Dear High School Seniors,
Senior year is amazing, isn't it? Coming to school looking like trash 50% of the time, classes being so easy you may as well not even attend the lectures, and having senior perks like early release or priority parking, it's truly the best. But all those amazing things come with an expiration date, a doomsday deadline. Senior year isn't made to last forever and you're now in the downhill of it. The beginning of second semester was probably when it really hit me. The panic. In a couple of months, I was going to be a high school alumna. I would no longer be able to say I'm in high school anymore. How did this happen? There's no way I've already been here for four years. Who is allowing me to adult right now and make all these grown-up decisions when I still have to raise my hand to go to the bathroom? What was I going to do without my mom to cook for me, make my bed, or do my laundry?
This part of senior year is an important time because you're pretty much done with all college applications (thank god) and you've just gotten through your firsts of lasts. Your last football game, last holiday break living at home, and last new semester of high school courses. It's bittersweet because although cheering for your college team is so much fun it's not the same as cheering on the boys you've watched play their hearts out every year since junior high. And the next time you'll have a holiday break you'll be coming home to small talk and pleasantries, even from your friends who will tell you stories about people you don't know and places you've never been. No longer will you anxiously wait for the first day of school to see which of your friends you were blessed with in each of your classes because in college classes of 300 you'll be lucky to see even a few familiar faces let alone have actual friends in your class.
Right now, you're just waiting, waiting for Spring Break, Prom, and Graduation. The trifecta that is the end of your high school career. It's no longer next semester or next year, it's right around the corner and it's coming fast. Some of you may be so ready for high school and all of it to be over you could just explode. Others may be clinging on to every last memory and moment of high school because you're just not yet ready to let go and accept that change is inevitable. I'm here to tell you that no matter what you feel like, it's okay. Even if you don't feel like your friends or peers are experiencing the same emotions, I promise they are. Everyone is just as ready to leave as they are scared to go because this is home and for a lot of people it's all they've ever known.
Even though it's a cliché, you really should try to enjoy every last second in that cold, miserable high school. You won't get teachers who care like that again, teachers who will let you hang out in their classroom no matter what time of day it is and let you complain about all your problems as if they were your therapist. Not to mention your classes will never be all in the same building again let alone the same stretch of the hallway which was a luxury I took for granted in high school. You'll never be this close to any of your friends again, whether you guys are going to different states or just different schools, they'll never be less than a 10-minute drive like you've grown accustomed to. And say goodbye to all your favorite hometown restaurants and being able to navigate your way around town with your eyes closed.
It's weird because you've grown up with these people, always wondering how they were going to turn out and who was going to go to which college and now you're finding out. Everyone is growing up and it's always strange to see people you've known since your awkward stages become semi-mature adults. ("Oh yeah remember Chase who used to run around table-topping everyone at recess? He's going to Brown.") It isn't even being far away from your closest friends that will hit you the hardest because you know that no matter what the distance you'll always keep in touch, it's the acquaintances. The class best friends you've made along the way, the people you'll graduate next to who have always been to the left and right of you alphabetically, and the kid you always see in passing in the hallway because these are the people you'll never see again.
So enjoy the time you have left because there will never be anything like it again. Your life is starting and this new chapter is going to be nothing like you've ever experienced before, but you'll be fine. We're all waiting for you here at college because as great as your high school memories were, there are tons more you've yet to make at your respective colleges and lots of new friends who can't wait to meet you.
Love,
A College Freshman
