"33 days" by Joshua A

33 days. There are 33 more days until we graduate. I remember in seventh grade we were doing an assignment that required us to fill in our graduate year. I remember thinking “2023, damn that’s a long time, I still have six more years until I graduate.” Now I have a little over a month left of school then I’m done. The fact that we are graduating soon didn’t really hit me until like 3 days ago when I was driving home from school. It’s a surreal feeling that we are gonna walk out of Etiwanda soon for the last time as students. We have AP tests in two weeks, one more student led discussion, and one more book to read. Then that's it, we’re grown. Soon, I'm going to walk into Mrs. Cogswell’s class late for the last time, sit down for one last bio lecture from Mrs. Aurora, and turn in my pre-calc homework for the last time. I remember my freshman year I was put into Computers, Career, and Finance as an elective. That class was mostly made up of seniors and juniors with only about 8 freshmen including myself. I made a lot of senior friends in that class which was really cool for me back then since they were so much older than me. I started to think to myself that soon I’ll have less than six periods, I’ll be driving myself to school, and I’ll also be suffering from senioritis, which I am. I got some great advice from them like how to carry myself throughout highschool and what the next three years would look like for me. I also got to experience how freshmen get toyed with a lot by seniors. At the beginning of second semester I sat next to this new kid who was a senior and he realized that I was a freshman. The first thing that he said to me was, “Bro you know what’s crazy, if I punch you right now that’s assault and I’ll go to jail”. Obviously I knew he was joking. I laughed and we ended up becoming great friends during that semester. The biggest piece of advice that my senior friends told me during that time was to enjoy every moment of high school, because it goes by fast. I think I can speak for everybody when I say we’ve all been hearing this for a long time whether it be from friends who graduate, social media, etc. I personally heard it a lot from my middle school teachers. But, if I had to be honest, high school did not go by fast for me. Don’t get me wrong, I loved high school. Even though it's a struggle getting out of bed early each morning and going to school, I wouldn’t trade my high school experience for anything. I had a lot of great memories in high school like all the dances I went to, the friends I made, the teachers I had, the conversations I had with my friends when we had work periods, etc. When this is all over very soon I know I’m going to miss it. But my high school experience didn’t go by fast for me. I don’t know if it’s because I was looking towards the end of the year throughout all four years of high school, or because all the times I stressed about my grades, or because all the times I had to work on assignments that were due in 2 hours because I was procrastinating (This blog). I don’t really think there’s an answer for it. Time keeps going, it doesn’t stop. Personally, I’ve been looking forward to graduation since freshman year and now that it’s just around the corner, I couldn’t be more excited. I cherished every memory I made in high school and will continue to do so as this year comes to a close. Looking back, I changed a lot from freshman year to now.  For starters I got some facial hair now, I don’t wear bright-neon outfits anymore, and I’ve grown more as a person. If I had to go back and give my freshman self advice about the next four years, I would tell him not to stress about the future and just enjoy the journey. We wrote letters to our future selves during sophomore year and should be getting them back during graduation so I’m looking forward to that. We’re now in the final stretch of our high school lives and we will very soon get handed a piece of paper and leave this place most likely forever. For many of us this will be a very joyous and emotional occasion. I’m proud and happy to say that I am a part of the class of 2023 at Etiwanda High School, and I wish all of you guys good luck on your future endeavors.