At the time, I thought it was a sign that I never got an actual acceptance letter to Virginia Tech. I remember logging onto the application site one night at the request of my high school counselor; I glanced quickly across the screen, trying to find the proper button to hit to get me where I needed to go.

My gaze slid to a stop when I saw the words, “pay your deposit here,” in the middle of the screen in all-caps. It was such an insignificant moment; I wasn’t anxiously slitting open a thick envelope shaking with excitement, a moment so many of my friends talk about fondly.

I was staring at a glowing laptop screen that—despite the lack of the word, “congratulations,” was telling me that I had been accepted to Virginia Tech—and I felt nothing. I never wanted to go to Virginia Tech; I never even considered applying until my older brother, a freshman at Tech while I was applying to schools, begged me to apply. Even my parents, both alumni of the University of Virginia, told me I had to apply, that it would be a mistake if I didn’t.

My heart was dead-set on another college, but because my family insisted, I applied to Virginia Tech with what could only be described as a begrudging attitude.

Spring rolled around and for one of the first times in my life, so did the rejections; one after another came in, each one with the worst anxiety-riddled word stamped on the pages: waitlisted. Was it worse to be not wanted at all or to be pushed into the category of “you’re not quite good enough”? It felt like being told that I had all the qualifications, but unfortunately didn’t stand out enough to make the cut. I wasn’t special enough.

Before I knew it, I had little to no options and I found myself for the first time facing the possibility of something I had never considered: going to Virginia Tech. Everyone I knew that went to Virginia Tech told me to wait—wait for that moment, they said. You’ll fall in love with Virginia Tech. Just wait until you get to campus. I waited. I went to orientation, had the most incredible orientation leader in the world, and had as good of a time as anyone could have at orientation. But I left with a pit in my stomach; yes, my orientation leader had made me excited about going to college, but I wasn’t excited about where I was going to college.

Though I had heard people talking about going to something called Hokie Camp, I didn’t even bother looking into it—why would I want to go to another experience like orientation where I would be surrounded by people who were in love with Virginia Tech? I’m one of the most outgoing people I know, but I also knew that I could be very good at putting on a front so as to appear like I fit in. I didn’t want to start putting up my fake “I love Virginia Tech” front before classes even started.

So I waited until I got to campus. The entire first semester, my thoughts constantly shifted between knowing that I was loving the college experience in general and knowing that if I was honest with myself, I was unhappy. I didn’t want to be at Virginia Tech; it was so hard to change my mindset from having my heart set on one school my whole life to being thrown into a sea of die hard Hokies. I hated the idea of being a failure though and I didn’t want to think that I failed at Virginia Tech, so I tried everything I could to give Tech a chance. I got into a freshmen leadership program, I joined a sorority, I met some of the most life changing people I’d ever known.

I put up the front of being the most dedicated, in love Hokie you’ve ever met, hoping that if I faked it enough it would become true.

All the while, I had a half filled out transfer application saved on my laptop. There’s a cheesy quote out there that says something along the lines of, “I fell in love the way you fall asleep; slowly, and then all at once.”

I fell in love with Virginia Tech very, very, very slowly (painfully slow)—and then all at once. The slowly part was over the course of my first two years at Virginia Tech. I began to learn that the walls I had built had been constructed from heartbreak; heartbreak that had stemmed from expectations. I had been shutting myself off because of the expectations I had held in my head about where I was supposed to be, and how it was supposed to be. Bit by bit, or more accurately, person by person, I began to see what everyone had been telling me to wait for. I stopped working on my transfer application and instead began spending all my free time looking up to these incredible people I was lucky enough to have for mentors.

These people were Virginia Tech for me. When I wasn’t in love with Virginia Tech, when I couldn’t see past the walls I had built up for so long, they showed me how to open myself up and how to let Virginia Tech love me, so that I could love it. The all at once part happened at Hokie Camp. During my sophomore year, I was hit by how far I had come since crying to my mom on the phone at night when I was a freshman. I realized that the only reason I had stayed was because of my mentors that had made Tech home. I had found reasons to stay, but it took me a while to find them because of all the walls I had built up. I thought to myself, if I could shorten the amount of time it takes for even one incoming student to find their reasons to stay, than everything would be worth it.

That’s how I found myself standing at Smith Mountain Lake on August 10th, 2014, falling in love with Virginia Tech, all at once.

Over the course of four training semesters, two summers, 22 days, and five Hokie Camp campfires, I found myself falling in love with Virginia Tech so quickly and so repeatedly that I felt my heart could burst. Being at Hokie Camp was like being in the most pure form of the Virginia Tech community—I was surrounded by everything that I had been waiting for, and I got to experience it alongside students who were discovering that feeling for the first time.

Every minute I spent at Hokie Camp, all I could think about was channeling the strength and love I had learned from my mentors and trying to find a way to pass those feelings down. All I ever wanted was to convey that no matter where you were on the road to falling in love with Virginia Tech—no matter how in love you were, or how against it you felt—that all you had to do was stay. Wait for those people that could show you how to let Virginia Tech love you.

My whole heart ached with the hope that these students, having already taken their first step by going to Hokie Camp, could leave for school having found even one of those people.

Today, nothing makes me feel more at home at Virginia Tech than when I see Hokie campers on campus with their people. Nothing has ever given me more joy than hearing two weeks, or two years, down the road how in love they are with Virginia Tech. I was lucky enough to find my people, and lucky enough to have them save me from leaving a school that has become a part of my very being.

I’ve been even luckier to have 22 days of helping incoming students fall in love with Virginia Tech. I was extraordinarily blessed to have experienced the majority of those 22 days with 13 people who held inside each of them the love and selflessness that makes people fall head over heels for Virginia Tech. I wouldn’t be as deeply in love with Virginia Tech if it weren’t for the people that helped me on the road to becoming the person I had always aspired to be. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I never once imagined myself coming to Virginia Tech; I wasted so much time planning when I could leave, asking myself if I was out of the woods yet.

I never would have expected finding my home, right there, in the woods. Looking at it now, I’ve never been happier to have been so wrong.

We live in a day and age where it’s difficult to find someone who’s life hasn’t been affected by cancer in some way. Unfortunately, like many others, I can’t remember the point in my life where cancer wasn’t in my vocabulary.

From a young age I have been exposed this disease that has robbed me and my family of so many memories with the ones we love. It became all too real in high school, when my best friend was sleeping over on school nights while her parents were away in Mexico on experimental chemotherapy trips to attack her father’s colon cancer.

It became all too real when my aunt was asking us to come visit to explain her terminal diagnosis in person, rather than over the phone. It became all too real when my cousin, and built in field trip chaperone, was told that only 3 hospitals on the east coast would even look at his case because it was so rare and unexplored.

It became too real when the man who knew how to light up a room with his belly laugh was told he had throat cancer that barely allowed him to speak at most points during his treatment. It all became too real, and too unbearable at a speed that took my anxiety to a whole new level.

Every time the phone rang, my heart sank into my stomach wondering if it would be an update that would change everything. I lived my life in fear of what cancer was taking from my loved ones.

Day in and day out, I couldn’t find solace that I was away at college and unable to help, even though all I could do was miniscule in compared to their daily fights against this horrible disease.

And then I found Relay For Life at Virginia Tech.

As a confused little freshman, I joined a random person’s team (shoutout to my now BFF), and arrived at the rainy and chilly event, unsure of what to expect of the night. I knew there was music, food, and community, but I didn’t expect to find the comfort my soul so desperately needed.

As I heard others speak about their battles with cancer, the loss of their loved ones, their continuing bouts, my eyes were gently opened to all that I could do to help. Even from hundreds of miles away, I could do something that would help change someone’s life.

Here I am, 3 Relays later, 2 committee families created, and one final Relay For Life at Virginia Tech approaching, and I am at a loss for words to express how much this organization has given to me. Opportunities to stray far outside my comfort zone, to not settle for mediocrity, and to express all the love I feel inside of me for the wonderful members of the executive team and committee of Relay For Life at Virginia Tech.

A Relay friendship is unlike any other. It is created on the basis that we’ve all been hurt by the whirlwind of cancer in our lifetimes, and while that hurt is immense, we can counter it with hard work and determination to make our event successful and spread the mission of the American Cancer Society.

In every event we put on or Cookout milkshake we eat, we bond a little more, learn a little more about each other, and eventually fill some of the hurting void that cancer left with a friendship that will last a lifetime. I find myself at a loss for words to explain what these friendships mean to me and I’m continually thankful for all the twisted paths that brought us all together.

I am thankful to Relay this year in memory of my Aunt Marilyn and Rich Conklin, in honor of my cousin Terry Carson, and in celebration of Jere O’Brien kicking cancer’s ass this year.

I want to change the world. It is not a dream or vision but a reality that I am able to change the world for the better. I figured this out while visiting New York, New York. For my 16th birthday present, my parents took me and my best friend sightseeing for the weekend.

The night before we left to go home, we visited Ray’s Pizza, which had been personally recommended to me. This was, in fact, one of the primary reasons I wanted to visit, for the fabled New York style pizza.

The pizza was delicious, but I made my discovery while walking back to our hotel.

We had gotten three whole pizzas all topped with unique toppings for the four of us to split, and I was carrying the box with the few slices leftover. I was admittedly walking slower than normal because of the large amount of hot cheesy pizza, and so maybe that was what caused me to notice the homeless man half-asleep on the edge of the sidewalk.

Most people in New York City are so busy they don’t notice, or pretend not to notice, the large amount of unfortunate people without homes. I was planning on eating the pizza  I held in my hands for breakfast the next morning.

But seeing someone without anything while I had so much just did not seem right to me.

I was not compelled by guilt nor did I feel any responsibility for his condition, instead I acted on what was an obvious wrong that I could make right. He was hungry. I had food. Our conversation lasted no more than thirty seconds; the look of surprise and gratitude in his eyes stays with me to this day. On that day, I discovered just how easy it is to change a life.

The way the pizza had an effect on the man whom I had not met uncovered a dramatic revelation: I can change lives and by changing lives, I can change the world.

The price of the pizza was not the important part; however, the gesture of giving what I did not need was where I found the breakthrough. Because of my interaction in New York, I have found new discoveries that I want to dive into. I want to know why it is right for me to get an iPhone 6 for Christmas, while other people my age do not have a dinner on Christmas. I want to know why it is acceptable for me to have luxuries yet some do not have necessities.

I am not tackling world hunger or extreme poverty by giving away some pizza, but I do believe I can personally change the world for the better. I want to learn how I can drastically improve the lives of those who I interact with. It now seems like common sense when I tell people that I want to help people. Who doesn’t?

It is logical to dedicate your life to helping people, because the feeling you get from it cannot be expressed in words.

That is something that is best discovered on your own. Today, I give back by participating in Virginia Tech Relay For Life – which has raised over $5 million for cancer research and patient services. Join me today to make a difference in the lives of millions.

(Written by Juliana Leckszas)

I have been given the amazing opportunity to be on the executive board for the 2015- 2016 Relay For Life at Virginia Tech. I was not given just a board of fellow peers and students to work with to plan the event this year…I was given a family.

Throughout the fall semester we grew from just a group of single individuals meeting each other for the first time into something so cohesive and wonderful. We all complement each other and help each other grow and flourish so that we can put on the best Relay For Life event that we can.

When you are apart of such a big event like Relay For Life especially at Virginia Tech where we are the largest collegiate Relay For Life in the world you always get the question so why are you involved in an event like this. Whenever I am asked this question I could talk your ear off for hours about the many different reasons as to why I want and love to be apart of Relay For Life.

However, the beauty of Relay For Life is that you don’t have to be personally affected by cancer to be apart of the event.

Yes, the majority of people that participate have been affected somehow by cancer in their life whether it be the grandmother had cancer, their dad had cancer, their neighbor had cancer, etc., but you also see the people that come out and participate just because they want to support the cause and that is one of my favorite parts about Relay For Life.

Relay For Life is about everyone coming together to support one cause and that is the fight against cancer.

One of the main reasons why I relay takes me back to when I was 10 years old. My parents sat me and my older brother down and told us that Grampy had lung cancer. Now, as a 10 year old I had a hard time wrapping my brain around what exactly cancer was and how it was going to affect my Grampy. My parents did their best to explain what was going on to a 10 and 13 year old, but they could only tell us so much.

Finally, the question surfaced, “is Grampy going to die?”

Those words coming out of a little child’s mouth should never have to be said, but my parents knew they had to answer.

My mom was gone a lot the next couple of months traveling to and from home to be with Grampy. We would visit him a few times a month, but each time we went we could see the progression of him getting worse and worse and the visits would get harder.

One day, my brother and me came home from school and our stepfather picked us up from the bus stop. He brought us inside and sat us on the couch and gave us the news that Grampy had passed peacefully in his sleep. The cancer had become too much for his body and he couldn’t hold on any longer.

Tears immediately burst from both of our eyes as we realized that we were never going to see Grampy again. That night we drove to Maryland to be with our mom and the rest of the family to get ready for the funeral.

I will never forget the last moments I had with my Grampy and all of wonderful memories before he was sick.

I relay so that no one has to say good-bye to a loved one because of cancer. I relay because no one should have to grow up without a mom or a dad or a sibling because of cancer. I relay because cancer has taken too many lives.

Virginia Tech Relay For Life has given me an amazing opportunity to make a difference in so many lives. I am proud of what we have accomplished so far this year and I look forward to what the spring semester has in store. We won’t stop fighting until cancer is no more. For more infromation visit vtrelay.org.