Carly Menker
Editor in Chief '17
From lunches that lack the luxurious Panini to bathrooms with cruddy toilet paper to an over-abundance of extracurricular activities to choose from, this high school has got it all. As a current member of the student body, I’ve encountered some highs and low through my time spent at high school thus far.
Each morning, we drag our sleepy selves slowly up the stone steps through the pillars that guard the entrance to the grandiose building we call our school. For some, it is 7:30 in the morning. Others, with their watches set on “Persian time,” stroll through the doorway nonchalantly as the clock strikes 8:05, or even 8:10 if they were busy cleaning the snow off their car or their parent was too busy doing their hair to take them to school on time. Me? I’m there at 7:45, neither too early nor too late.
I watch the morning unfold through a wallflower’s eyes, as if I were a spectator looking into a fishbowl: unnoticed, but yet still a presence. First period flies by as the numbers and letters appear and disappear on the glowing board in front of the room. Cutting the sharp silent solemnity of a sleepy science class, the bell drones on signaling the beginning of the three minutes of terror to get to our next class. We struggle to race across the battlefield of flying paper bullets, shielding backpacks, and faceless people; we must make it safely to avoid the consequence of a daunting deadly detention. Alas, for some, detention is a time for bagels and cream cheese, rather than the discipline it is meant to enforce.
Within the masses, there is a clear division: those who care and those who do not. Either is a personal choice, but is only enforced when a person gains their voice. As I approach a point where I am speeding toward a split end in my highway of high school, I begin to doubt myself. I diligently complete my assignments and my homework, simultaneously trying to push away the idea of making the most important decision for the next four years of my life. Yet, sometimes I cannot resist the temptation to scrutinize the daunting numbers glowing bright on my computer screen that has the potential to define a large portion of the future. It’s not my math homework. It’s Naviance, the dreadful website to guide us lost juniors toward potential college choices, based off test scores, campus sizes, and GPAs.
I am not a number, nor am I a test score. I am a person; dark brown eyes, glossy cocoa colored hair, with a passion for baking gluten free brownies and dancing in places like Physical Education class where I’m not supposed to. Atop my nightstand coated in chipping white paint, my digital clock flashes 2:03am. I doubt my choices, my habits, my non-existent friends. I question whether or not my life is together or completely sputtered all over the place. Have I taken advantage of all my opportunities? I do my best to suppress the ever-growing fear of getting into college that has transformed into a monster. Have I tried my best? Will my best just never be good enough?
As I wrestle the things I cannot control, I slowly begin to continue to ponder my reality. Have I truly lived? Have I let the blankets of stress suffocate me? Are my feelings of disdain and desire to murder the greedy money-eating CollegeBoard normal? In a year I will be graduating. In a year, I will be hopefully going to a college, furthering myself on my quest to achieve what I want to do with my life. This year, supposedly the hardest working year I should have in high school, I feel like I’ve worked the least. I’m stumbling blindly with the rest of my classmates, searching for answers that do not want to be found.
At 4:00pm, the hallways snaking through the body of our school are a barren wasteland. The walls are wide open, but the silence of the sleeping morning is creeping slowly back in. The students have gone home, yet I’m still here. I spend my life in school, at clubs, in sports, in science research, studying. I’m trying to reach the end goal without feeding into the innate undertones of competition that pulse through the veins of our school. I walk alone, the sound of my footsteps echoing following me. My life is whatever I choose it to be. What are the things that I can do? What are the things that can be made better in or out of high school that has seemingly become my full time job? What’s truly the matter with high school?
Editor in Chief '17
From lunches that lack the luxurious Panini to bathrooms with cruddy toilet paper to an over-abundance of extracurricular activities to choose from, this high school has got it all. As a current member of the student body, I’ve encountered some highs and low through my time spent at high school thus far.
Each morning, we drag our sleepy selves slowly up the stone steps through the pillars that guard the entrance to the grandiose building we call our school. For some, it is 7:30 in the morning. Others, with their watches set on “Persian time,” stroll through the doorway nonchalantly as the clock strikes 8:05, or even 8:10 if they were busy cleaning the snow off their car or their parent was too busy doing their hair to take them to school on time. Me? I’m there at 7:45, neither too early nor too late.
I watch the morning unfold through a wallflower’s eyes, as if I were a spectator looking into a fishbowl: unnoticed, but yet still a presence. First period flies by as the numbers and letters appear and disappear on the glowing board in front of the room. Cutting the sharp silent solemnity of a sleepy science class, the bell drones on signaling the beginning of the three minutes of terror to get to our next class. We struggle to race across the battlefield of flying paper bullets, shielding backpacks, and faceless people; we must make it safely to avoid the consequence of a daunting deadly detention. Alas, for some, detention is a time for bagels and cream cheese, rather than the discipline it is meant to enforce.
Within the masses, there is a clear division: those who care and those who do not. Either is a personal choice, but is only enforced when a person gains their voice. As I approach a point where I am speeding toward a split end in my highway of high school, I begin to doubt myself. I diligently complete my assignments and my homework, simultaneously trying to push away the idea of making the most important decision for the next four years of my life. Yet, sometimes I cannot resist the temptation to scrutinize the daunting numbers glowing bright on my computer screen that has the potential to define a large portion of the future. It’s not my math homework. It’s Naviance, the dreadful website to guide us lost juniors toward potential college choices, based off test scores, campus sizes, and GPAs.
I am not a number, nor am I a test score. I am a person; dark brown eyes, glossy cocoa colored hair, with a passion for baking gluten free brownies and dancing in places like Physical Education class where I’m not supposed to. Atop my nightstand coated in chipping white paint, my digital clock flashes 2:03am. I doubt my choices, my habits, my non-existent friends. I question whether or not my life is together or completely sputtered all over the place. Have I taken advantage of all my opportunities? I do my best to suppress the ever-growing fear of getting into college that has transformed into a monster. Have I tried my best? Will my best just never be good enough?
As I wrestle the things I cannot control, I slowly begin to continue to ponder my reality. Have I truly lived? Have I let the blankets of stress suffocate me? Are my feelings of disdain and desire to murder the greedy money-eating CollegeBoard normal? In a year I will be graduating. In a year, I will be hopefully going to a college, furthering myself on my quest to achieve what I want to do with my life. This year, supposedly the hardest working year I should have in high school, I feel like I’ve worked the least. I’m stumbling blindly with the rest of my classmates, searching for answers that do not want to be found.
At 4:00pm, the hallways snaking through the body of our school are a barren wasteland. The walls are wide open, but the silence of the sleeping morning is creeping slowly back in. The students have gone home, yet I’m still here. I spend my life in school, at clubs, in sports, in science research, studying. I’m trying to reach the end goal without feeding into the innate undertones of competition that pulse through the veins of our school. I walk alone, the sound of my footsteps echoing following me. My life is whatever I choose it to be. What are the things that I can do? What are the things that can be made better in or out of high school that has seemingly become my full time job? What’s truly the matter with high school?