“We two who’ve paddled in the stream From morning sun ’til night, The seas between us roared and swelled Since the days of auld lang syne.”

Till the strings of fate let us meet again. Farewell, my friend.

There’s a strange kind of silence that comes with the end of something beautiful. Not loud. Not sudden. Just a soft echo of laughter fading in the corners of memory, like a song you once knew all the words to, now humming only in fragments.

As graduation tiptoes closer, a quiet truth begins to settle in our hearts: that everything we thought was constant was only borrowed time dressed as permanence.

We spent years paddling the same stream. Classmates, orgmates, roommates, soulmates. Through early morning classes and sleepless nights, through heartbreaks over grades and life itself. And in those passing days, we built a home in each other. A makeshift family in a place that once felt foreign.

But no matter how tightly we held on, time moved anyway.

Back then, we thought we had all the time in the world. We passed each other in hallways without much thought, waved casually, made plans we never followed through on, thinking there’d always be a next time. But time is a quiet thief. It tiptoes past us while we’re distracted and suddenly, it’s the last semester. The final exam. The last tambay outside the building. The last “Shot?” turning into “Kailan ulit?”

Was there ever really a next time?

Ms. Dawn Oquiño, a graduate from the College of Education, described it best—that indescribable bond forged through shared chaos and joy.

The bond I built is thicker than blood. We started as strangers, then became online friends, and now, truly, we’re family. I’m incredibly proud of the journey that brought me to a lot of people, ”she said.

Strangers turned lifelines. People who once sat beside you in silence becoming the ones who stayed up with you when your world was crumbling. And that’s the beauty of college-somehow, it teaches you that family is more than blood. It’s who shows up. Who stays. Who laughs with you through the deadlines and holds you through the breakdowns.

Yet, somewhere in between the midterms and microwaved meals, the org meetings and campus events, we missed chances to pause. To savor. We overlooked the ordinary and even the quiet walks, the shared tricycle rides, the short conversations somewhere in the campus, never knowing those would be the moments we’d long for the most.

“Now, as we stand on the brink of taking different paths,” Ms. Oquiño added, “a mix of pride and nostalgia washes over me. It’s heartwarming to see everyone stepping into their own, growing into the incredible individuals they’re meant to be. Yet, there’s a quiet ache knowing that our routines, the spontaneous hangouts, and the simple daily interactions won’t be as common. It’s no longer a casual ‘Tara, shot?’ but a hopeful, longing, ‘Kailan ulit, shot?’”

And this is where it gets real. After graduation, life begins pulling us like tides. Jobs, responsibilities, cities far from where we first learned how to grow. Group chats grow silent, not because we stopped caring, but because life started moving faster than our schedules could handle.

Some friendships fade like postcards forgotten in drawers. Others stay, not in everyday messages, but in the deep knowing that you once mattered to each other, and always will.

And it hurts not in a sharp, devastating way, but in the slow, aching realization that some of the best parts of our youth happened as we waited for “better days.” We were too busy rushing through the present to see we were living in the golden hours.

But perhaps, this is what growing up is. Understanding that not everything lasts, and that’s what makes it precious. Like fireflies in the dark— brief, flickering, magical.

Maybe we’re not meant to hold on forever. Maybe we’re just meant to remember. To tuck these memories in the softest parts of ourselves and carry them forward. Into our new lives. Into the new homes we’ll build. Into the new versions of us we’re still becoming.

So here’s to the nights that turned into mornings. To the strangers who became family. To the goodbyes that didn’t sound like goodbyes. To the version of ourselves that bloomed in each other’s light.

Here’s to the days of auld lang syne. The days that made us, broke us, healed us, and shaped us.

And if fate is kind, maybe someday, in a random coffee shop or a nearby reunion bar, we’ll find our way back to each other. Laughing again, like no time has passed at all.

Until then, till the strings of fate let us meet again… farewell, my friend.

Article by Denise Cañete