290 days left.

The school year started and led to the typical new stress, finding classes, where to sit at lunch, what to say on the ‘about you’ papers, and keeping up grades. I think near the beginning, I expected there to be some drastic outlandish change from middle school to high school, but in all honesty, it felt the same with the addition of more people.

Walking into Room 140 every day in sixth hour was what made my first semester. I had friends, a great teacher (hi, Mr. George!), and a new type of class environment that I thrived in. My love for writing took off, and suddenly I had a new place where I could take all of my ideas and share them with the world, or, in this case, my mom’s Facebook friends (hi, mom’s Facebook friends!). 

Then, in what felt like the blink of an eye, it was almost winter break, and I was going through the never-ending stress of exam review. I was pouring my heart and soul into an Extenuating Circumstances form as to why I should be allowed to swap out my second-semester health class for Writing for Publication. Every sentence I wrote included my profound love and interest in writing, and although some aspects were fabricated, as far as truth goes, I was proud of it. I was told I could rejoin for second semester, and I was left with the promise of more memorable moments and another five months of writing.

174 days left.

Winter break went by so quickly that it was like it didn’t even happen. Second semester was suddenly a day away, and I had been left with an entirely altered schedule and new teachers.

156 days left.

January was spent counting down the days until February.

127 days left.

February was spent counting down the days until March.

99 days left.

And March was counting down the days until spring break, my brief respite, the one and a half weeks that I optimistically believed would solve all of my life problems. Eventually, after the grueling 647 hours it took to reach spring break, I was free. After a—mostly—incident-free plane ride, I was in Spain and living my best life six hours ahead of everyone else. 

Even while I was enjoying myself, I spent my time counting the days, and in the blink of an eye, my spring break was over. So I was left counting until the end of school.

59 days left.

I was always counting something—the minutes left in the hour, the hours left in the day, the days left in the month, and the months left in the year. I spent so much time worrying about the time that it flew out from beneath me.

Every painfully-cliché sentence that my mind creates is another second seemingly wasted and another minute wondering at the profound mysteries of time. And so I spent my 74,880 minutes from then to now trying to focus on the present rather than the future.

It turns out that trying to live in the moment is more complex than it seems.

I still spend my time in an endless countdown of days. Now as I’m writing this, it is June first.

7 days left.

After the end of school, I’ll be counting the days until summer ends, and I have to return to school. Then, I’ll be counting to 2024, and I’ll be counting to the end of my sophomore year.

When I look back though, it’s hard to decipher my haphazardly organized mind to find the specific moments. I wish I could go back and remember to remember.

I can’t say I want to relive the entire year. There are many, many moments I wish I could erase from my memory, but there are the special ones that made the whole year worth it. I want to return to my first-semester bio class when I was guaranteed a partner and always had someone to laugh with. I want to go back to first lunch with my lively table that made going to econ right after worth it. I want to go back to first semester of Writing for Publication when everything was new and the thought of ending freshman year soon was nothing but a fantasy.

I want to go back to the days in class when I laughed so hard I cried. The day when we each cut off a piece of our hair and made a little friendship paper. The days we got shushed in the hallways for laughing too loud. The days I got to French-braid Evelyn’s hair. The days that Ella shared her lunch. And the days when I was content to simply sit in silence and enjoy just existing near some of the best people I’ve ever known.

I may want to believe that everything about school is terrible, but there will always be a special place in my mind for the moments that made everything worth it; through freak-outs about late stories to whispered secrets across a table, you guys have truly made my year. So as I continue my never-ending countdown to the next big thing, I hope you’ll be there to join me.

Only 3 years left.