Senior Reflection: Caroline Shu
It was my first week at Exeter and I was laying on my bed when I heard a scratchy noise echo from my desk. I then heard a faint call of my name and proceeded to drag myself out of bed and over to the tiny voice box laying on the table face up.
“Carollllll!” I heard her voice again.
I laughed, picked up the walkie talkie, and responded with her name.
“Esmeeeee…”
We met on October 3, 2020, our first day on campus. I was sitting outside in the Webster quad next to the Kona Ice truck when a smiley girl with curly hair and her older sister walked up and introduced themselves to me. Thinking nothing of it, I smiled, introduced myself, and continued on with the conversation that was interrupted. It was not until late that afternoon that I was sitting in my newly unpacked room looking around for something to do. I missed home, I missed my friends, I felt alone. I shed a few tears, grabbed a bag of chips and headed towards Grill in hopes of finding my older sister.
At the time, the school was foreign to me. I had no idea where I was going and everyone that I passed was a stranger. Everyone except one curly haired girl laying on the ground by the staircase door in Grill basement. Before I could even say hi, she called me over to play the card game Spit. Even though I did not get to play, nor did I even know the rules, I sat on the ground next to a complete stranger yet was already feeling like Exeter was slowly becoming my home.
Through all of the ups and downs that I have experienced at Exeter, there has been one person that has been with me through it all, my best friend Esme. From signing up for all the same classes only to never have a class together to crying on the bus ride home from our last highschool lacrosse game, I have grown and learned so much about myself and the world with my best friend by my side.
Unlike most, one of my favorite years at Exeter was prep year. Despite such a restricting time on campus prep year due to COVID, Esme and I were able to build the foundation for our lasting friendship. When no events were held, we projected youtube videos of Just Dance on the second floor in Grill and danced for hours. When the dining hall was not open for people to sit in, we went from food truck to food truck in the pouring rain doing food reviews. Even when the dining hall finally opened, we sat there for hours talking about outer space, the graduating seniors and shared stories about our upbringing. We laid under the stars playing Among Us, and walked around campus screaming, singing Fragile by Kygo.
On one of the final few days, I sat with Esme on the second floor of Grill adding things to my time capsule. We both wrote each other letters and made Exeter bucket lists consisting of activities ranging from playing Cilley Ball to jumping into the Exeter river. I remember us both wondering if we would still be friends when we opened our time capsules. We laughed at how funny it would be if we weren’t and then had to open letters from each other and remember how we spent every second together Prep year. I am glad that fantasy did not play out, and that our friendship is still intact. Esme and I still review food together. We still stargaze, and just saw the coolest shooting star either of us have ever seen. We still dance to the same Just Dance songs and will always jump up with excitement when Fragile by Kygo comes on.
