But over the course of my degree, I've learned that it's important to do things that scare you. So many young people go to uni nowadays, and you hear all the good stories and bad, and it's almost impossible to stop yourself from worrying about every detail. Looking back now, I find it funny how terrified I was of getting lost on campus or in my student halls. The first week of uni was probably the hardest because that was when it all felt really real. I couldn't quickly go home to my mum if I was feeling sad - that's the good thing about going to uni further away because it stops you from constantly going back and forth. I always found myself more homesick every time I had to say goodbye to my family, so being in a city that is a good few hours away from home made me stick the first few weeks out.
But aside from homesickness, I never expected to enjoy university so much, and I'm so glad I decided to go to the University of Birmingham. The campus is beautiful and apart from the constant building works lol it quickly felt like home. The campus is one of the things I feel like I've always taken for granted, seeing it every day for my 9am lectures. It's only now I'm realising how much I'll actually miss Old Joe and all cute spots everyone uses to take graduation and dissertation pictures.
It's not until you step back and really think about how much you've achieved at university, that it really hits you how much you've actually done. The countless essays and sobbing phone calls home that make you think you've made a terrible mistake because you're no way near clever enough to be here. Getting disappointing marks and then trying to make sure you improve on the next piece of work. In many ways, university for me has been about taking ownership of my future and the skills I want to learn. No one at university tells you to do work, you are the only person who has the ability and responsibility to get everything done.
Deciding to do Creative Writing alongside English Literature was a tough decision I had to make when I was applying for universities way back in 2016. I'd never properly studied creative writing before but it interested me and I wasn't 100% sure I wanted to study literature on its own. It's a hard decision to make, deciding what to study, especially when you're studying for your A Levels and are really stressed. But I definitely made the right choice and have enjoyed the mix of poetry/prose assignments alongside the more structured side of literature. There has been a LOT of reading and I've had to skip reading a few books on my modules ( which is very sad when you buy 50 books at the start of the year & end up spending the majority of your loan on them too). I've read books I've absolutely loved and quite a few I actually want to burn I hated them so much haha but studying literature has really opened my eyes to so many genres - I've been able to study the Gothic, Detective Fiction, Romance and have consequently been able to write in many different forms too, so I got the best of both worlds!
Most of all, university has shown me that even in the really bad moments, perseverance and hard work really do pay off. I may not get the marks I want for one particular essay, and I may question (in the voice of Violet Crawley) What is a weekend?? since third-year students literally have no rest from work, but ultimately I know that I've worked my arse off the past three years & you can't do more than your best! The university experience has been so much harder than I anticipated but I've loved it so much and it feels really weird that at some point, I'll never walk on campus again or into a seminar. The highs and lows of university really do go hand-in-hand but I know that I've developed so much as a person, from the wonderful people I've met here and the experiences that university has enabled me to have.
So thanks Birmingham, you've been a blast!
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