What college students miss most about home
‘Home is a place you grow up wanting to leave, and grow old wanting to come back’ – John Ed Pearce
University of California, Davis is located in northern California, and is an amalgam of people from all around over the country and the world. This means that a lot of students have to leave their homes, and parents, to study here. Unlike students who live close by to Davis, out of state students and international students can’t visit or have their parents visit them at their convenience. So, what do students miss most about home?
Being home is a special feeling. Everything is familiar to you. Everything is yours. You know your way around your home like it’s the back of your hand. It’s that feeling you miss the most. It’s knowing exactly where the soccer ball left an imprint on the wall, or exactly where the not to keep the keys (because mom doesn’t like it). Being away from home, in a new environment, can be challenging, and no matter for however long you stay away from home, it will always feel the same each time you go back.
Up until the day we had to leave for college, most of us spent every day or almost every day with our parents and siblings. This is a long time span, 18 years for most of us, unless you happen to be an 11 year old prodigy, and even then it’s a fairly long time. So obviously we miss our parents, and also our pesky siblings.
When you fall sick, you miss your mom making your favorite food or checking up on you every hour or so.
Anant Thockchom, a first year Economics and Psychology double major at UC Davis said: “I miss homemade food the most! I can’t wait to go back in the summer.”
The annoying habits of your siblings suddenly become more endearing than irritating, and your dad’s jokes too. The Skype calls and FaceTime conversations only make you miss them more.
What makes us miss our families the most are the festivals and birthdays. We miss the festival decorations and excitement, and the birthday cards and cakes. And all of this is worsened when you see your friend’s parents visiting them.
So, mom and dad, now you officially know that I miss you.
When high school ended, most of us had to leave our friends too. We left behind our clique, our chosen family. We may not miss our friends, or even think about them all the time, but when you’re learning about lenses in physics, you just can’t help not remember that one joke that cracked everybody up.
The heated arguments and mockery whenever your favorite teams are playing or the endless days of shame after an embarrassing picture of yours resurfaces. College is all about making new friends and meeting new people, but nobody truly ever comes close to your clique.
No matter how far away you are from home, it is always going to be in your heart, and as clear as a sunny California day.