Everything Has Its Place

The blistering heat and humidity of the past summer fade abruptly into the cool respite of autumn, characterized by the gentle breeze which disrupts the fading oak, maple, and buckeye leaves as they find their way to the ground. Everything has its place, but few things seem more out of place on The Ohio State campus than the huddled throngs of Freshmen surging their way from building to building. They cluster in herds of 5-15, they yell out OH! (or a responding –IO!) every few minutes, they don’t handle their alcohol well (and yet they consume it in mass amounts), they wear lanyards and they quickly develop nicknames for their dorms and the dining halls. They stare intently at their smartphone maps (physical maps are so last year) as they wander from place to place. They treat everything on campus, from the oval to the Horseshoe, with the same zealous excitement and look of discovery an infant has when it sees its toes for what it believes to be the first time.

However, there’s perhaps one thing that Freshmen do better than anything else: they provide endless stereotypes for the amusement of upperclassmen. For every bright eyed “Freshy” asking Brutus Buckeye for a picture, there’s a semi-jaded Senior scoffing loudly as he or she walks by. But this is part of what makes college so great. The intensely set relationship between these newcomers, just wading into the pool of knowledge that is the University, and those who have been in the water long enough to no longer be impressed by the waterslides. It gives the school and its students a unique sense of identity which is vital to the success of a place which relies almost entirely upon the participation of those who attend. So without sounding too sappy or sentimental, let me end on this note. Freshmen, don’t get too bothered with all the crap we give you. Sure, we might get annoyed that you’re ahead of us in line, holding everything up because you still don’t understand how the meal plans work; sure, we might make fun of you right to your face; yeah, sure, we might give you wrong directions a few times sorta on purpose… but we do it out of love. Just remember that a couple of years ago– whether we’d like to admit it or not– we were exactly where you are today, and without you, the eager, nervous, enthusiasm which makes a college campus so great would be sorely missed. After all, everything has its place.