Dear Montgomery High School Staff and Student Body,
High school has been… interesting, to say the least. It’s the period of time where we’re all so desperately trying to figure ourselves out, it takes over our every thought. The place where we figure out who we want to surround ourselves with; what standard of person we want to be and be friends with.
Up until March 13th of last year, I was thriving in high school. I was getting the grades, and I loved my teachers, and I had amazing friends. To me, high school was a place of interaction, of communication. I live off of the energy of the people around me, and I was on a high.
I don’t think that any of us realized that COVID-19 would impact us as much as it did. I was sure we would be out for two or three weeks, tops. But soon I realized I had lost the rest of my junior year and I was taken aback. Now we are looking at losing all of our senior year, and I am unbelievably sad.
One would think that spending numerous hours in one’s room for days on end would help when trying to figure out who one is. But, I just confused myself even more. And I, like so many seniors around me, are now shrouded in this cloud of uncertainty. We don’t know where we will end up in college, we don’t know if we’ll be able to even go to college, and we are so very tired of living through history.
Fires. Power outages. Smoke days. Pandemic. Pandemic and fires. Domestic terrorism. It just doesn’t stop.
I think that the worst part is that we can all see the light at the end of the tunnel. We have finished our first semester and we know that vaccines will be coming to us in the spring. We know that we are almost done. But then that begs the question, “Why even try anymore?”
The usual senior class has things to look forward to. They have reasons to sprint towards the finish line. Our finish line has no ribbon to break through, so why wouldn’t we just crawl through the final mile? We don’t even feel like real seniors. I personally feel like I just started my fourth semester of junior year.
Winter Break usually rejuvenates us so that second semester is exciting and fun - a way to see all our friends after a while away. However, Winter Break this year wasn’t really a break. The emotional and psychological toll of everything else that is going on in the world didn’t break along with us, and so in my head, nothing had really changed. I came back to online school just as burnt out as I was finals week.
Every day I do the same thing. I go to Zoom classes and then do online homework until my eyes glaze over and I can't focus on what I’m typing anymore. I’m so emotionally exhausted throughout the day that when I can finally get a break from the screen at night, I can’t go to sleep.
So teachers, please be patient with us. I know we aren’t supposed to be getting senioritis yet, but I think it’s coming sooner than usual.
To fellow seniors, I know it seems rather futile right now. But it is a new year, and with a new year comes new things to be excited about. So one thing that I do to help stabilize myself when I am feeling unmotivated is to think of one thing to live for that day. For example, today I am living for chocolate chip pancakes. It helps keep me optimistic when I’m feeling down, so I would suggest trying it.
I don’t mean for this article to be a cry for help. It’s not even a whimper. I just want other seniors to know that they’re not alone in feeling this way, and I want our teachers to know why we’re feeling this way. I want to open these lines of communication so we can better find solutions that work for all parties, and we can better understand each other.
I hope that this helped you in some way. Thank you for reading.
Fiona Sweet and Emma Johnston