Stick together: Make friends with stickers

By Grace Everett | Photo Editor

I’ve made friends because of the stickers on my laptop. You’ve probably seen someone on campus with a laptop or water bottle covered in stickers. What did you think of them? Did you find that you had something in common?

I remember being hesitant to put stickers on my laptop, because I wasn’t sure if people would make fun of me. What if the wrong group of people saw my stickers and gave me a hard time? Eventually, I got past the initial anxiety and went for it.

The first thing I had to decide was how much of myself I wanted to share with the world. I went to Redbubble, an online marketplace, and looked for stickers I would want to put on my laptop. I found a variety that catered to my interests and purchased the ones I liked the most.

During the fall semester of my junior year, I was in my media photography class when the girl sitting next to me told me she liked the stickers on my laptop. I had different kinds of stickers, but most of them were related to K-pop or anime, so I wondered which ones she liked. Turned out she liked all of them, and we became really good friends as result.

There doesn’t necessarily need to be a method to your sticker choices. My water bottle is a prime example. Some of the stickers mean something to me, but for the most part, I just use any cute sticker I can get my hands on. That’s what’s so great about stickers: They don’t have to have a meaning, but they certainly can.

In reality, your anxiety about using stickers isn’t as deep as you think. It’s valid to be nervous, but it’s really not a big deal. If you’re worried about not being able to remove stickers from your laptop, purchase an affordable case online and put stickers on that.

Look at where my stickers got me. I not only became close friends with the girl in my class but also made new friends through her. So, give it a shot. What’s the worst that could happen?