With fall behind us, let’s spring forward


My favorite time to be at USC — and in Los Angeles — is the spring. With the whole of spring semester 2015 upon us, it’s interesting to see how our fellow Trojans experience the season commonly associated with rebirth, flowers, baby animals and cleaning. At USC, it’s more common to associate spring with crop-tops, flower crowns, shorter haircuts and salmon colored shorts. But in its constant state of sunshiny wonder, L.A. is not a place for drastic seasonal change.

We wear crop-tops seasonally here. Spring arrives quietly and unassuming as we all run to class and go about out busy lives, but if you pay attention just to the trees on Trousdale you’ll see how they’ll start budding and making new leaves. Spring semesters are like those flowering trees most of us walk past every day. Preparing to burst open and start smelling good as our campus squirrels lose their winter fluff and start jumping after each other.

We come back with fall semester’s failures and triumphs behind us. Winter break has become a distant memory narrated by Bing Crosby, shrouded in the scents of cinnamon and pine. We’re ready to start a new year afresh and make the most out of what is remaining of the current academic year. Spring is a good time to make cleaner healthier choices about whatever has been bothering you be it psychological, your love life, academics, or your overall health. Maybe it’s time you confronted your roommate about their science experiment in the back of the fridge.

What’s most important to remember about the strange limbo-space that could be used to describe the wintery beginnings of spring semester is that not everyone is on the same path. Some of us are returning with years ahead of us, others are graduating come summer. Some are abroad having adventures in foreign lands, while others have just joined the Trojan Family as spring admits. Each of us will be experiencing our own struggles. Support in all forms can make a huge difference in the outcome of this semester.

Everyone I’ve talked to sees this semester more as an opportunity for change than a continuation of what they’ve been doing. Whatever stage any of us is at, it’s comforting to know that the silent forces that push spring forward are able to push us all forward, too.