Epic notions

Teen Times: Before you head to college, you have preconceived notions of how it will all pan out. I envisaged college to be an absolutely earth-shattering experience, a sort of crazed day-by-day existence, writes Orna McDonald.

I pictured the "walk of shame", crawling back to my apartment at 10am the "morning after the night before", walking past stunned schoolchildren shocked at my bedraggled appearance. I imagined my nightly hellraising at clubs and parties all over the city. I imagined a sort of Paris Hilton, born-to-socialise lifestyle.

Elements of my imaginings have definitely been realised, but not all. My previous concepts of college omitted all sense of reality, failing to include banal and ordinary things such as eating, sleeping and travelling from place to place. In my mind, I was invincible, merely ending up in places without having to travel there, indulging in 72-hour binges of unprecedented partying.

At the age of 18 or 19, college-goers worldwide prepare to flee the nest. At the time, you are so wrapped up in the hazy excitement of the moment that you fail to recognise the enormity of the event, that this is an epic occasion in your life. Your meetings with your family from then on become fleeting visits, squashed in between the packing and unpacking of a suitcase; your conversations a mere recollection of your weekly timetable. You don't realise how much they mean to you or how much they do for you until you're chewing on your half-cooked pasta back in halls, too restless and lazy to cook it properly, until it strikes you in a moment of clarity that you have been washing your clothes in fabric conditioner for half the year.

As the year goes on, you establish a happy medium between being at home and being away, finding your balance. You really should enjoy it, as you definitely get the best of both worlds. You are only ever home long enough to receive the benefits of a honeymoon period where everyone gets on harmoniously, even though you know that one day more in each other's presence would tip you all over the cliff into the sea of familial tension and aggravation.

In one year, a lot changes; people change. You suddenly experience a déjà vu of that awe-inspiring transition from primary school to secondary school, of your incredulity as the quiet people around you become loud, the loud people meek and timid. In the midst of it all, in your warped sense of reality, you wonder are you the only constant thing in your life.

It sometimes feels as though you alone have stayed the same. And sometimes you can't believe how you've changed. In one year you have learned to fend for yourself, tapped into previously unused survival instincts and discovered opinions you never knew you held.

Quite by accident, and without even trying, you have become someone quite different from your previous self.

• Orna McDonald (19), from Gorey, Co Wexford, is studying English and Sociology at TCD

• Submissions of 500-word articles from teenagers are welcome to teentimes@irish-times.ie. Please include a telephone number