Four years have come and gone so fast, and here I find myself, a senior writing his last column, which, as dictated long ago, must be of a reflective nature.

But how to go about reflecting? A tribute to favorite professors? Too narrow an audience. Waxing poetic about the interweaving of our fates? Already been done. But don’t worry – I did not kiss any gay French man with whom I did not share a common language (“The threads of fate,” April 29). Instead, I’ll just give you underclassmen a laundry list of things to max out on in your remaining time.

Who doesn’t love diversity? You can be assured that on this campus, no fewer and no more than two viewpoints are presented on every issue. We’ve got it all: Campus Drive Purple Liners and Preinkert Drive Purple Liners, town and gown, Cornerstoners and Thirsty Turtles, SGA and a Anti-SGA, Greek life and non-tool and those “militant feminists with AK-47s” and “chauvinist potential rapists” commenting online about Skirt Day and “Wet streets cause rape” (May 2). Whatever your opinion on any issue, you can surely mask your true opinions just slightly to gain acceptance in one camp. But never admit to liking country music; this will have you ostracized from several circles of friends. Actually, if what makes you different doesn’t relate to skin color, genitals or what genitals you like on other people, you’re better off keeping that to yourself.

I have no hard feelings regarding the housing mess. Sure, I was booted in April of my junior year, but I got to live in some great dorms. I’ll admit freshman year in a basement by a dumpster was rather lousy, but sophomore year, I inhabited the castle-like Anne Arundel. Medieval hygiene rules must have been in effect, as the frequency with which people washed their hands in the bathroom led me to believe the act was prohibited. Don’t worry, readers: I broke that law every chance I had. Just remember to use the paper towels on the door handle, and you’ll be fine.

Some would say the Department of Resident Life needs to “do something.” I disagree. Have you heard the economic reports lately? I’m glad the entire staff of Resident Life spends their days shopping online. Personal consumption expenditures really need a shot in the arm, and it’s Resident Life that’s going to turn this economy around!

But there’s big-university bureaucracy everywhere, right? My friend Julie Keating, a 2007 cell biology and molecular genetics graduate, is a first-year graduate student at Wisconsin. Recently, she discovered her graduate stipend was about $600 less than it had been every other pay period. She sent an e-mail to somebody vaguely related to payroll (in fact, the wrong person to contact), and within an hour, the entire payroll division was aware of the problem. Not only had it been fixed, but she also received apologies from three different people. It’s too bad I don’t go there; two coworkers and I pointed out payroll errors to Resident Life around October, and we are still waiting for our hourly wage to be corrected and to be compensated for the hundreds of hours logged at an incorrect pay rate.

There are only a couple things I won’t miss. One of them is that anonymous heckler who posts regularly on my columns, calling me a racist for once using the word “gringo” in print. The other has got to be that good old College Park mentality. As Ms. Keating put it, “there’s more to college than getting blackout drunk several nights a week, sleeping around and just generally being a huge [jerk], and I shouldn’t have felt bad about not wanting to do those things.” Well put.

But hey, I’m not bitter. Thanks to the university, I’ll be starting a doctoral program at Michigan in the fall. As far as I know, that’s a university where people who know each other say, “Hello,” rather than looking away or at the ground at the last second, and conversations outside of bars generally aren’t labeled “awkward!”

Sounds pretty different.

Daniel Marcin is a senior economics and mathematics major. He can be reached at dmarcin@umd.edu.