Dear Freshman Year,

    When I think back to end of last year, there are so many things that I expected you to be. I remember feeling so eager to finally be able to call myself a high schooler. For many years, I was told that high school would be some of the best 4 years of my life. And although some people told me that high school would be full of change, I never believed them. I was blindsided by the facade of school dances, a sense of new independency, and a fresh start. What I didn’t realize was even though high school had so many of these amazing festivities, it actually included change.

    To be completely honest, freshman year has not been what I expected. To say the least, when I used to think of high school, I mainly thought of going to school dances and how I was going to experience everything with my same group of friends. I had the goal of getting straight A’s on every quiz or test. I thought everything would be the same as my 8th grade year, only better. But shortly after the first month of school, I realized how completely oblivious I really was. I was oblivious to the fact that people and things in your life are going to change, whether you like it or not. I also didn’t realize that each night there would be hours of homework and that I would NEVER go to bed before 10:45pm.

    And through it all, I’m sure I have changed too. Through my mistakes and rough times, I think I have become stronger, more independent, and open to meet new people. Within this semester, I have made friends with so many different people whom I never really talked to before. But despite all of this, I have a question. Why didn’t you warn me? Why didn’t you warn me that being a high school student brought hours upon on hours of stress? Why didn’t you warn me that as the year continued, there would be so many things changing, including myself? I went into this year with an innocent and oblivious attitude to everything that was going on. I’m ending the year with a sense of strong independency and the openness to meet new people.

    So to answer my own question, I guess I would say that I’m glad you didn’t warn me. High school is about experiencing new things and getting out of your comfort zone. If nothing were to change from middle school to high school, then how are you going to learn, mature, or participate in different things throughout the 4 years? The answer is: you can’t. If I were to take away 4 things that I learned from this year, it would be:

1. Branch out and meet as many people as possible

2. Always work your hardest

3.(I know it’s cliche), Be true to who you are

4. Everyone changes, myself included.

And as much as I would have liked a little heads up, I realize now that I’m glad things have changed and there is nothing that I can do about that. So, I guess this is my way of saying, thank you to freshman year.

Sincerely,

Payton Field