Reflections on High School

Today was my last day of high school.

For the past few weeks (months, even) people have been asking me if I am excited to be done, and that was always a hard question for me to answer. At times, I felt very, very ready to be done, but at other times I didn’t want it to end. Eventually, I decided that I am very excited to go on to what is next, but leaving is bittersweet.

Observing my fellow classmates this last day, I saw some people who clearly couldn’t wait to be done. Either they had checked out mentally long ago, or felt like they were being held back from what they wanted, or some other reason. But every bit of them wanted to be gone. There are others, I saw, who were holding onto high school with every bit of strength they had. They didn’t want it to end, and it was clearly very hard for them that there was nothing they could do to stop it ending.

I examined my own feelings and wondered which of these described me. But I realized that neither of them described me. I felt bad that I wasn’t super sad about leaving high school–did that mean I was ungrateful for the experiences I had or the friendships I’d made? But then I realized, it has to do with where I find my identity. My life is not defined by these past four years, and my life does not end now that this chapter of my story has come to a close. I have things to look forward to beyond high school, and because of that, I don’t have to be sad, or filled with uncertainty.

The end can be good.

Being a writer, I like to think in story-related metaphors. And high school has been a story, and just because this story has come to an end for me, does not mean that I need to be sad. It is bittersweet, closing this chapter and preparing to enter what is next, but I knew that I had four years, four precious years, to do what I wanted to do. And I believe that I lived these four years as best as I could. Looking back on my high school career, I have no regrets. Sure, there are things I can see that I could’ve probably done better, but that will always be the case, no matter what the situation in life. The way I’ve lived these past four years has shaped who I am today, and that is not something I want to change.

This does not mean that I’m devoid of emotions right now. As I said earlier, this is bittersweet. And when I do find myself emotional, or “sad”, it’s not the sadness of something ending unexpectedly, of something being torn away from me. It’s the sadness of realizing that I am moving on, continuing on my journey, and these wonderful memories I’ve made are now part of a closed (or nearly closed–I still haven’t graduated) chapter of my life.

High school is something I will always cherish, and something that has defined large parts of who I am. But I am excited for the new memories I will make, the new people I will meet, and the experiences in store as I move on to college and whatever is next.

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