It’s hard to believe that in less than two weeks I’ll be a senior in college. It seems like just yesterday I was unpacking my bags in my first room in Dickinson Hall. I came into college expecting it to be like all those movies I’d seen with the crazy parties, drinking and wild late night excursions to who-knows-where.

I remember one of my first nights at UMass. My roommate was a sophomore who, it seemed to me, knew the college ropes fairly well. I spent the majority of my first month of school following her around like the lost little freshman that I was, trying to soak up all the knowledge I could (you know, that special kind of knowledge you just don’t find in your classes). On this particular night she was going to a party in a friend’s room upstairs and I tagged along. A good amount of her friends from the year before were going to be there, as well as a few select freshmen that were new to the floor and managed to make some quick connections.

I walked into the overcrowded room, which was lit up with Christmas lights and a multi-colored disco ball, and was immediately hit with the smell of alcohol. There was hip-hop music coming from a CD player in the middle of the room, which no one seemed to mind yelling over. My roommate introduced me to a few people before engaging in some reminiscent conversation with her friends. I sat quietly next to her on the couch taking in the scene. After a few minutes a guy offered her a beer, and noticing me next to her, offered me one as well. Some of my friends in high school drank, so it wasn’t a completely foreign concept to me, but I certainly hadn’t even achieved social-drinker status. I did, however, know that I didn’t like the taste of beer.

I nervously asked him what it tasted like. He looked at me like I had three heads and shrugged. “Beer,” he said. I paused and thought for a minute, trying to come up with a way to say no to the beer but still sound cool. He got impatient, “So, you want it or not?” I took the beer. I proceeded to nurse the beer for the next three hours or so and finished about half of it. At some point someone turned the music up even louder and decided it was time to kick the party into overdrive. A few people got up and started dancing. The guy who’d offered me the beer began prodding people to get up and dance. I quickly assured him that I would do no such thing (hopefully in a slightly “cooler” sounding manner). He began to grind with a girl in the middle of the room, which made me decidedly uncomfortable, and I realized that the whole college party scene, as much fun as it seemed to be in the movies, was not for me.

I toughed it out for the rest of the night. My favorite part of the evening was when the room cleared out of all but four or five people, and those of us remaining turned the music down to talk about low alcohol tolerance.

To my freshman surprise, it turned out you don’t need to be a drinker and a partier to have fun in college! That guy who offered me the beer? Three years later, he’s one of my best friends. The two of us, and others who had attended the party that evening, now role-play together once a week. Our recent “parties” have consisted of cheetos, iced tea and the geekiest jokes you’ve ever heard. Guess you really can’t judge a book by its cover.

It amazes me just how much things have changed since that fateful night of my first year. I feel as though I’ve really come into my own and come to happily accept myself as I am. I openly express my detest for beer, and happily spend my weekends driving aimlessly around Western Massachusetts for hours, playing video games, and watching movies with some of the best friends anyone could ever hope for. No, college certainly hasn’t ended up being the experience I thought it would be. It has ended up being much better than anything I could have hoped for, and I can’t wait to get back here in three months to make my last year the best one yet. To my readers: thanks for letting me make your days a little brighter. To my friends: thanks a million for brightening mine. See you next year!

Stacy Kasdin is a Collegian columnist.