In August, we bring a set of new full-time writers to the blog. Today, please welcome Karis Schoon (‘26), who will be writing for us on the 28th of each month. Karis graduated with degrees in social work and psychology and also a major in English because people and their stories are pretty cool. She’s currently getting her master’s while working at Baylor University in Texas, where she gets paid to play board games and grab coffee with students. When not working, she’s probably playing a role-playing game, reading somebody’s memoir, or brainstorming a new writing project.
Someday soon, the milk will last longer in this apartment than I will.
The thought came unbidden, as the best and worst ones always do. A part of my habitual cognitive pre-processing, if I were to guess. Something unconscious deep within me is running through a checklist of mental work to be done before the move. Unbidden, like the ticking clock in my head reminding me how many days until the move, the milk’s “sell-by” date creeping closer and closer to my “move-out” date.
My housemates have taken to calling it “the unknown place.” They play a dramatic sadness when I mention the event, begging for me to stay. They coyly let slip their imaginary plans—the tame ones about luring me into a closet with fruit snacks and trapping me forever or the exaggerated ones about exploding my destination city off the face of the earth. I feel so incredibly loved to have people who will miss me like this; I feel so incredibly remorseful to know that my move will hurt them. It will hurt me too. I don’t tell them that milk makes me sad.
I go through my days like normal, but my ears perk up at the mention of Texas, or Waco, or Baylor University. Mine, I claim. It’s a new feeling. I didn’t use to take ownership of Chip and Joanna Gaines. I haven’t always known about the Waco siege. Texas has never been home. I’m Michigan-born and Canada-raised—Texas is another world entirely. Now I work for a school bearing the words “Pro Texana” in their motto.
During the weeks surrounding graduation, both whirlwind and plodding, Sarah Visser gave a speech at the social work commencement ceremony about learning people’s “befores,”—the places and people and experiences who have shaped them. I was startled by the realization that Calvin, and Grand Rapids, and Michigan, would no longer be mine. They would become my “befores.” I won’t live here; I’ll only be from here.
People ask me if I’m excited. I say yes. It’s true, and it’s not. I’m really excited about the classes I’ll be taking. And I’ve heard horror stories of students quitting because of them. I can’t wait to work in residence life at Baylor. And I’m scared that it’ll be too big and I’ll get lost in the crowd. I’m excited to discover who I am outside of my family. And I worry about being untethered from them. All are true. In the “after” of my life-changing move, it’ll fall into a neater narrative. I’ll remember what stayed true. I’ll forget what changed.
With the exception of my oldest brother’s gap year spent abroad, my family has always lived within a five-mile radius of each other. And now, I’ll be the third sibling to move states within a three-week span. Our “Find My Friends” feels like the opening to a game of pool—the rack lifted, the shot lined up, the break. We scatter to our corners.
I’m unpracticed in the art of managing long-distance relationships. How often do I call my mom? How often do I call my dad? Does one phone call suffice for both? How do I possibly begin the task of sorting friendships into “keeps” and “stop maintaining?” Do I just “let it happen” and see who reaches out? How do I balance investing in the people I love here with investing in the place I am going?
In the weeks leading up to a life-altering move, I’ve gravitated toward spending as much time as possible with all of the people I’ll soon be leaving. There’s a giant poster in my kitchen, The Apartment Formerly Known As Kappa One’s Housemate Adventures, bearing a list of all of the fun things my housemates and I want to do this summer. I don’t mention how limiting my ticking clock feels. I highlight the ones I really want to do, silently resigning myself to the fact that the others won’t happen. Scratch that: They will happen, just without me.
The clock keeps ticking. The questions sit patiently, waiting just four more weeks, three more weeks, two more weeks, for their answer. Waiting to find out how Texas will become mine, how Calvin becomes a “before,” if my excitement will endure, how many Housemate Adventures I can have before then, how often I will call my parents, which friendships will last. I keep buying milk and watch the expiration date grow closer and closer.
Karis Schoon (’26) graduated with degrees in social work and psychology and also a major in English because people and their stories are pretty cool. She’s currently getting her master’s while working at Baylor University in Texas, where she gets paid to play board games and grab coffee with students. When not working, she’s probably playing a role-playing game, reading somebody’s memoir, or brainstorming a new writing project.
