Graduation

Hello there, fellow classmates. Classmates that have learned to love one another, tolerate one another, or despise one another. Whoever you are, whatever desk you may sit in, this one’s for you. High school has been quite the journey, am I right? We have all grown up together, watched each other fall in love, fall out of love, or maybe just fall asleep. Some of us are scholars, others…not so much, and the rest of us are just kind of, in the middle, which applies to me. My 4 years of high school were, well, relaxed I’d like to say, especially the last one.

There were times my freshman and sophomore year, at the end of the semester where I was freaking out, not knowing if I was going to finish that math class (shout out to senior math), but I always did it, sometimes in summer school, but either way, look where I am now mom and dad. I will admit that my freshman and sophomore year, I cared way more and was way more stressed than I am now, but I eventually learned that there’s no point in taking high school so seriously, I’m not saying it’s a bad thing if you did, obviously, but it’s also not a bad thing if you didn’t. I just remember as an underclassmen, watching the seniors all year, dreaming that I could be them, hardly doing homework, skipping school and hanging out with friends instead, and my only worry being about what the weather was going to be like the next day.

But here I am, now a senior, at the end of my high school career, and I can genuinely say that my senior year has been almost exactly that. You see, the thing is, I didn’t take high school seriously, at all, which may be surprising to some of you. I look at my high school career and try to pick out the things I did and the memories I made that are most important to me. I’m not going to want to remember the nights I stayed up until 2am finishing projects, working on capstone, or writing blog posts, but I am going to remember the nights that I stayed up with friends talking all night, or driving across the country, flying through the Grand Canyon, helping poor families in Puerto Rico, watching sunrises and sunsets, staring up at the night sky, waiting for a shooting star, going to tons of concerts and barley being able to function the next day, hiking, and occasionally getting lost while hiking, and just literally living my life how I wanted to live it.

I remember going into high school with everyone telling me “these are going to be the best 4 years of your life” and being skeptical about it, but also hopeful. Thinking, well they were the best 4 years for someone, or else that saying wouldn’t exist, right?

In the beginning of my high school career, I was just waiting until that phrase held true. I quickly learned that whoever said that to me was lying and just said it to me because you would never tell a freshman the truth about high school, or else they’d never want to go. Although I figured out that these 4 years were never going to be anything close to the BEST 4 years of my life, I figured out how to make them some of the most memorable years of my life, and that’s literally how I got through high school.

The memories I made doing the things I love, are more important to me than the knowledge I could have from taking high school more seriously. I’m happy for those of you that strived to get A’s in all your classes, I applaud you, even, but I don’t regret not taking my high school education more seriously, because in the end, we’re all walking out with the same diploma.

Photo by GW Public Health on Foter.com / CC BY-NC