I'm a 21 yr male, currently attending a major state university in the northeast (you know, the one who's coach is so old he rocked Moses' fuckin' cradle. Not that I don't like the guy, but he's been faltering lately. Retire much?). I'm currently in my 4th year and going into a 5th because I took one light semester and have screwed up three.
First I'd like to explain the so-called 'college experience' from my point of view. I used to co to one of my U's satellite campuses; and it was really good. I was just starting to learn how to make friends going in (the best friend I've had yet I met at a model railroad club in the Pittsburgh area, and he's pretty cool), and had just come out of homeschooling through high school. I really liked the atmosphere there. I could go in and see someone I knew every day; the place felt like a nice little community. I was doing good work, making friends, and I was really happy there.
I had picked a business major based on the fact that the description mentioned that graduates from said major get jobs with railroads. I just sort of jumped at that without really thinking since the childhood dream was to be the engineer for a railroad-the dude in the cab. Those guys have the fuckin' POWER-handling 2 MILLION POUNDS OF STEEL EVERY DAY. But I digress.
I basically took it easy in my first two years at the branch campus. I had about half my credits done with pretty good grades. I'd been told I had to transfer to the main campus. Big changes ahead. I moved into an apartment with three other people I did not know; two girls and another guy. The guy was a fucking hick; he watched wrestling too loud at 2 in the morning when I had early classes and fought with his girlfriend all the time; the one girl (who knew the hick from high school) was a bitch and thought she was the fucking queen of the apartment; and the other girl was from around Pittsburgh and never around the apartment so I never talked to her, but her boyfriend and his asshole friend (both moron wiggers from Philadelphia and anal retentive about it) WERE around, too damn often. So when I had people to interact with, it was more likely than not it was someone I would rather have avoided; unless I called up one of my (three) friends from the branch who had also transferred.
I screwed up that year; I was into what I was doing but not the habit of doing it; and bombed a couple classes. I still didn't know many people and didn't get out much. I preferred to go home for game night at my house with all my friends. When I did get out and about I usually drove 25 miles to the nearest very active railroad mainline to watch trains (can you tell I'm a dork yet?).
Things straightened out on the next semester, and got better during the summer session I took after that. I didn't want a repeat of the apartment experience, so I leased an efficiency apartment and moved in alone. BIG mistake. I had only pulled average grades in my major classes last year; this year, I've flunked every major-specific class I've taken. I've realized that I no longer want to be in my major. I really wish I'd been able to go for the locomotive enginner job, the dream.
I even had a breakdown about a month ago when I went home and had to tell my parents about flunking two classes for the second time. That was the first time I CRIED in God only knows how many years. I want to drop out, but I know my parents will never let me. Before she passed over a year ago, my grandmother said I had to go to college or the Navy (since the grandfather of mine she married was a sailor in the mid-1950's), and I knew I wasn't military material. So off to school I went, because I had to. And because I had to, I had to pick a major. So I just picked one.