So You're A Super Senior

Originally, I was going to graduate in 2014.  But sometimes life likes to throw you little curveballs.  And then there's people like me; the strange man in the Goofy hat and clogs playing baseball by himself, and in this case, throwing balls at his own face.

...Yes, I realize it's a set-up.  Go on.  Get it out of your system.  I deserve it.

Yea, at the end of my sophomore year, I tacked on an additional major (because there's like, three minors at Columbia, it's great), and along with it, an additional year.  Hopefully.  I mean, hopefully just one more year.  Now the time has come.  If what my Facebook feed says is true, every person ever is starting their senior year this week.  Aaaaaaannnnd then there's me.  Not doing that.  It's surreal.  And kinda sad.  Also really great, because I've found that I'm crazy-happy for everyone that's sailing off to Grown-Up Land come May (well, maybe), even people that I've fallen out of contact with.  I know I'll do the same eventually.  It might be with a smaller crew, and it'll kinda suck watching that first boat, the one we missed, chasing the horizon while we can still see the port - but since it's full of our friends, that makes it at least a little-

What the fuck happened to this post.  What even is this ship analogy.  I'm gonna move on while I still have a chance of being on-point.

Despite all my bellyaching purple prose that's eerily reminiscent of senior-year me,

being a super-senior-to-be (there's no way that's grammatically sound) isn't all bad.  In fact, it's hardly worse than being a regular senior.

I'm closing one of my degrees this year, so if worse really comes to worse, I can close up shop and be the last skipper to hop on board (and you thought the ship analogy was over with).  I'll have taken probably a third of my classes for nothing, but you know what?  Worse things happen to better people every day.  If I want to make games, I'll make games, formal education be damned.  Of course, being able to say "Hey, I'm kind of educated in dis shit and that guy isn't" is a nice concept.
The above is pretty tailored to my specific situation, but if there's a particular lesson to take away from it, it would be... uh... I don't really know.  You can always back out?  Or something like that?  Okay, next point.

You get to be in college for another year.  Come on - even as someone who goes to an arts school that doesn't have any of the components of your "typical college experience" (Greek system, a quad, school spirit, tests), even as a total neurotic prone to flopsweats, I can say "college is pretty freaking great".  Of course, the extra year does mean mo money (in so facto, mo problems).  But it also means mo excuses for not being totally self-reliant, mo parties (don't worry; it's not completely creepy until you're old enough to have finished medical school), mo connections, mo hanging out, mo campus food, mo electives, mo learning, mo school-sponsored events (also known as "the cheapest dates possible that don't suck"), etc.  Of course, none of these are guaranteed experiences - since you're in your fifth year, you might actually spend some of that extra school developing as a professional.  You know.  If you're into that kind of thing.

Assuming you're not a super-senior because you failed everything, it doesn't look bad on a resume.  Some argue that five years is quickly becoming "the norm"... but uh... what's a more clever way of saying "it isn't yet"?  While four years is still considered the mean, look at your extra year of backbreaking, specialized work in a more positive light: you've got that much more learning experience under your belt.  Hell, even if you are back for year five because your freshman year was a haze of Four Lokos and Left 4 Dead, every top has its spin.  Except, you know, really shitty ones.  Like ones with chips in the bottom.  Those probably don't spin more than once or twice.
...I'm saying you should embellish on your resume.

There's more time.  Again, I get it; time = money, an old adage that fits college to a tee these days.  But you can make it worth your while.  More time in school means more time for figuring out what you want to do.  Come on - don't pretend for a second that your career path is cut and dry just because you took some classes tailored to a specific field.  More time to add some cards to your rolodex (or, you know, wallet - the normal person's rolodex).  More time to look for prospects after your late graduation.  The idea of the fourth year being your senior year is kind of terrifying and back-asswards, if you think about it.  "Sup, person barely into your twenties?  Oh look, it's already your final round of required classes!  Probably the most grueling/important ones!  Have fun finding a job right the fuck afterwards!"  Not that I'm totally making excuses for myself or anything.  In a fifth year (at least I hope), you can intersperse your "time to test everything you were supposed to learn" classes with classes you otherwise wouldn't have had time for, outside-interests kinda stuff.

Well... only four entries, but I think I covered some broad strokes here.  See you next time!  Or, you know, not.  Cuz you're in another part of cyberspace.  And earth.