I was recruited by Wisconsin for hockey my sophomore year of high school. When you’re 16 years old, it’s pretty crazy to make a big life decision like that.
I grew up with a solid group of friends and teammates back home. We all had known each other for as long as I could even remember.
When it was time to go to college I was terrified. Not a single one of them was coming with me. I had to go start a whole new life and make a bunch of new friends.
How was I going to do this? I had absolutely no idea.
I knew a couple of the girls on my team coming in, so that was comforting. I was assuming I would get the opportunity to pick one of my teammates to live with freshman year. Yeah, that was definitely not the case.
We were randomly assigned roommates by our coach. Mine was from Albuquerque, New Mexico. I was extremely nervous to live with someone I didn’t know.
I knew I had to go into it open minded, and I’m so glad I did.
She ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me. We instantly became best friends. Three years later and we are still roommates. I have absolutely no idea what I am going to do without her after we graduate.
When people say you meet some of your best friends in college, believe them. But, you have to be willing to be brave and get out of your comfort zone.