HELLO!

I'm real sorry I disappeared from the face of the earth. The good news is, I'm graduated. I made it! And I have so much to write about while it's still new. I got a laptop for graduation, and I'm making it a goal to write more. And I know I always say that, but you know what. Sue me. I'm doing what I can.

Anyway, I don't know if we've talked about this or not - probably we have in person, but not really on my blog? But my AP English teacher dislikes me. And I don't know what that is. It could be a lot of things. I think maybe she gets bullied a little, being a new teacher at Davis High School. I think she's in her late thirties and unhappy being not married - and okay, but she is GORGEOUS. I get this vibe like she's so hilarious and vibrant and feels like she has to be so suppressed. Whatever the reason, she really doesn't love me. She hates my style of writing, she docks me at every possible turn, and you know, it is what it is. I have the best GPA I've had in my whole life, and I'm positive I at least passed my AP test in her class.

That being said, our final assignment was to write a paper called This I Believe. There's a whole website of them, and it's sincerely delightful to read different people's beliefs. It's mostly incredibly inspiring. You should totally go there and give it a gander by clicking HERE. Now, my teacher, bless her soul, kept giving us prompts to give us an idea of what we believe. But I'm pretty sure you can't make someone's beliefs fit inside a list of six possibilities. People's souls, inextricably linked with their beliefs, cannot be bottled into something so simple.

So, I kind of realized, I was done with school. It was the last week of my last year of high school. This woman isn't going to like what I have to say no matter what I write, or how much time I spend on it. So. I came home on Wednesday, after my last day in the class that altered my course forever - Advanced Theatre - and after a good bit of fruit leather, I penned my one page essay. And it's pretty rough - we're talking a first draft written in ten minutes, here, but... It's really grown on me. It's just my mind. :)

And when I read it in class, I could almost feel her shrinking back at her desk. That wasn't my intention, but it was really empowering to speak my unfiltered, first draft thoughts and not worry if I was writing "the right way" or for her. I was writing for me, and what you're about to read was just something passing through my mind. So. Whatever, right?! If I can't be me, what can I be?

So. Here we are, friends. My last moment of unintentionally being a little rebel in high school:

There are some things, memories or moments, that transcend high school. Connections forged with people and lessons learned that will carry beyond this mundane, and often-joked about condition; high school. Some things are bigger than a transcript, and hold still more weight towards the future.

True, much of what we participate in here is temporary. We are given a deadline – sometimes impossible – to stress over, to obsess with. Even our time here is marked, dated. From the time we are old enough to log onto a computer, we have our expiration date – our year of expectancy to exit this institution and brave the wide world.

To be honest, I couldn’t tell you all the symbolism from Huck Finn off the top of my head. I don’t remember concepts from art in seventh grade. I’ve long since forgotten my lines from when I played Helena in a Midsummer Night’s Dream. I no longer know which countries have which kinds of governments.

But, I know that from each of these classes, these four-walled asylums, something was given to me that cannot be written in books. I am more than test or a grade, I am a laugh. I am me. I’ve unleashed my voice. One thousand moments and people and passing comments have molded me into the girl who will sit in that awful, colorless graduation gown they have the nerve to call “Vegas Gold.”

Michelangelo was said to have believed that the sculpture was already in the marble. He was only freeing the slave within the rock. I was that slave. I began bound, but through millions of moments so dear, I realized that we are only bound by what we think we are bound by. I met people who not only chipped, but tore at the rock around me to pull me out. These experiences transcend high school. They extend beyond graduation, and even college. They will follow me my whole life, as I meet each new Michelangelo – perhaps in a classroom, trying to teach me something on paper, and unaware that everything I will take from them has nothing to do with a credit or class score.

We are at the journey’s end, but the chipping has only begun. This will follow us our whole lives, and the people we knew, connections we made – not all are temporary. Some are powerful, sculpting influences. Cuts in stone, that extend beyond this place and these walls to our person.

This, I believe.