every time I walk past it I think about shoving it in the storage bin under my bed with my old textbooks and lumpy dorm bedding, and then I don’t. I just keep walking.
I thought I’d be different. All senior year I complained nonstop about deadlines and terrible group projects and how my 8am microeconomics lecture was killing my will to live. I wrote “FREE” in big messy capital letters on my graduation cap. I couldn’t wait to be done with being told what to do every single minute of every day. Now that I’m done? It’s weird. It’s empty, is what it is.
Last Tuesday I went to buy cereal at 1:47 in the afternoon. The store was almost empty, just a couple of retired people pushing carts slow, and I found myself standing in the cereal aisle thinking, I should be in lecture right now. I should be sneaking a granola bar out of my backpack and scrolling my lecture notes while the professor droned on about something I’d forget by next week. But there was no lecture. There was just me, staring at Cheerios vs. Frosted Flakes like it was the hardest decision I’d ever had to make.
A week ago I drove back to campus just to get the lavender latte I used to get between classes. The barista at the little shop by the library asked for my student ID for the discount, and I just stood there. I forgot. I don’t have a student ID anymore. I mumbled “oh, sorry, I graduated” and she gave me that tight polite smile you give someone you don’t know, and charged me three extra dollars. I sat at a wobbly table in the corner, and watched all the students rush by with their backpacks slung over their shoulders, talking about midterms and group meetings, and I felt like a ghost. I wasn’t supposed to be there anymore. My time was up.
Everyone keeps asking me what’s next. My aunt texts me every Sunday. My parents bring it up over dinner when I go home on the weekends. My old high school friends post their new jobs and new apartments on Instagram and comment on my graduation photo “so excited for you! what’s the plan?” I tell them I’m taking a little time off to figure it out, and they always go quiet for a beat, like I just told them I’m moving to a cabin in the woods to herd goats or something. Like taking time off after four years of nonstop school is some kind of moral failure.
My old roommate moved back to Indiana two weeks after graduation to live with her parents while she applies to law school. My best friend got that marketing job she wanted and moved to Portland. So it’s just me in this two-bedroom apartment we signed a year lease for, because we thought we’d both stay here after graduation. Half a jar of her chunky peanut butter is still in the fridge. I haven’t thrown it away. I rearranged my bookshelf three times last week. I walked around the small lake near my apartment every afternoon, and I started counting how many different ducks there are. There are 17, last I checked. One of them has a broken foot. I bring him cracked corn sometimes.
I think what no one tells you is that for your whole life up to this point, all you do is hit checkmarks. Kindergarten check, high school check, college applications check, midterms check, senior thesis check, graduation check. Every step is laid out for you. Someone tells you when to be where, what to do, how to do it. And then you hit that last big checkmark, and… nothing. There’s no next one that everyone agrees on. The space where all those checkmarks used to be is just empty. That’s what this feeling is, I think. It’s not that I’m sad. It’s not that I messed up my life. It’s just that the structure I’ve lived in for 22 years is gone, and no one gave me a new one yet.
Last week I ran into my old stats prof at the grocery store. The one I hated so much because he failed my first midterm. He stopped to say hi, asked what I was up to now that I graduated. And I panicked. I couldn’t say “oh I’m counting ducks and rearranging my bookshelf and avoiding job apps” so I lied. I told him I got a position at that local environmental non-profit I wrote my senior thesis on. He smiled and said that’s great, congratulations, and I nodded and hurried off before I remembered I didn’t even get the milk I came for. I stood in the parking lot for five minutes after that, just kicking a rock, feeling stupid. Why did I lie? It’s not like counting ducks is a crime.
People keep telling me this is the best time of my life, that I’m so lucky to be free. That I should enjoy it. It sounds so nice, but it doesn’t feel nice. It feels like standing in the middle of a room after everyone else has left, holding your coat, waiting for someone to tell you it’s time to go. I don’t need anyone to tell me to cheer up. I don’t need a list of things to do to beat post-grad emptiness. I know that eventually I’ll send out job apps, I’ll find something, the gown will get put away, the peanut butter will go bad and I’ll throw it out.
Tonight I’m going to walk down to the ice cream shop on the corner and get a mint chocolate chip cone. I’ll stop by the lake and feed the ducks. Maybe I’ll fold the graduation gown when I get home. Maybe I won’t. The emptiness is still here, sitting in the corner of the couch with the stained navy fabric. It doesn’t go away just because I post a cute Instagram or send one half-hearted job app. But sometimes, when that one-footed duck waddles up to me and takes the cracked corn out of my hand, I forget it’s there for a minute. That’s enough, I guess. For now.
Please indicate: Thinking In Educating » I Graduated Last Month and I Still Can’t Bring Myself to Put My Gown Away