I don’t know what I expected when I walked into the Vector office for the first time. I remember that I felt nervous and was extremely overdressed (I call it the pre-hipster phase). I felt bad for the nice people in the office that were utterly confused by the strange guy mumbling incoherent sentences. It was the first club I ever joined; a major step out of my comfort zone.

Time flies—a year passed. Suddenly, I’m an editor?

What.

It feels weird. People that I looked to for guidance now depend on me to do things. Every week, I have to work to ensure that this very paper that you are so casually reading is stuffed with content. It turns out that there are hundreds of things that need to be done before a single issue can be released, and it extends beyond twenty to thirty people. As one of them, the responsibility is humbling.

Thankfully, it is also tons of fun. I enjoy edits that extend into the wee hours of the morning. There is something oddly therapeutic about obliterating typos, then laughing as the punctuation is perfected. Sadly, my fellows seem to think that giggling maniacally in the office while doing my job is really weird. They look at me with fear in their eyes when I walk up, lean in and whisper softly “Edits are done. Buy me Chipotle.” That scenario somehow doesn’t end in free Chipotle.

But it’s alright. Despite the torture that my beloved staff inflicts on me, being in this position actually teaches me things. It gives me insight into my life that I couldn’t possibly have anywhere else. It tells me important things like:

• Free food tastes the best
• The newspaper makes a great umbrella
• You can never have enough couches in an office
• Fall Out Boy fans are an actual thing

But other than that, it’s also taught me a little bit about the real world. It thrusts me into situations where I absolutely have no choice but to speak with large groups of people. It hones my management abilities and helps me communicate effectively. I have absolutely no that that I am still growing, but when I become who I am meant to be, I hope that it’s as a respectable member of society.

That’s it for me. Through all the hardship and work and all these gooey words, doing all of it helped me grow as a person. It has helped my quality of learning at this institution, and it has helped me meet people that are interested in doing the same. I’ve gained so much experience from my time here, and already I’m excited to see where this takes me once that graduation ceremony ends.

So here is my advice to you, reader. Care about something. Like something, anything, a lot. Love it enough to want to help it thrive. It can be your academics. It can be a club. It can even be that plant that you have been neglecting over the course of the semester. Just make sure that you find yourself working to help that plant grow. If you do, you’ll learn things along the way that just might reveal something about you, and then you’ll find yourself.

If you find yourself, and you find others like you, that is more than what a lot of other people have right now, and that is something worth appreciating.

Yeah, I still am that awkward, nervous kid that stepped into that office. But now, I know that in addition that I love free food, long naps, and this entity called The Vector.