Nine months ago, I was afraid of you. That feeling seems silly now, but I remember it all the same.
I was afraid of nine months spent withering away under the blurry, grey gaze of another year’s boredom. I was afraid of my limbs being jerked away from me in a strong gust of speeding time.
It’s hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that I am writing this right now.
I was afraid of you, but you proved me wrong. You were good to me, and I’d like to thank you now.
Thank you for the people I met and those I grew closer to. Thank you for being gentle with my shaking body and my terrified mind. Thank you for the things I tried and for allowing me to succeed.
In all honesty, I loved this year.
At the end of August, I found myself lying in the sun, dreading the days to come. Apprehension and anxiety walked behind me. However, their footsteps were in vain, and their journey ended shortly after it had begun.
While I was planning this column, I found myself unable to stop smiling. Memories heal the cuts of missing assignments and unwind the leftover stress from this year.
Sitting in the hallway during math with Sadie and Ella, sometimes working and sometimes falling asleep (sorry, Mr. Garb). Singing ‘Sofia’ with my Spanish class in a scene oddly reminiscent of High School Musical. Ranking the attractiveness of presidents, laughing probably way too loudly at Mr. Labenz’s joke, and crying quite frequently in APUSH. Every hour of TCT with Addie, Ella, Maylee, and Ellerie doing everything from writing and editing to listening to music and doing BuzzFeed quizzes in the podcast room. Standing on lab tables in physics and making rockets out of construction paper, turning pennies gold in chemistry, and listening to the periodic lab table’ song every Friday.
The end of my sophomore year marks the halfway point through my high school career, and being who I am, I simply cannot help feeling melancholic about it. I spent so much of my time this year wishing that it was over, but now that I think back to it, there are so many things that I wish I never had rushed through.
Not everything, obviously—I never want to have to retake the APUSH exam or learn how to conjugate Spanish verbs in the past perfect tense again—but what I’ve realized in the last week of school is that this year was honestly, one of my best ever.
I suppose it is a bit cliche for me to just now realize how much I loved this year, but that’s just how it worked out.
This is the last thing I’ll write for The Central Trend as an underclassman and the last assignment I need to complete for my sophomore year. In all honesty, I’m elated to be done. I’ve grown tired of waking up at six in the morning and staying up until midnight to finish homework. I’ve grown tired of the stress that has followed me through the hallways every day for the past nine months. But that doesn’t mean I won’t miss it.
It doesn’t mean that I won’t wish I could sit in the math hallway or the podcast room or on a lab table building a rocket just one more time. It was such a good year, even if I’m just realizing it now.
Thank you to everyone who made it that way. Thank you to all my friends and teachers. All the people who edited my stories or helped me with homework. All the acquaintances who made me laugh in the middle of a boring Tuesday Spanish class and made it a little bit more memorable. Thank you to the people who sit at my lunch table and those I stand in the hallways with between classes. I don’t know what next year will look like, but I hope that all of you will be a part of it.
Most of all, thank you to Mr. George. This is the last thing I will write that you will read as my teacher, and I wish I could have made this better, but it’s hard to encapsulate a year’s worth of memories into a 700-word column.
I hope you have realized by now how profound your impact on Forest Hills Central has been. You changed the lives of dozens of generations of students. Because of you, hundreds of students found their passions. Because of you, hundreds of us have fallen in love with reading, writing, and, especially, Jay Gatsby’s smile.
I never imagined writing for TCT without you being the one grading my stories, but your legacy will not be lost once you leave room 139. They’re a rotten crowd, Mr. George, you’re worth the whole damn bunch put together. Thank you for everything.
In hindsight, I have realized how much I will miss this year once summer begins, and at the same time, I could not be more excited. What I do know is that this summer, when I am dying of boredom and, again, wishing the hours away, I’ll remember this experience this year and fall back in love with the little things that make up my life.
Thank you, sophomore year, you were good to me.
