Show of hands: How many of you are deathly afraid of the real world?

I’m not talking about the seven-strangers-picked-to-live-in-a-loft kind, I’m talking about the one after graduation.

To be honest, I don’t think the real world is all that much harder than college life, especially if you’ve had some experience living off campus and worked while in school.

In the real world, at least, you don’t have to juggle classes, jobs and maintain a somewhat decent social life - all while trying to scrape by with enough cash to pay the bills.

It’s not the possible difficulty of post-college life that scares me - I can handle that part just fine.

But what I dread is losing touch with a lot of aspects of college life that I enjoy.

I think the one aspect I would miss the most would be the constant interactions with the kind of people that I congregate with now, which has a lot to do with something else I would really miss that I’ll talk about later.

Among those people, the ones that take precedent are those nearest and dearest - my friends. Ever heard that famous quote, “Friends walk in when the rest of the world walks out?” I think it goes something like that.

Well, that quote was written specifically with my friends in mind.

I know you might feel your friends are special, too, and they’re the most amazing people ever. But I’m telling you they have nothing over mine. My friends rule.

Most of the other people I’m in touch with constantly are people who are involved in the same types of organizations that I am, like the Alliance of Lesbian-Bi-Gay-Transgendered and Straight Ally Students, the LBGT residence hall caucuses, Students of Color, International and Allies or SOCIAL and Multi-racial Unity Living Experience or MRULE.

There’s something to be said about the validation of sharing my opinions and experiences with people who may or may not feel the same way I do, and then get to hear theirs too.

The next part of college life that I would miss most is so tightly intertwined to my friends that I really can’t decide which would leave a bigger void - the people themselves or the pursuit of activism that led me to meet them.

Activism has introduced me to my best friend, my roommate, my role model and my soul mate. In case it wasn’t 100 percent clear, all those traits characterize one person.

Activism drives me. It’s the reason I get up in the morning, and it’s what keeps me up all night. It’s one of the most stress-inducing, ungrateful avenues of life that one could pick, but nevertheless, nothing else satisfies me the way fighting for change does.

A lot of people say they can see me being involved in activism for the rest of my life, including myself, which is why it is probably what I’ll end up doing.

But there’s something special about being involved with activism on a college campus.

Maybe it’s because a college campus, especially one the size of MSU, feels like a world of its own.

In this tiny world there are so many other activists it feels like you are surrounded by them.

Also, activism doesn’t exactly rake in the big dough, which can be a tad bit of an issue for someone that’s starting off with nothing anyway.

But that’s a minor problem.

One of my friends says people make too much of a big deal about being an adult. She says adults nag and moan about the simplest of things - like getting a loan.

Apparently, her roommate recently had to go get a loan to pay for her car and she came out of that experience feeling confused as to how easy it was and wondering why her folks would complain about it.

I think being a college student is a lot harder and more demanding than the life you lead after college with a degree in your hand.

Obviously, this leaves a large part of the population that doesn’t go to college out of the equation.

Having said that, I would never do away with any of my years here. Even the bad ones.

College and the life I’ve led as an undergraduate have molded me into the kind of person I am today, who incidentally I like a lot more than the person I was when I started out here back in 1999.

So, as I look toward my December graduation with dread, I also look back at my undergraduate years, trying to cram as many memories and life lessons as I possibly can into the scrapbook of my mind.

It’s a cheesy little statement, isn’t it?

Tamar Jourian is general management senior. Reach her at jouriant@msu.edu