Collegiate Times

Today it hit me ? I?m a communication major who can?t communicate. Seems a little sad, right? In reality, when it comes to initiating a conversation with someone outside of our normal groups of friends we all pretty much suck. What I want to know is: If I have a class with you, am involved in the same school organizations as you and our paths to classes seem to cross every day, then why the heck don?t you say ?hi? to me? Why do I sit in class three times a week staring at the back of your neck? This isn?t a personal plea for friends ? I?d like to think I have plenty. But seriously, aren?t we all guilty of this in one way or another? We all have those people who we seem to see everywhere, yet neither of us has the nerve to break the barrier of silence and initiate normal human interaction.

The longer I?ve been at college, the more I am coming to realize that there are endless types of pseudo-friends that you will come to make during your four (or five, or six ? ) years here. First there?s the ?we have the same major and we have had every single class together since freshman year friend.? It almost seems too generous to call this person a ?friend? when in reality you?ve never talked. You slave over the same homework, do the same projects, fail the same exams, but for some reason you haven?t taken the courtesy to initiate any type of comradeship. I say if we have to suffer through the same classes, can?t we suffer together?

Next there?s the all-too-familiar ?hey friend.? If I had it my way the ?hey friend? would cease to exist. In this circumstance you still don?t really know where you and this person stand on the friend scale. When you walk by them on campus, you both either exchange an extremely fake ?hey, how are you?? If you really want a friendship with this person, why not say something a little more personal then that. I would rather a: ?Hey Susan, did you really get stood up by that guy on Friday night?? than a ?what?s up??

Often times we find ourselves needing any possible method to avoid having to say hey to the ?hey friend.? When you see this person in your path you quickly scramble for something to make yourself look so overwhelmed that you don?t notice them. Quite possibly my favorite avoidance tactic is the fake phone call, perhaps one where you are in a fight with your ?boyfriend/girlfriend.? See, I don?t have a boyfriend, but I must say I can do a pretty convincing fake-breakup-phone call. And truth be told, no one will ever say hi to you if you look like you?re on the brink of a breakup phone call.

Lastly there?s my favorite type of friend; what I call the ?potential friend.? I?ll give you an example from my own life ? Freshman English class boy. This guy enthralled me for reasons that I can?t explain. He just had this aura, and I strived to initiate a friendship. There he sat every Tuesday/Thursday with his black ski hat, corduroy jacket, one-strap man-purse backpack and iPod headphones in. I could sit here and tell you I didn?t have a crush on this mystery man, but that would be a blatant lie. In the beginning I would plan on walking into class five minutes late so I could nonchalantly go and sit next to him, but weeks went by and I gave up my chance. I learned from this that there is a definite ?potential friend red-zone.? This red zone is the first two weeks of the semester, and if you fail to initiate conversation in that time, the chance that a relationship will form exponentially decreases. See, for me the potential for friendship with English 1106 boy was there, but I blew it. I still think about how much fun we could?ve had together. We could?ve played pranks on our professor together, passed an occasional note or grabbed lunch.

So what?s the difficulty with potential friends? None of us seem to have enough courage to initiate. We like to sit in class acting like we have better things to be doing, but do we really? Maybe the reason some of our classes are so excruciating to sit through is because we have no one to talk to. Everyone needs a friend. It?s about time that I address this ever-growing problem to you, the student body of Virginia Tech. The opportunity to make new friends is there everyday. I promise you that if you man up and get shot down in your attempts, there?s always me. I?d like to say I have some potential.