If ifs and buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a merry Christmas

Recently I've been waking up with night sweats and experiencing a warm and fuzzy feeling inside. At first, I suspected that I had been bitten by a radioactive spider and decided that before I was ready to take on the Green Goblin, I would have to trade in my identity for a red and blue mesh onesy from American Apparel (what? I might as well get something I can wear to the lodges, too).

But, then I decided I wasn't sure if I wanted my Hollywood debut to be Spiderman 4. Superhero movies are sooo 2006.

And alas, the real cause of my strange symptoms came to fruition last Sunday at Proclamation Night.

For those of you who don't know, Proclamation Night is when the seniors and freshmen of Westhampton College gather in the chapel. Freshmen write themselves letters to read their senior year; seniors read their letters and realize how much of a freak they were three years ago (or in my case, how much of a freak I still am).

I didn't plan on going to Proclamation Night this year because this column was due on Sunday night. (It is now Wednesday. Oops.)

Plus, I didn't care to retrieve my letter since I distinctly remembered writing about the tendency I had freshman year to tell people my name was Cheyenne and that I was raised by Eskimo-midgets in Alaska and the other mundane things that all freshmen write about, right?

No. I decided I had to get my letter for fear of someone else reading it.

As I sat at the chapel on Sunday and listened to my classmates speak and read their letters I started getting an uncomfortable ache in my chest. My icy, German heart usually rejects anything sentimental, but for some reason a lump started to form in my throat.

Is this what crying feels like?

Nope. Just a gag reflex from reading this letter to myself ("And if you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you daaaaaaaaaance").

But I realized this reaction was also the culmination of the feelings I had been experiencing for the past few months. I'm coming to terms with the fact that this is it. The G-that-must-not-be-named is upon us, you know ... g-g-g-gradua-- I can't finish. But come the G-word, my life will officially be over.

It's the final year until we step into the land of paying rent to live in mom's basement and dating balding dentists with foot fetishes via Match.com or blind dates with Grandma's friends from Bunco.

As I learned to cope with the difficult news, I decided that the only thing worse than the slow progression to saddle bags and Saturday nights spent playing Mah Jong with Grandma is to experience the latter and also have pestering ifs and buts about my college years.

While the prospect of control-top pantyhose and red Swingline staplers loomed over me like the Great Smog of 1952, I decided I'd make list of things I must do in order to make the most of my time left at Richmond before I kick the can in May.

Freshman or fifth-year, there's no time like the present to make sure you squeeze more out of this wonderful school than 15 pounds of beer and D-Hall food. And your degree, of course.

Now, I'm not advocating idiocy. Don't jump in the lake. No number of showers, medications or therapy can protect you from the fun-bag of diseases for you and developmental repercussions for your future children.

But, I do encourage you to embrace the DIFTS. What's that, you say? DIFTS is when a situation presents itself (usually involving public embarrassment or mayonnaise) that defies rationality, but you decide to participate anyway on the grounds of DIFTS: do it for the story.

For example: Your parents land at 8 a.m. on Friday and you have yet to disguise the eight-person beer bong affixed to your ceiling and stripper pole in your apartment living room. But, your friends DIFTS you into attending the cash-money blowout party on Thursday night.

Sure, Dad might cry a little. But, you can buy him a Blow-Pop with the beer-soaked dollar bill you scraped off the floor the night before. Plus, you can tell your parents you were offered a perfectly good DIFTS and to just throw it away would fly in the face of the way you were raised. After all, there are plenty of children starving in Africa.

Second, catch that unicorn! No, I don't mean real unicorns on campus (they only come 'round with the dragons and centaurs for Saturday Quidditch, of course).

Your "unicorn" is the person you've been completely enamored with from the moment you stepped on campus. You tried to make conversation with him or her once before, but for some reason the words "do you have to poop?" vomited out of your mouth.

No need to despair, it's not over yet (unless you're a ginger, in which case it probably never began). Give yourself another chance to catch your unicorn. You could very well find your happily ever after. (But more than likely you'll find a court order to remain 200 feet away. It's a risk we all have to take.)

And finally, sacrifice a little for what's important.

The only thing I like more than a cool glass of white wine is a cool glass of white wine that I can purchase using my Dining Dollars. Or that girl's Dining Dollars at the end of the bar who's on my intramural softball team and doesn't seem to understand that I'm still not going to do her Bio homework. I'm not picky.

But, last spring, I decided to start polluting The Collegian with ginger jokes and irrelevant information. Unbeknownst to me, this meant that I would have to forfeit every Wednesday evening at the Cellar for the remainder of my junior and senior year, since the paper goes to print on Thursday.

As soon as I found this out, I quit. But, I had already signed a six million dollar contract and wasn't willing to forfeit my new boobies and Maserati, so my last Wednesday night at the Cellar is now a distant memory.

And, to my own surprise, working at The Collegian has been one of the most meaningful things I have done since I came to Richmond.

Moral of the story: Monday night is the new Wednesday night at the Cellar -- er, I mean -- do something useful with your time here. You won't regret it.