By Christina Bivona, Inside Columnist

The first week of school has arrived, and whether you’re an incoming freshman or an old–school senior like myself, there are a good amount of emotions that come with it. You may feel anxious about your classes, nervous to make new friends, happy to see old ones – but whatever you may feel, there’s one thing you should remember – you’re going through it with roughly 16,000 other kids.

Looking back, I’m pretty sure I cried the day I left home to move to college. Yep, pretty embarrassing, but I knew the next five years of my life were going to be big – really big – and change me into the person I am today. After never being particularly popular in high school, and approaching Northeastern as an incoming D-1 athlete for the women’s rowing team, I had a lot of expectations for my freshman year.

Was my first roommate going to be my best friend? Nope. Were the parties going to be outrageous? Eh, sometimes. Was I going to kiss a hundred boys? Definitely not a hundred. Would I gain the freshman 15? More like the junior 10. But nevertheless, I was excited for the semester in front of me.

My first year, as well as the years following it, was a learning experience with unexpected twists. There were, of course, the classic freshman learning curves: finding out BU parties were dry after searching an hour for them, walking to MIT’s campus to find out their fraternity houses are, in fact, not across the river, having no idea where or what Rebecca’s was, or that the Hill isn’t just some magical place people talk about, rather somewhere you will probably live in two years.

   Then there were lovely surprises, like getting placed with five random roommates my sophomore year – girls that were already friends and who only talked about Harry Potter in our group chats. Despite our literary differences, they turned out to be some of my best friends. Oh and those freshman friends from Melvin Hall? Yeah, they stuck around too. After living with one of them for two years, and holding on to the others, they’re friends I know I will have in my life for a long time.

There will be co-ops and dialogues, heartbreaks, library dates, final exams, and Red Sox games. You’ll go to places you never expected, meet people who brighten your day, work jobs you’ll learn to love, and through it all you’ll learn some valuable lessons – like living above the campus bar that one year wasn’t the best idea, especially if you planned on sleeping at night, or that you shouldn’t have gone out with that guy who thought BHOP was an acceptable first date, and maybe you should have remembered to back up that extensive 18-page research paper you wrote before deleting it the morning it was due… not that I’m speaking from experience.

You’ll make mistakes, but that’s what college is all about – making mistakes, learning from them, making the right choices, and learning from those too. You’ll grow throughout these five years and not only gain a better understanding of the world around you, but a stronger sense of the person you truly are, because we’re all figuring it out, and as a senior, I still am too.

So don’t be afraid to take risks. Don’t hesitate to do something new, no matter what year you are. Go into this semester with your head held high and ready to take on your next challenge, because it’s your year and whatever may happen, you’re not only a Bostonian now, you’re a Husky.