{shortcode-71be49da646ed44962b85108bd155fe2140e31d2}You’ve submitted your thesis. You’ve folded and packed your grad gown. Your parents booked a hotel in Cambridge that cost a semester’s worth of tuition.

You did everything you needed to graduate…right?

Truth is, walking the stage didn’t mean you met all your requirements. No, not the ones you skimmed

through on my.harvard while Googling, “is a 3.69 technically cum laude?” I’m talking about the rites of passage that mark a true Harvardian — the ones you would be quizzed on in the Suits multiverse to check if you really went to Harvard.

Section crushes? Library all-nighters? Comping trauma? Galore. We’ve all had them.

Unless, of course, you haven't. In that case, you have one final chance to pull off the ultimate buzzer-beater and earn your unofficial social degree before you leave campus this year.

Now, take out your metaphorical punch card and see if you really graduated from the big H.

Sidechat Fame

Did you have your moment? Your anonymous fifteen minutes of fame? If you’ve cracked >100 upvotes on a single post, you can confidently say that you have.

No, it doesn’t count if your post was begging everyone to mass-email your professor to bump the class average (an A- will not kill you) (touch grass guys) (go outside and breathe air).

Instead, your post must have sparked laughter. Forged community. Have been filled with language so incisive, humor so disarmingly astute, wit so unnervingly precise that users were left wondering: “Who wrote this? Can we be friends? Or fall in love? Or both?”

Which is precisely why there should have been a grand unveiling of Sidechat’s leaderboard celebrities at graduation. Radio Rebel-style.

Show yourselves. For the people. For the bit.

G-cal-ing Your Shower

Welcome to the academic underworld! It is only accessible via the Lamont elevator and reserved for when you’re forty lectures behind, you have a final tomorrow, and your shower time needs to be budgeted by the second.

There is no free will, there is only Google Calendar.

All Harvard students know, if it’s not on the calendar, it’s not happening. How else will you make sure your personal hygiene doesn’t bleed into the “Lecture #4” & “Overthink that one section comment from 3 weeks ago” slots?

You also get major bonus points if you’ve carved out time for breakdowns: “Crying in the MAC: 5:15-5:30 p.m. Hard stop.”

Because at the end of the day, you didn’t run your schedule at Harvard — your schedule ran you.

Lamonstering for a Night

It started innocently enough. You went to Lamont to make some “meaningful progress” on that double-spaced, 15-page paper you had due in the morning. Next thing you know, it’s 5:43 a.m., the sun is rising, you’re hyper aware of your newly formed eyebags, your spine is shaped like a question mark, and you’re sipping the last of your stale, soy-milk latte from Lamont Cafe (they were out of whole milk again).

Not to mention, you’ve been holding your pee for seven hours just to avoid the Lamont bathrooms, which reek of despair and someone’s regrettable HUDS dinner.

At some point, you check your progress and come to a horrifying realization: your hours-per-page rate is slower than your minutes-per-mile. You are somehow both illiterate and unathletic. Congratulations.

You didn’t just pull an all-nighter. You haven’t spoken aloud in over 10 hours. You have morphed into one of the Lamonsters you have been warned of before. Vacant eyes. Hoodie up. Laptop glowing.

Did you really go to Harvard if you didn’t have this descent into fluorescent-lit madness?

Lost a Friend to Consulting

They used to be full of joy — promise even. They used to paint, laugh, and smile. Their Harvard applications once said things like “I want to make a difference and be a force for good.”

Then, came the info sessions, the tote bags, and the free sushi. Suddenly, you’re hearing the words “It’ll just be for two years” from the same friend who once wanted to run a community goat farm in Vermont. Classic last words.

Now, you wake up to the buzzing sound of Slack notifications from their phone. They whisper weird words like “client-facing” in their sleep. They unironically ask if you could “circle back” to grabbing a meal together.

You nod. You smile. You grieve. Congratulations, MBB killed your best friend’s personality, and you can finally join the thousands of other mournful Harvard alumni who can say the same.

Saying Goodbye To Your Characters

No, these are not your friends. Not your blockmates. Not even your old situationships you avoid making eye contact with at the CVS self-checkout.

We are talking about the recurring characters in the movie of your college life, the ones with virtually no speaking lines but a looming presence. The characters you’ve unlocked and now suddenly see everywhere.

You’ve talked about them with your friends, you’ve assigned them personalities, and you’ve built entire narratives around them. From the girl who always raised her hand in EC1010a to the guy who was always in the dhall when you were, you begin to wonder if they remember you the same way you remember them.

The worst part is, these goodbyes are the hardest. You have virtually no way to stay in touch, but you’ll miss the way they quietly filled the background of your days.

Part of graduating is letting go of the strangers who’ve shaped your life without ever knowing they were in it.

So no, you can’t just post your Widener thesis photos and proceed through Johnston Gate. To really graduate from Harvard, you have to laugh, overschedule, work all night, spend time with your friends, fall in love with strangers, and somehow find joy in the small chaotic moments that make Harvard home.

Only then can you really say goodbye <3.