I assumed that to have a memorable four years in high school, I needed to be the captain of a sports team. I thought it was imperative that I was cast as the lead role in the spring musical or that I needed to be someone’s high school sweetheart. These false assumptions are what lead me to believe my high school experience was painfully dull or that I was mediocre.

If you know me, then you know that I’m embarrassingly uncoordinated. My attempts at any sport leave me bruised beyond belief. I once came home from bowling with a swollen knee, so clearly, sports have never been something at which I excel. The main character in the musical also wasn’t an option. I couldn’t carry a tune if my life depended on it. And the fact that I actually thought being in a relationship in high school was of utmost importance proves my naivety. You’re in denial if you tell yourself that every aspect of life trapped behind those bland walls was what you expected.

Here’s my story of how staying behind the scenes in high school was actually my favorite part of those not-so-miserable four years. Some say flying under the radar is for the lethargic or incapable, but I beg to differ. No, I couldn’t put “Student Council President” or “Captain of the Volleyball team” on my college apps, but the absence of those titles in no way hindered the experience I had as a successful high school student.

My sophomore year was probably the most unforgettable of them all. I dedicated a huge portion of those ten months to drama club. None of my time was spent in a costume or rehearsing lines though. That would have been an utter train wreck. Instead, I was content learning the functions of the sound and lighting board while hanging out on the sidelines cheering on some of the most talented individuals I’ve ever encountered.

Painting sets occupied a lot of my time, but when that got too tedious, hide-and-go-seek in a pitch black auditorium became a past time. Pre-show rituals like blasting the most overplayed songs we could think of, and scream-singing while simultaneously dancing along on stage ignited happiness in me like nothing else could. These moments weren’t the cliché Friday night football game scenes from the high school movies that you would expect. They were something else. They were the memories that have continued to linger in my mind when the lack of excitement at our football games couldn’t compare. These memories weren’t equivalent to the first day, or even last day of school pep rally’s, they were so much more than that. These intimate moments weren’t the over-glamorized scenes from a movie but the product of pure fulfillment. Drama club turned a group of strangers into mentors, who then became great friends and I am endlessly appreciative.

Nostalgia seems to always set in when we think back on high school, but nothing makes me miss those hallowed halls more than my yearbook class. I’ve been putting this part off, purely because I cannot form adequate words to describe my adoration for the peers I shared that classroom with, and the teacher that changed my life. High school wasn’t the easiest times for anyone. AP classes were demanding and involvement in clubs was time consuming, but I’ve never felt more at ease in a classroom setting than in Ms. Chunoo’s class. Yearbook became a haven for some of Ocoee High School’s most diverse. Walking into that room you could find the school’s football quarterback, SGA’s finest, the TV production crew and theatre’s brightest.

That class was a melting pot of students who came together with a common interest, and the amount of dedication that our team attained was inspiring. Yearbook was early mornings, late nights, long interviews and caffeine highs but it’s been three years and I still miss it desperately. I spent three years behind a camera lens rather than in front, three years writing articles rather than being featured in them, and three years making memories with some of the most passionate people I’ve ever met. Yearbook consisted of the most open-minded individuals and opinions never went unheard; our creativity was never stifled and for that I am grateful.

Those overrated movies we grew up watching, like

Mean Girls and Clueless portray a fabricated version of what our peers deem vital for surviving high school. They focus primarily on the importance of your rank in the social hierarchy and it’s pathetic. In no way is your popularity in high school going to correlate with your success after graduation and you’re ignorant if you believe otherwise. I did not write this with the intention to devalue any specific club or sport but to lift up the one’s that often go unnoticed. I wrote this to reassure those that weren’t athletic enough to make it on the soccer team that their four years were worthy of remembrance. I wrote this in support of those whose name didn’t make it on the cast list to make sure they know their high school experience was valuable.