The best 4 years?

The transition from child to adult finally has forged its way to the forefront. Sure, I've already become an adult three times. When I was 13, my faith deemed me an adult; when I came to college, my parents deemed me an adult; and when I turned 21, the law deemed me an adult. But this weekend -- for the first time in my life -- I'll really feel like the dreaded "adult." \nFor 17 years, all I've known is school. Now, I will receive my degree (later in the mail, of course) and head off into the harrowing "real world."\nHowever, I'm stuck wondering what that actually means. Does it mean no more kegger theme-parties? No more beer pong? No more taking a day off to play softball in Dunn Meadow? Are those things not "real?"\nThe answer is no. It's a dream world, a fantasy that lasts a mere four years, unless you received a D in a class that was attendance-based and didn't stipulate so in the syllabus, forcing you to spend six weeks here taking a class -- happened to a friend, I swear.\nAttending college in a college town is ideal. You become part of your own community. More than 35,000 students your age run around with a sense of entitlement. This is our place and our time, just like the generations before us. \nBut it's over now and it's time to move on, and Graduation Day is a time to reflect.\nReflect on the worst class you ever took, which for me is a rather easy distinction - Central Asian Explorers. A friend and I thought it was Central European Explorers, but instead it was a class of 10 students sitting at a round table, five of whom were graduate students, including one who wore a funny-looking Russian fur hat and another who informed the instructor she had to pick up her kids in an hour.\n To say my friend and I were completely miscast in this class is quite the understatement. This was never more apparent then when one of the students brought in his photo album of his spring break trip to Uzbekistan.\nRemember the first time you ran from a frat party when Dean McKaig and IUPD showed up and you ended up standing on the soccer field, an even greater conundrum, as you added trespassing to the list of illegal activities on the night?\nConsider the damage Taco John's and all the other dormitory eateries did to your stomach. Think fondly of the 2002 run to the Final Four, the subsequent rioting and all that it entails. \nThere was the good, the bad and then the ugly, but it was college -- a four-year party with class sprinkled in somewhere. Does the real world offer us such fond memories? \nWhat lies ahead for many is clear: work, marriage, parenthood and death. Some stuff happens in between, but the highlights might be limited to coaching Little League, showing the punk who's taking your daughter out on a date your brand new Louisville Slugger and buying a house in a nice neighborhood far away from your parents. \nI hear Uzbekistan is nice. \nLife lies ahead, but there's a reason every adult utters these cliché words: "College is the greatest four years of your life."\nTrust me, they know, just as we'll soon find out.