Great, Expectations

Paul and I drafted a working theory about what happens after high school while standing in line for Grad Night check-in. The reason the line was taking so long to progress, we deduced, was that they wanted to be subtle about gassing the students into unconsciousness. From there, they were locking the dazed in janitorial closets until daybreak, where they would resume high school. But school was now longer – sixteen hours a day, every day of the week. I could imagine my perky government teacher smirking with a sharp cackle, “Oh, so you thought you could leave? Ha!” Soon enough we would discover that our peers whom we assumed were off at college enjoying their freedom were tied up in the closets nearest the whiteboard. Those who sat in the closet would tell of the horrors. The people who we did presume to be college students were in reality just clones, molded by a mix of chewed gum and cafeteria food.

My other friend poked me through the mob of sweaty, impatient students, “Look – we’re the next ones in!” Regaining conscious awareness and forgetting the bitterness that came with the two-hour wait, I cautiously stepped inside, awaiting my fate.

Other than being felt up by a proctor, I cannot say that anything unusual happened that night. To my knowledge. Though, admittedly, the morning and day after, I felt delirious enough to occasionally think otherwise. The whole experience, or lack thereof, did prompt me to reflect on expectations I had going into high school. The prominent emotion that many of my peers felt before coming to high school was fear – fear that classes would be overwhelming and drama would ensue. I really was not too intimidated. And rightly so; high school ended up being a rather lackluster experience, with few positive memories to outshine the negatives. High school was dull and boring, shattering the line I had been force fed so many times – that high school was the “best time of your life."

And here I am now, a month before I start college at UCLA. My best friend, Paul, left for his college in Portland Tuesday, and for the most part, I am left to face many of the same myths and fears for college that I had about high school. Before he left, we joked that after all the time we had been waiting for college, it would just be a larger, more depressing repeat of high school. But I take our cynicism with a grain of salt. We are both going to great schools, schools we chose to attend. And through a rather lengthy and roundabout way, I would like to make my point. I am not nervous or frightened about the work load that college may bring, nor daunted by the task of having to carve out a cave in the social cliff side. I think if high school did anything besides jade me further, it helped me in some sadistic way become a more mature person (note: correlation does not prove causation). Now more than ever I want to be off on my own, doing things independently, from scheduling my classes to washing my skivvies. And I hope that by finding time to write in this blog, I may be able to chronicle what may actually be the best years of my life.