The Transition

The transition from 8th grade to becoming a freshman in high school is something most everyone remembers. You’re excited, nervous, scared about what will happen next. Everything changes so quickly. Your friends, your teachers, you’re treated differently, you realize you have to start changing too. For the better. Your work load, so much bigger. Suddenly everyone that you looked at as the little kids you once were, they are all growing up. Everyone is getting jobs and talking about getting their license. Lives are getting busy with sports, school, and relationships. Everything starts to feel overwhelming. You start to panic because your friends are drifting, but you’re making new ones. Through all of the changes you become a better version of yourself. You stop hearing the question, “what do you want to be when you grow up?” And realize you might actually have to start figuring it out over these next few years. 

At the beginning everyone is choosing their classes, you pick all the same classes as your friends. You try out for your sport and get in. You’re scared to join a club because you don’t know anyone but you decide to do it anyway. My freshman year I joined a club solely because my brother was in it and I knew that if he did I would be okay. I looked up to him a lot. Waving to him in the halls, feeling cool because I knew a junior and all his friends. The club I joined was Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA). That was possibly the best decision I could make. I made so many new friends and so many lasting memories. I stuck with it all four years of high school. So try those new clubs, make those new friends, and keep all of those amazing memories in your heart. You enter your first prep rally. There are so many people and you’re so nervous. You see everyone joining in on all of the games. You think, this is my time to shine. You jump on in and embarrass yourself by falling on your face. You can’t flip the cones right, or wheel yourself across the gym in time on the scooters. But you don’t care, it was so much fun. Maybe you will just do it again next year. 

You get to your sophomore year, you’re used to the schedules, you have your group of friends, and you’re feeling good. It’s the middle of the year now, football season is over and you’ve got used to all your classes and even made a couple more new friends. Life starts to get hard, you enter your sophomore slump. I unfortunately entered this state and entered it fast. I started missing school, missing turn in dates, failing tests. It was the hardest of my high school years. I tried and tried to get back on my feet but the end of the year came quickly and I unfortunately did not make it. I spent half the summer at school finishing up and passing my classes. Thank you Oak Hill High School for being so easy going and helpful to help me pass. I wouldn’t be able to do it without you. Entering junior year. It is easy peasy. You’re an upper classman now, you feel cool and old. My friend group changed again, and you know what that is okay. The older you get the more you realize you only need a couple of friends, and that is all I had. You breeze through your junior year, classes are easy, homework is easy. But your job takes up most of your time. You’re always working, having barely any time to hangout with your friends. But you make it through. The end of the year is approaching. You pick your classes for senior year and it hits you. This is the last summer you have with all of your friends. 

You spend the summer hanging out with your friends, soaking up all of the good times. Having fires, Taco Bell runs, and long summer nights. This becomes the most important summer of your life. The first day of school comes and it gets serious. You and all your friends get matching back packs. I got a Minnie Mouse one. The first few months are a breeze. Homecoming comes and you go with your boyfriend and all your friends. Now it’s time for FNL season. You try to make it to every game knowing this will be your last year with all of the cheering, under the lights, and excitement of winning a game. It’s the middle of the year now, you apply to your colleges and get into the one you wanted. You register for your classes and you see your future unfolding in front of you. This is where it started to get hard for me. I was wrapped up in nostalgia, started turning in my assignments late and working so hard to pass all of my classes. That was probably the easiest part. Prom comes and goes and now we have a couple of days left of school. We do our cap and gown pictures and can see ourselves walking across the stage receiving our diplomas. 

The transition from 8th grade to high school was exciting and nerve racking, scared of getting older and what high school will bring. At 14 years old, you start to think high school is going to change you completely. You spend your summer thinking about how this is the last summer as a kid before you enter high school needing to be mature and adultish. Then you realize high school really isn’t that bad and scary. And for the people who say high school really is the fastest four years of your life, they’re absolutely right. And you should listen. Freshman year felt like yesterday and suddenly now we are standing here in a cap and gown getting ready to leave it all behind, holding on to the memories. I believe that the transition from a senior in high school to a freshman in college is going to be the same way. Personally I am having the same feelings as the little 14 year old me was 4 years ago. The excitement, nervousness, and curiosity about what comes next for me. But if being in high school taught me anything it is that even the scariest transitions can lead to some of the best things in life, and you get to carry those memories with you for the rest of your life. Albus Dumbledore once said, “Soon we must choose between what is right and what is easy.” So take those opportunities, take those hard classes, join those clubs, and go on those field trips. Hold on to your friends and live. Live your life to the fullest.

“Graduation 6” by wrightbrosfan is licensed under CC BY 2.0.