Let me begin by welcoming to the world of college romance where you can look forward to: being sexiled by your roommate, having late-night conversations about the writing style of your favorite poet with your crush, recapping the night’s events over brunch at Center Court and even watching the beginning of relationships which might result in a wedding at Graham Chapel someday.
As the romance columnist, you might be looking to me for advice on how to catch that hot senior’s attention in your calc class or how to get the freshman girls to stop drooling over the frat guys and instead pay attention to you. I won’t be helping you out with that (yet) because the best advice I can give to you now is don’t race into romance.
That first floor meeting during orientation you’ll be looking around to see who’s attractive, who’s funny, basically who could be a quick hook-up or who could be the person you want to spend the next four years with and even beyond. When your RA’s tell you to hold hands to form the Human Knot, you’ll quickly jump up and place yourself strategically next to that certain someone so you can have a few minutes to chat as you try to untie yourselves. Not only does this bring up issues of floorcest (usually not the best idea, think about that awkward walk past their room on the way to the bathroom), but it’s just too fast. Slow down, take your time…you have the next four years to find someone.
If you jump quickly into a relationship just to have someone (and get to declare it officially on Facebook), you’ll miss out on the fun art of freshman flirtation. Think about it: you will be in a new place with no curfews, no parents and thousands of new people to meet. You will want to be able to strike up a conversation with the cutie in your chem lab, dance with whoever you want at W.I.L.D. and spend a few extra moments chatting in the laundry room with the hot guy from the third floor who you always run into at Bear’s Den. Freshman year is a perfect time to have fun and polish those flirtation skills.
Relationships take a lot of time and hard work, and believe me, getting used to life as a college student will also require both of these elements. You will be amazed how quickly you form a relationship with Olin Library. As you get adjusted, you will be spending many hours trying to figure out what the hell the professor was talking about in the lecture, reading countless pages and getting involved in the exciting extracurriculars that you read about months ago in the thousands of brochures that Wash. U. sent you. Before long, that new relationship will shift to a lower priority and then slip out of your schedule completely. Give yourself time to get college figured out first and then add a relationship into the mix.
Probably the most substantial reason to not immediately dive into a romantic relationship is because of the much more important relationships you will form-friendships. Instead of looking around at that first floor meeting for who you’d like to hook up with that night, start getting to know the people who could become the most influential part of your four-year career at Wash U.
College friendships are a completely different species than high school friendships, as you’ll soon discover. When a relationship ends, they’ll be the ones to take you out for a night on the town or bring over some wine and listen for hours as you analyze what went wrong. Romance will come and go, but those people who held your hair back as you puked after your first W.I.L.D. will always be there for you.
You will be surprised how much fun you can still have being single for awhile and just living life as a collegian. This is a year for you to enjoy and explore before the Career Center starts sending you reminders that you might want to think about how to make money after college or your advisor stops being subtle about reminding you to fulfill clusters or long-term relationships start requiring post-graduation planning discussions.
So don’t race into a relationship that will probably just be a 100-yard dash, but instead, enjoy your beginnings at Wash. U., and someday you might just find someone to run the marathon with you.