4320 Hours: A Few Lessons From My Time At North Scott

In a few short days, I will graduate. It still doesn’t feel real, and I don’t think I’ve fully processed the fact that my High School career is at its end. 4 years spent in this building, soon coming to an end. 180 days a year, 4,320 hours spent within these 4 walls. Through this time, I’ve learned a lot. I’ve grown and matured, and along my way, learned a few lessons. So, with graduation drawing near and my time with The Lance coming to a close, I’d thought I’d have a little virtual chat with you, dear viewer, and share what I’ve learned with next year’s class so they might have a better high school experience.

Freshmen: You suck, and That’s Okay

Okay, I know that sounds harsh, but let me explain. I’m not saying you personally suck. Okay, maybe some of you do suck, I don’t know every reader. I know a lot of Freshmen who are very talented, very kind people. However, no matter what you do this year, there's a good chance that in a few years time you are going to look back and think, “Man, what was I thinking?” Freshman year is hard. You're just thrown into High School, everyone is awkward and weird, nothing makes sense, and you have no idea what you're doing. 

Personally, I look back at Freshman year and see a scrawny kid who simultaneously thought he was better than everyone, but also lacked any form of self-confidence to do anything. Freshman year, I didn’t do Choir, I did art instead, which I ended up not pursuing after my freshman year, while Choir became one of my favorite activities. I ended up not getting to know so many of the amazing people that I know now because I lacked the confidence to audition for Lancer Productions. My mental health suffered because I surrounded myself with people who were constantly involved in petty drama. I also pushed away several of my friends because I constantly put myself over everyone else. I look back at that time and have a lot of regrets. But, I’m going to go out on a limb and say no one else really liked who they were in freshman year. Freshman year is rough. So just accept the fact that you are not going to like who you were Freshman year when you become an upperclassmen.

Do yourself a favor and take it easy. Don’t let your mental health suffer because you surround yourself with bad people. Take your ego down a notch. You may think you’re god’s gift to the world, but 98% of the time, you aren’t. Just be humble, be kind, and ride it out. Try new things, as those are the things you will most likely look back on the best. Don’t find yourself regretting all the things you should have done, and just do them.

Sophomores: Branch Out and Try New Things

One of my biggest regrets of my High School Career is that I didn’t join Lancer Productions sooner. Even though I’ve only done it for 2 short years, it’s legitimately changed my life for the better, so much so that I plan on doing Theatre in College. I would never have thought that in my Sophomore year, however. So, don’t be like me. Try new things. In High School, you have so much open to you to do. There are so many sports, activities, and extracurriculars for you to participate in. You might be going into Sophomore thinking that you got everything figured out, but I can tell you for certain that you do not. My plans post high school and even just in High School changed significantly between Freshman year and Senior Year.

Do new things. Join a club that you are interested in. Go out for a sport. Audition for the play. There are so many opportunities open to you now, and you have nothing to lose by going for them. If it doesn’t work out, so what? High school is short, and no one will care post-high school that you did poorly in JV Soccer in Sophomore year. But, imagine the world where it works out. Imagine the world where you join Soccer and you love it. You make state. It changes your life, and you can’t imagine where you’d be without it. Now imagine the world where you always regret you never went out for Soccer. After High School, you will almost never regret that you did something that you didn’t vibe with for a year. But you will definitely regret all the things that you didn’t do. So do it. You have no reason not to. High School will pass you by quick, and soon you will be graduating, forever wondering what could have been. So try new things. 

Juniors: It’s Going to Get Worse Before it Gets Better

Junior year is most likely going to be the hardest year of high school. This year, you're going to have so much on your plate and it's going to be a bit overwhelming. You're most likely going to be expected to work a job most of the time you have free, you're going to start having classes which you can’t just slack off and coast through, like Western Civ, AP Gov, Pre-calc, Comp, Stats, and Physics. You're likely going to be in Varsity activities or other honor-level groups, like Singers, and your teachers, and the world, for that matter, is going to expect a lot more from you this year. To be honest, it’s going to be overwhelming, but it's something you're going to have to get through.

If you aren’t used to working hard, prepare to learn. If you barely paid attention in class and have a 4.0, prepare to lose it. My biggest piece of advice for you this year is to put your head down and work. It’s going to suck. Trust me, it will. You will spend many hours editing a Comp Paper thirty minutes before the due date, or cramming for a Physics test. It will be painful, but you can make it through. If you're the kind of person who never really had to study before, get ready to, and get ready fast. I don’t want to say this all just to scare you, however. It is doable. I mean, I did it, so you're kinda going to have to.

It’s not all bad, however. Many of the most fun classes become available this year. All the hard work you’ve been putting into activities will get noticed, and you’ll start to be able to really feel pride in your accomplishments. Trust me, there is no better feeling than grinding on a quick write in Comp so hard that Mrs. Sambdam features it in class. So just keep on keeping on. Get through it and enjoy the ride.

Seniors: Work hard, but also play hard

Something that your counselors probably won’t tell you is that Senior Year is either going to be your hardest year or your easiest year depending on the choices you make. If you want, you can do the bare minimum needed to graduate and just coast by, or you can load up on classes, work, and activities and make your life a living hell of stress. If you do the former, you’ll have a pretty good senior year, but if you choose the former, you’ll hate every second of your senior year. I unfortunately did the latter my first semester, and it sucked. So don’t do that. I was trying to balance work with a full schedule with Lancer Productions and I was always stressed. 

Now, it might sound strange, but I personally think you should find a middle ground between nothing and everything. You have much more free time now, but don’t waste it. There is a lot you should do this year with that time. College is coming up, so prepare yourself. Don’t slack off on scholarships, it might be a lot of work for very little reward, but you honestly get way less than you expect, so apply to everyone you possibly can, even if you don’t think you qualify. Do everything you can before the deadlines too. Get involved in activities. Work a job. Maybe join LP, we also take new people. You have so many opportunities to do things not school-related, so get involved. Take hard classes, too. Take Public Speaking, Comp, Bio, and Calc. Get your associate's degree.

But also, play hard. Have open blocks. Have free time. You can still work hard, and that hard work will pay off, while still enjoying your Senior year. Senior year will be your best year, IF you make it so. But if you don’t, Senioritis is going to hit you so much harder and so much earlier. So don’t drown in stress, but also don’t coast by. You're doing yourself a disservice by not taking advantage of all the opportunities available to you.

And To All: Farewell

4,317 hours spent in this building. Three more to go. Soon, I will leave this building. I leave this school behind. All the hours spent cramming for a Calculus test. All the hours spent performing in the Theatre. All the hours spent writing Essays for Comp. All the hours passed behind me. Soon, it will all end. Soon, all this time spent here will exist in little more than passing memories, little more than reveries. You never truly understand how ephemeral all the time you thought you had truly is until it is little more than grains of sand slipping between your fingers, finally gone. During all these hours, I always thought I had more time to waste. But time is a precious resource. It is a delicate flower, slowly withering away as its petals blow away in the wind. 

But the flower of time is a beautiful thing, is it not? It is something precious. Something to not be discarded headlessly. It almost seems prophetic, in a way, that my first show in Lancer Productions was Our Town. I wish to give you this quote from it, from when Emily looks upon her life after her death. “I can't. I can't go on. It goes so fast. We don't have time to look at one another. I didn't realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed. Take me back - up the hill - to my grave. But first: Wait! One more look. Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover's Corners … Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking ... and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths ... and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? - every, every minute?” 

I think it is true. I’m going to miss studying with my friends in the library. I’m going to miss procrastinating my Orchestra Assignments until the last possible week. I’m going to miss the long rehearsals for Radium Girls. I’m going to miss fighting to get out of the parking lots before the buses come. I’m going to miss getting up at 6 am for Jazz Choir Rehearsals. I’m going to miss my Chromebook that I always forget to charge. I’m going to miss the halls. I’m going to miss the teachers. I’m going to miss the people. I’m going to miss it all. You never really truly miss something until it’s almost gone. It might seem like a lot, but 4,320 hours is not that long. It’s only really dawned on me now how short it really is. So, my last piece of advice is to not take this for granted. One day it will end. So just enjoy the ride.

I just want to say, truly, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. Thank you for reading all my articles. I know that they weren't always the best, or the most relevant, or the most succinct, but I appreciate it. This will be my last article. I hope you can find some sort of wisdom from my words, and I just want to say, thank you for everything North Scott. This is been Jax, it’s been an honor.