Dear Chapman University,

I was young when I first met you. I was just a silly girl, with dreams, hopes and ambitions.

Lilac flowers rained from the jacarandas along Glassell Avenue when I made the life-changing decision to pursue you. It was the most innocent of commitments — solidified with all of the bravado an 18-year-old high school graduate could muster.

Anything imaginable is what you said to me. Do you remember it?

Then came my response: come hell or high water, four years of my life will be ubiquitously yours.

Those four years would bring self-doubt, finding myself (and losing it too) and sleepless nights spent wondering if I would ever become anything important.

Those four years would also bring sweet golden memories — learning which pieces of my ever-changing mosaic to pick up and rebuild — and which to leave in the dust — knowing my worth was inherent and unchanging despite what I did or didn’t achieve.

But now, it’s time to say goodbye, Chapman. Let me start by saying, it’s not you; it’s me.

It’s important for you to know that I wouldn’t trade those four years for the world. We knew this day would come, and yet, I didn’t know how hard it would be.

I’ve thought about what I would say to you for a long time — what poetic words I’d use to describe the time we shared, so people might understand just a fraction of what these last four years meant to me.

But I come up short every time.

The moments we share aren’t a poetic narrative but rather a messy, incoherent and chaotic montage of scenes. Eclectic. Indescribable. Warped. The highlight reel of my college experience is little more than a cacophony of sound and a kaleidoscope of light.

Sleepless nights in the library. Dreary twilights when I wondered what all this was for. Simple coffee talks with friends when I got just a glimpse of what life had to offer.

But the people I met were the best part. From the brilliant minds I collaborated with, to the myriad of professors I learned from, to the genuine souls whom this shy and awkward commuter student has become lucky enough to call her friends.

It’s funny how time flies. 

I feel as though I blinked once and it was the September of my senior year. The scarlet gate of autumn’s mouth swallowed the summer whole. My daydreams fell dormant beneath the leaves; gold as the sun, but never quite as warm.

As for me, I was left with nothing but the writing on the wall.

I’m used to resisting change, but I have to lower my fists, just this once. The sun is setting now on Sycamore Avenue. You and I both know I can’t stay here. But please know that I could have never loved it more.

I’m a young woman now, with the same dreams, hopes and ambitions, plus a few more — some of which you even helped fulfill. It’s time for me to go on with my life, and you’ll go on with yours.

Perhaps another young high school graduate will walk beneath the lilac blooms. She’ll tell you her aspirations, and you’ll tell her the same thing you once said to me: Anything imaginable. And you’ll take care of her, as you did me. 

This spring semester has felt like a four-month long swan song. I pondered at the start of the semester what graduation might feel like: Will I mourn what I did, or what I didn’t? Will it feel like leaving or never returning?

The last few weeks have felt like the last act in my coming-of-age indie film, and yet, I still don’t know the denouement. Maybe I never will.

But I do know that I’ll tell my kids about you, the memories we shared and the people we knew.

Thank you dearly for the time of my life, Chapman.

Love,

Megan J. Miller