There is a strange, comforting illusion we all fall for in college — the illusion of permanence.
We silently convince ourselves that the people we see every single day will always be just a short walk down the hall or a quick text message away, functioning almost as a necessary defense mechanism. Acknowledging that these four years are merely a temporary intersection of our lives is far too heavy a thought to carry while trying to survive a constant barrage of classes, midterms and looming deadlines. So, we construct a mental bubble where time stands still and our current social circles remain intact indefinitely.
When you walk across campus, bracing against the freezing Binghamton wind, sitting in your usual spot at the library or grabbing a late-night dinner with the same group of friends, it feels like this rhythm will last forever.
We trick ourselves into believing that this specific chapter of our lives is fixed. We assume there will always be another late-night study session, another weekend to look forward to and another chance to have those genuine, deep conversations we keep putting off because we are “too busy” right now. We constantly trade the present moment for the promise of a tomorrow that we falsely assume will look exactly like today.
We get so comfortable in the repetitive cycle of our daily lives that we forget how fragile it all is. Because the people closest to us are always around, we begin to take them completely for granted. We almost always wait until they are gone to realize what they meant to us. This cycle of retroactive appreciation needs to stop. True value is not something to be recognized only when you are looking in the rearview mirror.
Our minds constantly pull us away from the present moment. We are wired to focus on what comes next — the upcoming midterm, the summer internship application and the impending graduation. In this relentless pursuit of the future, the people who are sitting right in front of us often become part of the background. We treat our closest college friends as permanent fixtures in a highly variable world. But people are not constants and it is a tragic flaw in human nature that we are terrible at recognizing someone’s worth while they are actively in our lives.
Think about the conversations you have every single day on campus. When a friend is sitting across from you in the dining hall, their everyday words, their complaints about a difficult history paper or their terrible jokes seem completely ordinary. You might even be staring at your phone while they speak. But the moment that person is no longer part of your daily routine, those same words suddenly carry the weight of the world.
But why is it that someone’s value reaches its absolute peak only after their absence?
Perhaps human beings measure worth through contrast. When someone is a constant part of your daily routine, their presence blends into the background of your life, much like the air you breathe. You do not notice it until it is suddenly taken away. It is only when a vacuum is created — when a familiar voice is replaced by silence or an occupied chair becomes empty — that our minds finally comprehend the true scale of the space that person took up in our lives.
It is a strange phenomenon that someone’s thoughts, advice and presence are much more vivid after they go silent. When someone’s voice fades, the space they leave behind echoes much louder than the words they spoke while they were here.
This illusion of permanence extends far beyond our years on a university campus — it is a defining tragedy of the human experience. We do this in every stage of life. We do it with our families, treating our parents as permanent fixtures of our universe rather than fragile, temporary gifts. We do it with childhood friends, assuming there will always be a future holiday to finally catch up.
In the grander scope of life, we are constantly walking past the people who love us, distracted by an entirely unguaranteed future, but the universe does not owe us a tomorrow with anyone.
When I say we experience a micro-version of this tragedy at university, I mean that a college campus is an accelerated, compressed simulation of life. In the real world, the tragedy of taking people for granted unfolds over decades. Here, it is condensed into a few short years. The college experience is inherently temporary, yet it tricks us with an intense, false sense of stability. We are thrown together in dorms, apartments and lecture halls, quickly building daily connections that become our entire world.
But because these people live just down the hall or a short bus ride away, we assume their presence is a guaranteed given. We skipped dinner with a close friend because we were “too tired.” We tell ourselves, “I will catch up with them after midterms.” We sit in the same room but remain isolated in our own digital worlds. We constantly trade the present moment for the promise of a tomorrow that might look completely different.
Until one day, the dynamic changes.
The semester ends. People transfer, move off campus, study abroad or graduate. The routine fractures permanently. Suddenly, the empty chair at your usual library table echoes louder than any of the noise around you.
It is in that quiet realization that the true weight of their absence finally hits you. You find yourself instinctively turning to your side to share a passing thought, a complaint about a difficult class or a terrible joke, only to be met with empty air. That physical void left behind becomes a constant, glaring reminder of how much space they actually occupied in your everyday life.
You look back and realize that those seemingly mundane moments — complaining about the upstate New York weather, eating mediocre dining hall food or just sitting in comfortable silence during finals week — were not just pauses between the “important” parts of your life. They were the peak of your college experience. We realize their true value only through the lens of their absence.
We have developed a terrible habit of loving people in retrospect. We write beautiful, heartfelt paragraphs about our friends on social media only when they are packing their bags to leave at the end of the year. We appreciate the warmth of a shared table only when we are forced to eat alone. We treat appreciation as a parting gift, rather than a daily practice.
This needs to change. Appreciation must be felt, shown and shared in the present moment. How the people closest to us look at us, the specific words they choose to comfort us when we fail an exam and the times they choose to be present for us — these are the things that lay the foundation for the emotions we will carry long after we leave this campus.
Do not wait for graduation, a move or a permanent absence to teach you what presence means. Look around the table today. Understand that some words only find their true meaning when they are spoken on time and some people only feel complete when they are loved out loud, while they are still here to hear it.
Omer Mungan is a sophomore double-majoring in history and philosophy, politics and law.
Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.