High school. It was some people's greatest four years they'll ever know or it was their worst and they're just happy to be done.

For me personally high school was just one big life lesson.

The first life lesson I learned is not give a damn what people think. Take it from the girl who has gone through every phase in the process of finding herself. I was little Ms. Teacher Pet, wannabe punk-rocker, skater girl, tom-boy and girly girl. I got made fun of a lot, whether it was because of red cowgirl boots I wore in the eighth grade or my fishnet tights and knee high Converse boots. And I just learned not to care what people think. Through the dirty looks and the whispers down the hallway I ended up happy and able to find myself. I always admired the people who just seemed like they knew who they were, who they wanted to be, where they wanted to go in life. High school is all about finding yourself even though I never came to my realization until after I graduated.

The second life lesson I learned was about people. Whether it's a teachers, peers, friends and even best friends; some people are just a lesson. I've lost best friends from middle school and freshman year that I thought would be forever friends. They simply weren't. And that's okay. I learned that the most unexpected people will stay in your life. Like one of my best friends, Allie. I hardly knew this girl all throughout high school, but then my senior year she was in two of my classes. One of those classes became like a family and that's how our friendship blossomed. We went to the pink out football game together, and then on a field trip for art to NYC together, we spent BWG night (a spirit night at my school) together, we hung out before prom, and then of course senior week. Just goes to show you sometimes the best things in life are unexpected.

However, I still believe in "forever friends." I guess I kind of have a forever friend. His name's Jeremy. We've been friends since kindergarten and now going into college together; we will have a class together and we work together. I don't know how long our friendship will last or even if it will. However, I'm just living one day at a time. Although he wants to kill me sometimes, I learned that sometimes you just need one friend to make everything feel OK.

And than you have teachers. I couldn't speak on the behalf of students everywhere, but for me personally, teachers were an important part of high school. I have had teachers who just seemed like they don't want to be there, like they hate their lives. They were important too! I learned from them that I don't want to wake up everyday and hate my job. Other teachers showed me its possible to wake up and love your job. That's what I want, because "If you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life!"

So in the long run, high school wasn't the best four years of my life. But I wouldn't change anything. I learned who I wanted to be and learned valuable lessons.

All these life lessons is what is important that you take out of your high school experience. Sure graphing a y-intercept will come in handy (not really...I've had a math teacher tell me himself) or it can be cool to know when the great wall of china was built, but life lessons are the most valuable things you can recieve during this time in your life.