Ahh, high school graduation: the day you've all been counting down toward for months (maybe even years). You're down to the single digits in days till the big event. Your last pep rally and football game, the senior trip and picnic, Convocation (*snore*) and high school classes are all over. All but one of the hallmarks of senior year have passed. There are a few things that, looking back nearly a year later, I wish someone had given me a heads-up about.
When graduation is about to start and you're lined up, waiting to walk in with your fellow classmates, look around. It sounds cheesy, but for no other reason than just to take it all in, glance over the room. What didn't cross my mind at the time was that I wouldn't see 90% of these people ever again after this day. Even the people who you don't get along with, or the ones who you simply pass by in the halls, it's still incredibly weird that they'll no longer be presences in you life in any shape or form after so much time spent coexisting. As for the classmates who are your friends: appreciate these last moments walking side by side in the same direction. Because your lives will be changing drastically in the near future and the directions you all head toward will never again be as similarly aligned.
You probably won't remember the blur of the actual ceremony (at least I don't--maybe it's just me), but the graduation parties are what makes the memory sweet. After you hear your name called and walk across the stage, make it a priority to go grad party hopping as efficiently as possible. Soak up the day that is about you and your class by eating as many chicken nuggets as possible from Chick-fil-a platters (there was literally one at every party I went to). Dance with your friends as the sun sets (again, cheesy, I'm sorry), cry with them if you have to but only for like a second. Appreciate friends and family who come to your party, if you have one, and just take it all in. There will never be another day exactly like this one; a day when you're young enough to have endless and limitless plans for the future and old enough to appreciate the love you're surrounded by.
This school-aged part of your life is about to be over! I know that this sounds like such a relief, but trust me it gets harder (better too, but college work is not a joke). Understand the significance of this ending, and look forward to the future. Enjoy your last summer as a kid in your childhood home. Before you know it, you'll be back here again as a slightly changed version of yourself at the least. You'll be someone with a totally new life having lived somewhere else for nine months, made new friends, and experienced new challenges and rewards that life has to offer. Savor it, enjoy it, have a great summer, Class of 2016.
