As the 2021 school year comes to an end, it leaves many of us seniors with our final thoughts on our high school experiences.
High school has been an interesting experience full of highs and lows, I don’t think any of us can say that we had a perfect time in high school, but that’s just how it is; nothing is perfect.
My personal experience in school was illustrated with both classwork and running, which has basically been my life for the past seven years.
Now, I’m moving on to continue my education and athletic career at Illinois State University, which is not what I ever expected myself to do.
I never thought that I would take my running seriously enough to continue on in college, but I feel that there’s a lot that we learn about ourselves as we grow.
Freshman year was rough for me to say the least, and it was running that pushed me to be stronger.
I was also able to slowly begin to improve my grades throughout the course of my time in high school.
I was never one to attend all of the school events, even football games, but I would go to events like Homecoming.
It wasn’t the typical, traditional high school experience but the years went by so quickly, and if there’s one thing they always tell you throughout the course of the years, it’s that the time will go by so fast and to enjoy it.
High school may be stressful and make students want to stop caring about their education, but I believe the experience will leave most people with some of the best memories they’ve ever had.
The people I’ve met through the journey of it will be people that I’ll always remember, regardless of whether we keep in touch or not. In addition, it’s crazy how we enter high school as one person and leave high school as a completely different person altogether.
Your hobbies, friendships, and priorities may all may change, sometimes for the better. I definitely had my share of friendship troubles and huge changes in my life throughout high school, but these changes were for the best, and I wouldn’t change any of it.
My experience was definitely categorized by fantastic highs and outstanding lows, which made things very interesting.
I’ve had my share of horrible heartbreaks; most of them involving track or cross country.
I’ve had to say goodbye to some of my closest friends, I missed out on what could’ve been amazing experiences, and of course I made many simple-minded mistakes as we all do.
Of course, with these lows, there were also many highs including breaking many school records with my teammates in relays and in individual events in track and qualifying for state after a very questionable season.
I learned a lot about myself, and gained more knowledge on the world around me.
I also went through my final year of high school during a quarantine, which is definitely something I won’t think of as an amazing experience.
To all high school students, make sure you stop and live in the moment throughout all of your experiences, because you won’t live through this stage of your life again.
