Okay…what now?
I remember asking myself this question the day I moved into Justice Hall on Appalachian State’s west side of campus. I had gone through the process of being accepted as a transfer student, confirming my best friend was also going to be my roommate (hey, Madison!), bought all of the supplies for the dorm, got it all carried up to the room and unpacked, and my parents were on their way back home to Stokes County. What now?
At most colleges and universities, “Welcome Weekend” is a great time to meet new people and fellow incoming students. The school will host many elaborate events to get students excited and familiar with the campus and also make connections within the student body. Though I encourage all students I work with now to go to those events, I have to admit, I was too anxious to attend them.. My roommate, Madison, and I spent most of that evening exploring the campus and avoiding the hotspots, where there were sure to be hundreds of students attending the events. Though we had been fortunate enough to secure a spot in the residential dorms for the year, many of the students who lived there were first-time freshmen. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I do remember feeling like a bit of an outsider even just having been two years older than some of the other residents in the dorm, with my pathway to university also looking a little different.
That night around 9PM, while Welcome Weekend festivities were still in full-swing, my phone pinged from a GroupMe chat titled “2019-2020 Transfer Gang”. There were about 20-25 people in the group chat who lived in Justice Hall, and the message that had been sent was an invitation to everyone to meet in the lobby of the dorm to create a Fantasy Football league. I remember looking at Madison like “Should we do this?” despite our very limited knowledge (at the time) of the sport; eventually, we decided that worst case scenario, we would learn a thing or two about football before the App State home games started for the season.
When we got down to the lobby, there was a group of guys already talking about football and eager to help explain the rules of Fantasy to anyone who needed a refresher. We ended up doing a Snake Draft setup, and the entire group stayed in that lobby until nearly 1AM. We laughed together and went around a circle sharing where we had transferred from; there were many different walks of life, and I felt like I had found my people. I remember when we got back to our dorm, I turned to Madison and asked if we had just met our group of friends.
For the months that followed, our “Justice League” would go to the dining hall together, study for exams in the library, and, my personal favorite: hold movie nights in the common room of Justice Hall. I watched a lot of movies I really liked that semester - not because they were that great, but because the company and memories meant so much.
As we have all officially graduated to Justice League Alumni, it is harder to plan group gatherings, especially with us living all over the state and some even on the West Coast. We have worked around this in the way of using a Snapchat group chat, so that we can all keep in touch and share good memories (and memes). I can honestly say that I consider the Justice League my dearest set of friends, and I would not have found them if I had not gone out of my comfort zone that night with the fantasy football draft. Though my fantasy team was CRUSHED that year (I didn’t really know what I was doing), I have continued with it each year since, as a way of keeping close with the group. I want to take this time to thank the whole Justice League - Madison, Luis, Chase, Nick, Jordan H. (J-Harb), Charlie, Jacob, Skelly (Thomas), Jordan B., Brandon, and Tyler - for making that first semester, and every semester that followed at App State, so memorable. I genuinely believe we helped push each other out of our comfort zones, while also sharing motivation and encouragement with each other to continue and earn our Bachelor’s degrees. Though most people would agree living on your own beats living in a dormitory, I can’t help but miss the convenience of having my friends live two floors down and just a text away.
My purpose for sharing this story with you is not only to look back fondly on one of my more memorable nights of college, but to also let you know it is possible to find your ‘people’ in the unlikeliest of settings, so long as you are willing to explore outside of familiar territory. Whereas I may not have gone out of my comfort zone with the Welcome Weekend events that year, I put myself out there by joining a group of individuals playing a game I had zero experience with simply for the purpose of meeting new people. Although I may have been uncomfortable in the beginning as one of the only members without extended knowledge of football, I made memories that I will cherish for a lifetime. While I may still lose each year of Fantasy, I would like to think the experience of joining the League ultimately worked out in my favor.
Written by Ashley Bingman, adviser at Mitchell High School.
Ashley Bingman, Adviser Mitchell HS
Ashley Bingman, Adviser Mitchell HS