Jenna Rae

About 12 years ago, my first day of school began with a commemorative photo. Soon, I will celebrate my final day of school with the same.

The average student attends only three schools before college. I have attended 13.

In kindergarten, I attended Village Leadership Academy in Boise, Idaho. There, I learned how to cross the street without hesitancy. 

From first through third grade, I attended Whitney Elementary School (Boise, ID). We were taught with an onomatopoeia of a wolverine’s growl—”RRR”—to have respect, responsibility, and readiness.

In fourth grade, I attended four schools. First, Meadow Ridge Elementary (Mead, WA), where I started a caterpillar club. Then, Seahurst Elementary (Burien, WA), where I learned that imagination has no bounds. I was homeschooled for a while, and I taught myself how to copy someone’s handwriting for fun. Finally, I ended up at Ponderosa Elementary (Post Falls, ID), where I learned that being smart meant you were special.

I stayed at Ponderosa through fifth grade. I earned a trophy with my robotics team, adopted my first dog, and learned that girls are mean.

At the end of fifth grade, I was removed from Ponderosa Elementary and enrolled in Connections Academy, an online program, where I realized it was hard to thrive in isolation.

Partway through sixth grade, I enrolled in the Colon school district (Colon, MI), where the town was so small that our graduating class had 20 students. It did not work out.

I quickly joined the students at Legg Middle School (Coldwater, MI). I got my first cat, and I thought I found my forever friend. I learned at Legg that your true friends are where you’d never expect—for me, they were sitting at the table covered in card games, the table that everyone else avoided.

My attendance at Legg was short-lived, and I spent my last quarter of sixth grade in the halls of Baseline Middle School (South Haven, MI). There, I learned how to work for what you want.

In seventh grade, I moved to Grimes, Iowa, and enrolled at Dallas-Center Grimes Middle School. We were the “Diamonds,” but I did not shine.

My mom and I returned to Michigan for eighth grade. We stumbled across FHC, and I have remained in a single school district, for the first time, for five years.

And of 13 schools, FHC has been my favorite.

Goodbyes have always been easy for me. I’ve grown used to the rhythm of life, where I am often struck by a storm of change. I consider myself a tree with no roots, easily blown over, permanent nowhere.

I knew that this goodbye would be different. For ten years, I refused to call any new place home; I didn’t want to tether myself somewhere that would ultimately fade from my life. I had made that mistake before. Yet, for the past two years, I have given FHC this privilege—I have called it home.

And as I say farewell to the FHC community, for the first time in a long time, I am torn to leave.

In a few weeks, my footsteps will be trampled by the traffic of underclassmen. My raised hand will disappear from the corner of room 211. I will no longer publish stories for The Central Trend. Soon, my existence will be wiped from the school, as it has been 12 times before. 

In a few weeks, I will no longer walk past Dr. Keller in the hallway. The sound of Stiles’ music will be an echo of my past. The juniors that I consider a second family will sit without me, and they will forget, eventually, that I am not there.

The laughter that I shared at the table by the garden will dissipate. The scratching of my pencil won’t add to the noise of a quiet room anymore. Now, the halls seem to whisper, “Goodbye, goodbye.”

It’s funny how, in one moment, seniors “rule the school.” We are glass: carefully crafted from years of hard work, untouchable, beautiful. It’s funny how, in the next, we are shattered and swept away.

I admit that I am wrong in one way; not every trace of us will be gone. In tenth grade, our Honors English class planted tulip bulbs in the mulch outside. Mine is beside the gym doors. Tulips are strong; they grow strong roots, and they sprout from the soil every year. 

My tulip, and all of our tulips, will be our mark: the one thing that stays, the one thing that sticks.

Goodbye, little tulip. May you grow the roots I’ve never had the chance to keep.