Born and raised in Santa Fe, I am now across the country in New York for college. No, Dorothy, we are not in Kansas anymore.

I had to condense the contents of my life into four suitcases (under 50 pounds for airport weight requirements), which for an 18-year-old girl is no easy feat. This is not a time to pack posters, or the piles of books you have read throughout high school. I arrived to discover all of the little things that I subconsciously use in day-to-day life without realizing it (What? I have to get my own Q-Tips, stapler, spoons, toilet paper!) I got to campus with so many expectations and preconceived notions about what exactly college would be, and some could not be more spot on, while others are complete bull.

The beginning feels all too much like summer camp. You have to go everywhere as a group, become buddy-buddy with your roommate immediately, partake in mandatory scavenger hunts and just generally have a booked schedule from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. each day. This can be annoying because the whole reason we go to college is to avoid feeling like a child. Well, get used to it. I have found that a lot, if not the entire point, of college is to start from square one and learn how to crawl again. You will not feel mature in college, at least not as a freshman.

After that, the madness of registration begins. I was all of a sudden thrust into the school year, but without mommy and daddy taking care of all the papers. Your education is on your shoulders. It was exhausting but a great feeling to have so much control over your own schooling and path.

Then you get your classes and schedule and begin classes, looking for campus jobs and trying to balance this new exciting world of people with the huge stack of reading you have from each class. That is one thing I had heard from every returning college student, and something that is 100 percent valid: There is a lot of reading. However, I realized that I am reading stuff that I am actually interested in, or otherwise is actually interesting. The reading is nothing to sweat on, and neither is the paperwork or forms.

The thing I have found so marvelous about college is the overflowing amount of things to do — not only in number, but also in variety. The first week I played Laser Tag, went to a lecture on villains in film and rode a mechanical bull. I am never bored. The same goes for the people. I am surrounded by people who are individual libraries of knowledge and bombs of expression and talent.

In college, the teachers cuss, the curfew is 2 a.m., and the biggest challenge is learning how to sneak food out of the dining hall. You are on your own schedule, and operate by your own motivation and accord. At the same time, in college the teachers are brilliant, sometimes you will get a lecture class at 8 in the morning, and it's sometimes hard to remember to eat because you are so busy and preoccupied.

I continually have to remind myself that it is only the first week, and that there is still so much more to come.

Jahla Seppanen is a freshman at Sarah Lawrence College. You can reach her at jnm747@hotmail.