Piles of homework. Grades dropping lower in the alphabet. The end of the semester looms near. Final reviews stacking up. They say you learned this, but you have no idea. The days lull together, sleep lessens. Headaches, anger, confusion, stress fill the days.

Hello. I am a typical high school senior, and I have given up. Why? You might ask. The answer: I have no idea. There’s a point everyone experiences during their senior year when everyone seems to just give up. No more gunning for that A, no more studying until 3 in the morning, no more caring. We become senioritis zombies; trudging to class, canyon-like dark circles, staring at nothing.

What is the point? There’s no point anymore.

The stress is too much. It’s become too much. Thirteen years of school for a piece of paper. That’s it. Thirteen years of crying, chronic stress, and wondering when the heck I am going to use this information in the real world. Everything has lost its meaning.

With this lull comes the realization of how close “real life” is. Graduation is so close; months, weeks, days, it draws closer. The time when you have to face what you’ve been preparing for for so long. It doesn’t feel like it should be this close. It’s too soon. Yesterday, you were playing on a playground at recess and trading silly bands with the kids in your class. And freshman year,I can remember freshman year. The excitement upon starting high school. Things were easier.

Somehow what seemed so far away is here. Graduation is the pot of gold at the end of rainbow (if the rainbow is thirteen years of chronic stress). It’s freedom from the locker-lined walls of hell. No longer will 8 hours of our days be stolen, no longer will we be in fear that we have a test the next day, no longer will we be stuck in the parking line trying to get home, or taken down in the hallway by the neanderthals who think it’s fun to sprint out of school after the last bell. It all ends.

Adulthood hovers over your shoulder, stalking you, pressuring you with the idea of bills, politics, and mortgages.

You’ll take your last test, your last fire drill, your last pep assembly, last time you have lunch with your friends, last time you get to look at your friend across the classroom because you’re texting each other something funny, last time… the last time.

It all comes with such an array of different emotions: sadness, worry, relief. It all becomes so overwhelming. You want to leave, but, at the same time, you don’t. Everything’s changing so fast and it’s overwhelming. It takes over.

Amongst all this internal turmoil, I find myself regretting letting it get the best of me. I advise, current and future seniors, don’t give up. Don’t lose the GPA you’ve been working for for four years, don’t lose your relationships with your teachers, don’t lose yourself. Things may be changing and it may be hard, but push through it. This is what you’ve been waiting for.

So finish strong. Keep high school memories close, and take on the world. This is the new generation. Everything’s gonna change, but the change will be good. The world will change. And it all starts with us.