I had the idea to write this article for a very long time - or at least the month and a half since I was so graciously added to Oneonta's Odyssey team. The greatest times of our lives are often the ones that define us. The days we base our entire selves on and only hope to experience again. I always wondered how those days were in high school for so many people. And with that thought begins my open letter to the worst four years of my life.
Like a few of my class of 2020 peers, I attended Farmingdale High School in - you guessed it - Farmingdale, NY. The amazing staff and teachers there were about the one thing that kept me there for a long time - they were the friendly support I never got outside of my family. But it was the students that made me feel like Dante slowly descending into Hell. Call me melodramatic all you want, but what I felt on a daily basis was something I would never wish upon my worst enemies.
I'm going to be the better man and not go into excruciating detail, but looking back through my yearbook I see maybe a handful of friends - and pages upon pages filled with faces that bullied me into the ground and stabbed me in the back. High school was a vile atmosphere filled to the brim with jealousy and contempt. The social hierarchy created by generation after generation of hormonal arrogance is palpable in the air, and leaks out when the doors open briefly before they engulf and digest you for four years. What I didn't realize until my last six months was how fake it all was - how the stereotypical power structure was just a conjuration by the popular, the entitled, and the football players.
And of course the hierarchy hurts all of us who are passionate about something other than sports or underage sex. I was that straight-A student who spent most of their high school career lost and confused, who ended up hitting rock bottom about halfway through his junior year. As somebody who was always at the butt-end of the joke and the receiver of pointing fingers, you tend to grow a thick skin - but you never notice it until you lose it. In the ever so infamous third year of high school was quite literally the lowest I had ever felt in my life thus far. Thankfully I had the support of my loving parents and my beautiful girlfriend, but it was a journey I had to accomplish for myself.
I spent countless sleepless nights looking up at the ceiling begging for someone to tell me why I felt like every day was the end, why I was always the outcast that was discarded and stepped on by my peers, why I spent all my time hating myself for what everyone else told me. I have always had bad anxiety, I still very much do to this day, but this period in my time in high school was by far the most awful bout. Confusion, anxiety, stress, depression - it all blurred into one giant mass of unstoppable force. I went into school each morning desperately wishing for something that could numb or even take this pain away. I searched and searched for something that truly understood my seemingly endless agony - and that's when I truly discovered music.
"Oh God," I hear you all groaning in unison. "Here we go - another ridiculous story of how music saved some upset teen's life." Well hold on here, give me a chance. It all started when I found out about an upcoming tour my all-time favorite band, Linking Park, was doing with direct support from my second favorite band ever, Rise Against. But there was one band on the tour bill I didn't recognize, some group called "Of Mice & Men" (those of you who listen to the same music as me know this name well). I decided that if I was going to this show I should at least know all the bands. One day during lunch I ignored the "friends" I was sitting with and searched this strange band on YouTube. Let's just say my life changed after that. From thunderous guitar riffs to the lead vocalist screaming out to the world like his life depended on it - I just felt hooked from the beginning. It was all cathartic in a way, it was music that knew how I felt and channeled the anger and tears I choked back each and every school day. I finally felt like somebody got it - even though that somebody was a metal band from California.
As much as a relief and outlet music was for me, I never truly took it into my own until senior year. Of course by then I had already met my wonderful girlfriend, who kept me sane and together we made the absolute best out of our last year and a half of high school and so many sweet memories with that. And she helped me realize how to become my own person, how to disregard the power structure our peers kissed the feet of. For a long time I never looked in the mirror and saw myself, but saw the flaws that were on the other end of pointed fingers. But I began to see myself, see myself begin to change. I bought myself a cheap leather jacket and decided that senior year was the year I would grow my hair out. I went to concerts and saw my favorite bands as much as possible, and slowly began to feel something resembling confidence - a feeling alien to me.
Why am I rambling on about this? Because finding yourself and loving what you see in the mirror is the true secret to surviving high school. All the vile words or belittlement thrown begins to mean nothing - if you own who you are and realize that this ridiculous, age-old hierarchy is solely imaginary, a fabric of the imaginations of the popular and insecure, high school can even be an enjoyable place.
I want to thank Farmingdale High School's senior class of 2016 for making me the person I am today, by showing me everything I never wanted to become and for humbling me for so long that I molded myself to face any adversity ahead. I want to thank my peers for scraping me off their over-priced boots for four years, for taking advantage of me and showing me how it felt to be stabbed in the back. Without every single one of you, I would never have become the man I am today. I wouldn't be in college studying music industry, and I certainly wouldn't be photographing bands or playing guitar. The pain is never permanent, and the darkest of nights will always turn to day. I seal this open letter to the worst four years of my life with my blood, sweat, and tears - because without them I would never have truly become Shane Chavatte.
