I’ve always disliked the adage that we should live each day as our last. It seems too panicked, too frantic a motto. I’ve never been the kind of person to kick herself for not going to “the” party of the week, or month, or year-there will always be another party-or the kind of traveler to plan anxious, tightly scheduled days of sightseeing.

I always assume if I enjoy a place, I’ll be back someday. I like the slow moments, the unplanned stretches of time that living like you’re dying doesn’t seem to allow for: the lingering over a cup of coffee, the quick study break that becomes two hours of talking in the kitchen, the long walk with no destination.

But.

This is my last column. These are my last days of the first half of college, and for a quarter of us the last days of the second half, and since college is something I half-thought I’d be doing forever, I’m wondering if I have as much time as I thought.

Most people like Friday or Saturday, but my favorite day is tomorrow. Scarlett O’Hara and I have that in common. Instead of “Live each day as though it were your last,” our motto is “Tomorrow is another day!” Tomorrow is a fresh start, the day that maybe I will spontaneously embody my ideal version of me: the version that is more self-assured and fearless than I am today. The me who will put herself out there, make the first move, take the leap, whatever the leap happens to be that day.

Because of this, this faith that I always have tomorrow, there are steps I’ve been afraid to make, crutches I’ve been unwilling to relinquish, a fear of rejection I still haven’t released. But I am recognizing-not spontaneously but slowly, gradually-that I won’t release this fear while lingering over a cup of coffee or talking at the kitchen table.

Tomorrow may be my favorite day, but it will also never come, and so I may have to reschedule my day to take risks to one of the seven days of the week. Wednesday sounds good; Wednesdays are boring anyway.

We’ve all heard there’s a first time for everything, and the accompanying truism is that there’s also a last. A last call for drinks, the last episode of “Lost,” the Last Supper, the last day of school. I’d like to decide how many second chances I get, but unfortunately the world is not a video game, and I don’t have multiple lives. I’m moving toward many “lasts” faster than I want to admit.

And so I’m giving up the idea of “starting over tomorrow.” We will never live at any time other than now; whatever we do, when we do it it’s today. When you think about it, we can’t actually do anything “tomorrow.” I’m going to push myself to stop always looking forward to the next chance, the next opportunity, the next time. My last chance is now. Weinberg sophomore Hayley MacMillen can be reached at [email protected].