Forget me not

Outside your favourite hometown club, you pull your friends in for a drunken embrace before departing for Fresher’s Week at your respective unis. These have been your primary school friends, your high school friends, your sixth form friends. Some first learnt to multiply with you, some saw you struggle with puberty and some laughed with you through the stress tears caused by UCAS. Your mum knows their names, their mum’s know your name. But now it’s time to head to uni to make new friends who will witness your tentative attempts at keeping yourself alive. You repeatedly promise to stay in touch with your home friends, and sometimes it’s hard to keep the magic alive, but there are some great ways to maintain these bonds of friendship.

In my experience, the easiest way to keep in touch with your home mates is via memes. It sounds silly, but memes are brilliant because they are evocatively relatable. Often when scrolling through your news feed you may chuckle at a meme which reminds you of one of your friends, or a shared comic memory. Frequently tagging your home friends in relatable and funny posts will let them know that you are still thinking of them and you are aware that they haven’t fallen off the face of the Earth. It’s a nice two minutes out of what could be a stressful uni day, or a bad hangover.

The biggest, most vital way of retaining your best friends is to actually visit them at their universities, or vice versa…

Another surprisingly simple way of keeping your home friends relevant to your uni life is to talk about them by name in conversations with your uni friends. The more you and your uni friends and flatmates mention home friends by name, the more interested and invested you become in each other’s lives. You may actually find yourself feeling somewhat hyped to meet them, that is if you and your uni pals have relayed some excellent anecdotes, and maybe some photo evidence to enhance these new indirect friendships.

The biggest, most vital way of retaining your best friends is to actually visit them at their universities, or vice versa. Organise a date to get the train or the Megabus to their city. Checking out their halls and maybe hitting their new favourite club with them is a great way to make new memories. This is the time to meet the uni friends you have heard so much about, and laugh about the various embarrassing tales you can all share about your mutual friend. You may even find yourself adding your home friend’s crew on social media, meaning you’re kept in the loop of your home friend’s lives.

Treasure warm memories, tag them in the odd meme, and introduce your home friends into your uni conversations…

Lastly, who could forget the value of a regular message? A text conversation or a Skype call here and there is a popular and easy way of catching up with your besties and making sure that they are doing ok.

Always make sure to ask your home friends how they really are and be there for each other as you always have been. Treasure warm memories, tag them in the odd meme, and introduce your home friends into your uni conversations. If you can afford it, give your friends an occasional visit. There may be many miles between you but it will always feels like nothing has changed.