Newsflash: I’m about to graduate, and a few weekends ago, I had an epiphany.
Buzzed from downing five screwdrivers and two beers, I tore through the hoard of beat-bumping clubbers – with sweat dripping from my face and stale cigarette smoke in my lungs – and found a comfy couch in a shadowy corner of the club where the boom-boom of the wall soothed me.
And then the world stopped.
I realized that the past four years of my life had flown by and now I was done flying – a few more days and I’d be hearing graduation bells. College life stresses started whizzing around in my brain: No more begging professors for extra credit or cramming for tests or sleeping in during the week. No more late-night romantic walks around Lake-O or dorm hopping in the residence halls.
It was time to be severed from the collegiate bubble – almost as hard to swallow as tequila on the rocks – and thrown into the real world.
But if I’ve learned anything in college it’s that everyone is made up of layers and layers of past mistakes – and life has no white-out. And that’s perfect, because the regret/forget mentality can only get you so far.
Every mistake I’ve ever made has left a scar that has calloused over, hardening and making me stronger. At this point, I’m made of steel – pretty impressive, huh?
My philosophy is that denying or ignoring your mistakes is like hiding bad breath with gum or covering up armpit stank with cologne – it isn’t very effective. And frankly, it’s really disgusting.
So it’s with this wisdom that I sat there slouched on a couch in the back of the club, drunk and dizzy, waiting for the music to stop. But it never did. And neither will I, because there are many, many more mistakes to come.
And the good news is that you can share one of those mistakes with me over some dinner, a few drinks and a wild night of clubbing – till then, wish me luck on finding a job and a place to live.
Jorge Arauz can be contacted at j.arauz@umiami.edu.