I Went Back to School at 27, and This Is What It Actually Feels Like
I stood in the 8am coffee line on campus this morning, fumbling through my backpack for my student ID, and realized I’d left it on the desk of my dorm room. The barista tapped her pen on the screen, waiting, and the kid behind me shifted his weight, his AirPods propped in both ears, already back to his TikTok. When I said I’d just pay full price, I caught myself apologizing twice, like I’d inconvenienced the whole line just by forgetting a plastic card. That’s the first thing no one tells you about going back to school as someone who’s already been out in the working world for almost a decade: you spend half your time apologizing for things that don’t need an apology, and the other half feeling weirdly out of step with everyone around you.
First day of class, I sat down in the front row (because I can’t see the projector from the back, okay? My eyes are already starting to go, that’s another fun thing 18 year olds don’t have to deal with yet) and a guy with a skateboard slung over his shoulder leaned over and asked if I was the new TA. I laughed and said no, I’m just a student, same as you. He turned bright red and mumbled an apology, and I spent the next 20 minutes of the lecture overthinking every gray hair I could feel sticking up on the back of my head.
I thought when I quit my admin job at the insurance company and packed up my tiny apartment and moved back into a dorm, that I’d have all this figured out. I’d be the super focused student, the one who never skipped class, who turned in every assignment a week early, who took advantage of every single opportunity because I paid all this money to be here. Turns out that’s bullshit. Last Wednesday I skipped my 8am chem lab because I stayed up too late watching a bad reality dating show on Netflix and couldn’t make myself get out of the lumpy dorm bed that smells like the previous kid’s lavender laundry detergent. I spent three hours sitting on a quad bench eating a $6 everything bagel from the cafeteria and scrolling through my old coworker’s Instagram posts of the office happy hour I used to go to, and I cried a little. Not ugly sobbing, just quiet tears that I wiped off on my sleeve before anyone saw. The bagel was stale, by the way.
But then there’s the other stuff, the parts I didn’t post about when I announced I was going back on Facebook. Last week I stayed after my ecology lecture to ask my prof about the research project she’s doing on native bumblebees, and we talked for 45 minutes. I didn’t check my work email once, I didn’t think about my upcoming tuition payment, I didn’t wonder if I was wasting my time. I just stood there by her office door talking about bees, and it felt like breathing for the first time in years. The other day, my group project team — three 19 year olds who keep teasing me about my 10pm bedtime — asked me to bring those chocolate chip cookies I brought to the first meeting again. I did, and we ended up sitting in the library common room eating them and complaining about how bad the cafeteria fried chicken is, and one of them showed me photos of her rescue cat back home. No one cared that I’m 9 years older than them. Most of the time, they don’t care at all.
I walk past the freshman dorms every night on my way back to my building, and I see them standing outside in groups, yelling to each other, holding those big iced coffees that cost more than my first bus pass. Their phone cases are all clear with little polaroids and pressed flowers taped inside. Mine has a crack across the top corner and a sticker from a 2022 climate protest I went to, that’s it. I used to be just like that, caring so much about what everyone thinks, trying to curate how I look to the whole world. Now I just care that I remembered to bring my rain jacket, because it rains every other afternoon here and I hate walking to class soaked. But I still get nervous before I raise my hand in class. I still got that flutter in my stomach when I got my first essay back last week, even though I’m too old to care that much about a single grade. Some things don’t change, no matter how old you are when you go back.
My locker is in the back of the science building, second floor, number 217. It has an old sticker on the door that says “Class of 2024” that I haven’t peeled off. It’s too small, I can barely fit my textbook, my rain jacket, and a pack of spearmint gum in there, same as my locker when I was 14 in high school. I still can’t remember the combination half the time, so I have to write it on the inside of my hand with a pen. That’s so stupid, I’m a grown-up, I should be able to remember four numbers. But I can’t, so whatever.
People keep asking me if it’s worth it, if I’m happy I did this. I don’t know how to answer that. Some days I’m convinced I made the worst decision of my life. I’ll open my student loan statement and my chest gets tight, and I think I could have put this money towards a down payment on a tiny house, or a trip around the Pacific Northwest, or just a really nice couch that doesn’t leave my back sore every morning. Other days I walk across the quad after class, the oak trees are blooming and the air smells like cut grass and someone’s playing that new Taylor Swift song off in the distance, and I think this is exactly where I’m supposed to be. Most days it’s both, at the same time.
I forgot my ID this morning, paid full price for my coffee, walked to lecture with my backpack slipping off one shoulder, and that’s just it. Going back to school isn’t the big, grand, inspirational story people post about on LinkedIn. It’s just a bunch of small, messy, weird moments, half good half bad, all jumbled together. I don’t know how it’s going to end. I don’t even know if I made the right choice. Right now, that’s okay, I guess. That’s just what it feels like.
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