Apologies in advance for all the clichés.

I’m a commuter who lives at home, which means every day I get on the city bus to head to campus, and on the way there I pass my high school. It's quite the sight and you should totally be jealous.

Often times I don’t notice when I pass my high school, when you take the same route every day the buildings and surrounding sights all blur together, in an endless loop of monotony. On the occasion I realize the driver is cruising past notorious door number three, I always, at least for a moment, recall my high school years.

Before I went to high school, people (people being my middle school teachers) informed me high school would be the best four years of my life, I don’t think that’s true, then again, my high school teachers told me college would be the best four years of my life.

Personally, I hope neither of those are true, one because it would be sad if the best years of my life were dependent on grades, and two, if my so-called “glory years” include a time in my life where I thought bell bottom corduroys were a good fashion choice then I’d rather pretend my glory years didn’t happen.

Freshman year, I did not know what she was going in terms of fashion or life in 2009 or 2013, let’s blame it on the fact I wore a uniform for ten years of my life and move one.

The point of this, despite my horrible taste in clothes, and strong dislike for chemistry, I didn’t hate high school. I would never want to go back to high school, because who would, but I didn’t loathe it.

In fact, I would go as far to say I liked high school, it wasn’t my favorite thing in the world, because being forced to wake up before the sun to get to school on time wouldn’t make it anyone’s favorite thing. But I had amazing teachers, took interesting classes that fostered my knowledge and taught me how to look beyond my own front door, and I met some people there who, for better or worse, changed my life.

In another set of cliche words, high school gave me the building blocks of life, a solid foundation if you will, in friendships and values.

Now, I understand why some people hated and continue to hate high school. Teenagers for one, are relentless bullies, and school, on top of being monotonous, is not meant for everyone.

Really, though, if you think about it, high school was easy living. All your classes were in one building, none of this walking outside nonsense when it’s freezing, all your friends were there and most likely in your classes, and if you went to my high school, you had an hour long lunch break. (DUUUUDDEEEE)*

Once all is said and done, high school taught me some valuable lessons that went beyond the classroom, mainly to never choose a class that started before 8 a.m. if I don’t have to, and, that in the grand scheme of life, high school is a tiny little dot on the timeline.

So why hate on high school? High school was great. Middle school, on the other hand, was the worst, go ahead and loathe that all you want.

*watch video for reference