The names in this blog have been changed to protect those who might want to be protected after reading this!!!!  As I said goodbye to a friend's daughter, "Natasha", who was leaving for college, I decided to take her out for lunch to say goodbye.  As we discussed all the details, I noted some interesting and amusing differences between 1986 when I was getting ready for college and 2008. 

I asked Natasha if she was worried about her roommate recalling the panic all summer about who I would be stuck with or love... would she be mean, would she be weird, would she be really different from me?  She said she wasn't concerned at all because her close friend that she has known since first grade who lives within walking distance would be one of her roommates and the other is a girl that they both picked from Facebook.  No more waiting anxiously for the letter to arrive in the mail to find out which stranger would be sharing your room.  Now you can hand pick your roommate.  Natasha has over 900 Facebook friends many are people from her new college that she has never spoken to before.

As a freshmen, I remember having my papers typed by a woman in the local town while Natasha was busy getting her iMac ready to be at her side at any time.  In addition, a 26" flat screen would be making the trip to her dorm room.  Especially in the first two years of college, I hardly remember watching TV.

I told her the nightmare of long lines in the bookstore and books being sold out.  Natasha said that all her books were already bought online and ready to be picked up.  Her schedule is conveniently based on "good" times vs. the actual courses.  Natasha said that she will take all the courses she needs by the end of the four years... having big gaps of times between classes was too much of a pain.Her

I remember spending one of my last nights with my high school friends with a case of beer in the woods as we all held on to our last minutes together.  What did Natasha do?  The Season Premiere of "The Hills" (the reality show following the life of a rich 20something girl in LA) was on that night so in the spirit of the show, Natasha and her best friend put on dresses, went to a nice French restaurant and proceeded to share a bottle of wine (without being carded) and eat steaks.

 The anxiety about going away to college is still there along with the fear of homesickness but some of the little things are very different now!!!

-- Dana Edwards