By Derek Ha
Seniors are just dying to graduate – we’ve all turned into zombies! One look at those lifeless, robot-like faces and you’ll see what I mean. We can’t express any emotion except boredom and frustration. We either mindlessly wander around campus during class or sleep through the class. And we are unproductive, having just enough energy to fling our backpacks onto the nearest desk and wail, “I can’t take being here for even one more day!”
Or could it be that once again, we have forgotten another cheesy-yet-helpful lesson that Disney, Hallmark, and Random House tried so hard to hammer into our heads? No, I’m not talking about “don’t judge a book by its cover” (why shouldn’t we?) or “sharing is caring” (and for weaklings), but rather, “be careful what you wish for.”
Of course everyone wants to get out of school, start anew in college, and escape from that one girl in third period who no one can stand, but it seems that being turned into zombies has impaired our thinking abilities. Perhaps we the undead should take a moment to contemplate what graduation truly means.
Go ahead – take a mental snapshot of your life as it is now. Then, delete every single person other than yourself from that picture. Change the background to an image of a strange place that you have only seen once or twice before. Welcome to the next four years of your life!
Up until now, we have always had someone who can help us solve our problems if we asked – a friend, a parent, a teacher, a sibling, a counselor. Now, we have become the proverbial baby birds about to be released from (violently tossed out of) our cozy nest in the trees. Wings not quite strong enough to overcome gravity just yet? That’s too bad, because off you go!
This also means that in just a few weeks, we will say goodbye to most of the people we know. Let’s be honest with ourselves – “friends forever,” another one of those wonderful Hallmark slogans, is nothing but a cruel lie. Nothing is permanent, especially the casual companionships we’ve formed with that one guy who shares two classes with us, that other guy who happens to be on the same team. The moment we graduate, these people will disappear from our lives in a puff of smoke.
The others, those who we’re truly close to, will fade away more slowly. The emails and online messages will get less and less frequent. The attempts to get together and hang out will grow half-hearted and insincere. Inside jokes you used to share will wear out.
Three or four months from now, we will be in college – alone, uncertain, trying to make a new group of friends from scratch, desperately searching for our niche in wherever we end up. Thinking back to right now, the last moments we share with each other, will give us solace.
Let’s not waste these few weeks looking forward to the future. We can still salvage what’s left of our senior year – by enjoy each others’ company and, for once, being grateful for the present.
And zombies, most definitely, are incapable of doing either of those things.
Seniors are just dying to graduate – we’ve all turned into zombies! One look at those lifeless, robot-like faces and you’ll see what I mean. We can’t express any emotion except boredom and frustration. We either mindlessly wander around campus during class or sleep through the class. And we are unproductive, having just enough energy to fling our backpacks onto the nearest desk and wail, “I can’t take being here for even one more day!”
Or could it be that once again, we have forgotten another cheesy-yet-helpful lesson that Disney, Hallmark, and Random House tried so hard to hammer into our heads? No, I’m not talking about “don’t judge a book by its cover” (why shouldn’t we?) or “sharing is caring” (and for weaklings), but rather, “be careful what you wish for.”
Of course everyone wants to get out of school, start anew in college, and escape from that one girl in third period who no one can stand, but it seems that being turned into zombies has impaired our thinking abilities. Perhaps we the undead should take a moment to contemplate what graduation truly means.
Go ahead – take a mental snapshot of your life as it is now. Then, delete every single person other than yourself from that picture. Change the background to an image of a strange place that you have only seen once or twice before. Welcome to the next four years of your life!
Up until now, we have always had someone who can help us solve our problems if we asked – a friend, a parent, a teacher, a sibling, a counselor. Now, we have become the proverbial baby birds about to be released from (violently tossed out of) our cozy nest in the trees. Wings not quite strong enough to overcome gravity just yet? That’s too bad, because off you go!
This also means that in just a few weeks, we will say goodbye to most of the people we know. Let’s be honest with ourselves – “friends forever,” another one of those wonderful Hallmark slogans, is nothing but a cruel lie. Nothing is permanent, especially the casual companionships we’ve formed with that one guy who shares two classes with us, that other guy who happens to be on the same team. The moment we graduate, these people will disappear from our lives in a puff of smoke.
The others, those who we’re truly close to, will fade away more slowly. The emails and online messages will get less and less frequent. The attempts to get together and hang out will grow half-hearted and insincere. Inside jokes you used to share will wear out.
Three or four months from now, we will be in college – alone, uncertain, trying to make a new group of friends from scratch, desperately searching for our niche in wherever we end up. Thinking back to right now, the last moments we share with each other, will give us solace.
Let’s not waste these few weeks looking forward to the future. We can still salvage what’s left of our senior year – by enjoy each others’ company and, for once, being grateful for the present.
And zombies, most definitely, are incapable of doing either of those things.