I am urged, by my conscience, to remind my peers that our values, our strengths, and our worth will not be determined by an acceptance letter or the lack thereof. Prestigious college does not guarantee success.

On the day in question, I drove quietly. The December cold threatened to freeze me to death, so I had my heater on and the windows up. I was nervous—quite so that I decided to drown my neurotic thoughts with some music. As I turned left on my block, I played “White Dress”; immediately, the vocals pierced through my speakers. 

“This is it; this is how I will remember it,” I said out loud.

As I stopped the car, I couldn’t help thinking how different my life would be from this moment on. I was excited. I pictured seeing the confetti pop up from the corners of the screen and the big tiger mascot in the middle—I smiled. I pushed open the gate door, walked through, and closed it behind me. I smiled, thinking of the jumps I would have with every single one of my friends. The tears I would share with my parents. The relief I would have of getting accepted early.

Soon, my Instagram profile would be filled with beautiful landscapes. With pictures of my new friends at some renowned library. And hundreds of sunset pictures taken through my dorm room window. Soon, my parents would throw their eldest son’s acceptance letter at anyone. 

I now stood in front of my house’s door. The door was rusty and the exterior’s paint faded.

“My ticket out of here is just one click away,” I told myself.

My parents greeted me. The living room was dark and they seemed to have been sitting there for a while. No TV. No radio. No speaker somewhere playing. 

I laid my bag down on the kitchen counter, opened it, and took out my laptop. I opened it. Logged on. Went to my bookmark labeled ‘College Portals.’ Clicked Princeton. Logged on. And waited.

At last, a yellow banner greeted me, reading “Click here to view decision.”

My heart raced. My palms were sweaty, and I could feel my parents watching me. I clicked it. 

‘I am so sorry to inform you that…’

I didn’t bother finishing it. I closed the laptop and looked up.

“I didn’t get in.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I didn’t get in.”

“I heard you, but why, then, are you smiling?”

I didn’t know why, I was smiling that is. Where were the waterworks? The shattering of my dreams? I didn’t feel my heart sink. I didn’t feel my body give up. Why didn’t I break down like those kids on those ‘Dream School Decision Reaction’ videos? Maybe it hasn’t hit me yet.

My parents probably thought I was hiding it very well—my grief, I mean. They tried to comfort me. We got ice cream later that night.

Even now, on this cold January dawn in which I write this, I still don’t understand why the rejection didn’t damage me as I thought it would. I still thought of myself as worthy as before. Why then?

Perhaps, as I scramble to give you an answer, the reason is that Princeton wasn’t my dream school at all. 

As I now philosophize, the university is just another university but with a nice name. Because, at whatever school I end up at, I will still share those tears and those jumps and those Instagram posts. It’s not, perhaps, that I was infatuated with being a Princetonian but more so a college kid. I wasn’t obsessed with a building or a legacy—I was obsessed with knowing that I would be somewhere this autumn. That I would be doing something. That I wouldn’t have to struggle to find my place in the world, for it would be put in front of me: student. 

Attending a university like Princeton will not make you somehow better or worse of a person. Yes, it will bring you prestige and resources, but so can attending another institution. Yes, it might open doors, but not attending it might open windows. And yes, it may connect you with people you would otherwise never have even dreamed of networking with, but those people could be tired of meeting the same persona and are ready to seek the unlike. After all, although an institution may make it easier to do so, it is up to me, and you, to seek such and any opportunity.

Not attending Princeton will not make me a worse person. I know it. Even if so many think otherwise, attending the college that I will, won’t make me a finer one. For when autumn comes, whether at college or not, we will continue to be someone with value—worth that cannot be taken or given by anything. And at night, when we lie on our cold and uncomfortable mattresses and see-through that rusty window the autumn leaves falling down outside, we will begin to forget whatever power we had given an institution—a power that momentarily could have broken us. And we will smile and smile and smile.

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