Celebrating his 18th birthday didn’t stop tragedy from hitting Cam Coleman’s refrigerator.

“I’ll be honest, I ate my last four waffles yesterday. Because I’ve been in fall camp, I ain’t really had time to go grocery shopping for real so I’m all out of Eggos,” Coleman told reporters on Aug. 15 — a day after his 18th birthday.

“Thick and fluffy ones, I’m all out.”

Being out of frozen waffles is a fitting concern for an 18-year-old, who just months ago moved away from home for the first time and was still learning how to go grocery shopping for himself.

“My mom used to tell me, ‘You’re going to see when you move on your own how much you eat.’ And I didn’t realize it,” Coleman told reporters in March. “It’s like, gosh, I gotta go to the grocery store again and get some more cereal, gotta get some more milk, gotta get some more paper towels and stuff like that.”

When asked if it made him appreciate his mom a bit more, Coleman didn’t think a split second before replying in the affirmative.

“And I miss her,” Coleman added.

See — he’s just a kid.

Maybe a kid who was rated the No. 2 wide receiver in the country last recruiting cycle and a kid who recorded more than 1,300 receiving yards and 18 touchdowns en route to a state championship as a senior at Central-Phenix City — but a kid nonetheless.

Coleman arrived at his first media availability in March wearing mismatched socks and “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” gym shorts.

Asked if he knew the show’s theme song, the rookie wide receiver bashfully obliged: “Uhhh… West Philadelphia, born and raised… something about ‘where I spent most of my days,’” Coleman said before trailing off.

“That’s all I know,” he admitted to a chuckling table of reporters.

The NBC sitcom starring Will Smith first aired in 1990 and later called it quits in May of 1996 — over 10 years prior to Coleman being born on August 14, 2006.

Feel old yet?

When Coleman first arrived at Auburn in January, he wasn’t old enough to vote, get a credit card or, evidently, effectively go grocery shopping for himself.

He was, however, old enough to shoulder the weight of the expectations that came with being the crown jewel of Auburn’s 2024 recruiting class.

Earlier this month, Coleman happened to walk by while Auburn senior linebacker Eugene Asante was talking with the media.

Asante stopped mid-answer and pointed in the direction of Coleman.

“Cam Coleman. The guy,” Asante said. “The franchise.”

“The franchise” — one would be pretty hard-pressed to find a distinction that comes with more pressure than that, though Coleman swears the pressure isn’t all that heavy.

“I haven’t really thought about it too much. I’m just worried about playing ball,” Coleman said when asked about the pressure in the spring.

When Coleman flipped his commitment from Texas A&M to Auburn on Dec. 1 and later signed his letter of intent with Hugh Freeze and the Tigers, he became the second-highest-rated recruit in program history.

And Coleman looks every bit the part.

If you can get past his babyface, you’ll see a kid who stretches 6-foot-3 and weighs every bit of 197 pounds.

He’s got sticky — almost magnetic — hands that seem able to catch any ball thrown in his same zip code. Not to mention his ability to jump.

“The dude’s got bunnies,” Auburn linebacker Austin Keys said of Coleman. “ It’s something I’ve never seen in my life. It’s just different, generational stuff.”

“Generational” seems to indicate it could be 20-30 years before there’s another like Coleman, who — from the sounds of it — is well on his way to becoming a household name, despite having yet to play a single snap of college football.

But in watching and talking to the young Auburn receiver, no one would guess that’s the trajectory he’s on.

“I’m not entitled to anything. I come in and work for everything I have achieved. I don’t feel like I’m entitled to anything,” Coleman said. “Stars don’t matter in college. Everybody is good in college. Comes from my mom and dad. It’s just how I was raised.”

As is the case in many southern households, chores were leverage for bargaining in Coleman’s house growing up.

One summer, Coleman, an avid bowler, asked his mom if he could join some of his high school teammates at the bowling alley the next day.

She agreed that he could, barring that he did the dishes.

“I forgot and it slipped my mind and I went to sleep,” Coleman admitted. “I went in the room and asked her, ‘Can I go bowling?’ And she asked me, ‘What did I ask you to do last night?’”

So Coleman spent his morning washing the dishes, even if it meant him being a little late to the bowling alley.

And it’s that same mindset of being accountable that’s helped Coleman thrive as he prepares for his first college football game.

In his last throwing session with Coleman, Auburn quarterback Payton Thorne said he saw the rookie receiver get “really, really pissed off” when he messed something up.

Thorne loved it.

“He works his butt off, he wants to be held accountable and he wants to get better,” Thorne said. “And the guys that I’ve been around in my career, those are the guys that got the furthest, play the longest and make the most money, to be honest with you.”

And while those things might be true, Coleman doesn’t appear concerned with getting the furthest, playing the longest or making the most money.

Right now, all he can think about is taking the field at Jordan-Hare Stadium for the first time.

Coleman is excited to run out of the tunnel and onto Pat Dye Field. Like, really, really excited.

“Every time I used to get recruited up here, I was just thinking about myself in this stadium scoring touchdowns,” Coleman said on Aug. 15. “Sixteen days away, it gives me excitement thinking about it. I’m excited to show my talent.”

On Saturday against Alabama A&M, the stage will finally be Coleman’s.

And if all goes well, Coleman will leave very few questions about whether or not the just-barely-18-year-old is ready for a career in SEC football.

But before those conclusions are drawn, it’s important to meet Coleman where he’s at — as a just-barely-18-year-old who misses his mom, as a college kid who likes playing video games and making YouTube videos with his fellow freshmen teammates and as a young adult who will likely return home to a freezer empty of thick and fluffy frozen waffles because, well, grocery shopping is hard.