My absolute best year in school was my junior year in college. (You didn't specify what type of school ) During winter semester, I stayed on campus, which was the first time I'd ever been on my own and I had a ball. I went from sharing a room with an 7 year-old and 13 year-old who were unholy terrors, tore up my belongings and never were made to clean up their mess, which I had to do, to sharing a dorm room with a wonderful roomate who couldn't have been more perfect if I picked her myself.
I got to be around others my age and have a fuller college experience, going to activities I couldn't otherwise attend due to transportation issues. I also was saved a commute to class so all I had to do was wake up 15 minutes before class, throw on some clothes......and run....real fast. The classes were much easier to deal with without the distraction of two little kids and a mother who was emotionally abusive and I made the highest grades during that semester.
The skills I taught myself by staying there prepared me to have my own apartment the next semester as it was being on my own without really being on my own, like adulthood....with training wheels. I tell you, when that semester ended and I had to go home until I got my own apartment that July, I wanted to cry my head off.
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"There is difference and there is power. And who holds the power decides the meaning of the difference." --June Jordan