Leaving School

If somebody had asked me a few months ago what I felt about leaving school, I would have replied that I was feeling pretty pleased about it. I would have explained that the HSC was like a great mental sponge, soaking up all the energy out of my body. I looked to the future as some vague dot in the distance where I would study things that I needed in life and work hard for reasons that made a lot more sense. It confused me when I saw the previous batch of Year 12s were so nostalgic and told us to treasure our days of school. They must be institutionalised, I thought. Like in The Shawshank Redemption how Red has been in prison for so many years that he doesn't know how to live freely once he is finally released.

Now that the future is a little more than a dot in the distance, I feel a bit more trepidation about leaving school. In a way, I guess I've been institutionalised (I'm only using this word half-seriously) too. What I mean to say is that in school you're stuck in a little bubble but in a way that's good because that's all you have to deal with. Once the bubble pops, you have to look after yourself in a much bigger place. I do look forward to making my own choices and deciding what kind of a person I want to be. But still, I worry that I will be burdened by choices rather than freed.

Also, only with the end so near do I realise that I'll really miss everybody. Once it's all over, it will certainly be strange no longer seeing so many familiar faces every day. There's still the formal and everyone will probably still maintain their networks of friendships but without the routine of school and being stuck with each other, things will be different.

Though I've had a change of heart about leaving school, I certainly have not forgotten the bad things about being in Year 12. I don't think I've ever experienced anything as stressful as the week before the English exam in Term 1. And there's still the HSC in 4 weeks. But I guess what I mean to say is that being a member of our year group has become a big part of who I am and it won't be easy to see the end of that.