To the Graduating Class of 2016

As your MC for the big night, I thought I’d take this time to go a little off-script and give you the more informal farewell I think you all deserve.

Firstly, I’m going to miss having the safety net of another class right above me. The ability to use you as my examples and learn from your mistakes. I took great comfort, especially this last year, in knowing that there was a layer of thirty five odd people between me and ‘real life’.

Secondly, your leaving is a horribly unwelcome reminder that life outside of and after school is a very real, tangible thing. And it is very close. I will have to apply to college. I will have to give in my IAs, start my EE and actually do all the things I keep complaining about having to do. If I have anything to say to you guys, it’s, please don’t go. I am not ready to burst the bubble.

And lastly, I know I probably shouldn’t feel too many feelings about you guys going. I mean, yeah its a big deal, but I probably only talked to four of you enough to warrant any sort of emotion or opinion on your Graduation, but honestly there is a lot going through my head. For instance, how much it sucks that I didn’t make friends with more than four of you. And how much I wanted to get to known some of you guys, and I always postponed actually approaching you. How some of you (based on your grades and TOK Presentations) seem like such insightful, interesting people that I really wanted to have conversations with, but never actually did. I want to have a legitimate reason to be there for your big day, aside from explaining the significance of the lighting of the lamp- and I know that that’s stupid, and selfish and that this is less of a farewell and more a self pitying list of reasons why something that has literally nothing to do with me actually has everything to do with me, but I feel like it is important to know that you guys have made an impact, and it isn’t going unnoticed.

To the graduating class of 2016, you may not know it, or care, but I really appreciate your existence. You guys, without ever knowing it, helped me get through much of my school life just by screwing up and surviving, which if nothing else, is a great way to get over the stress of missed deadlines and failed exams. And even though your impact on my life means very very little to you, know that I am grateful and I always will be.

So, you know, good luck and stuff. I’ll provably check your Facebook profiles in a year just to see if I’m on the right track.

Thanks,
At least one of your juniors

Above Average

Teenagehood comes with the shocking realization of just how average you really are. I mean, unless you aren’t. But, if you think about all the math you weren’t paying attention to, it isn’t likely, or even possible for everyone to be as “above average” as we’re all constantly reminded of as kids. The pressure put on us to be special is a lot bigger than it seems. From the time we are nothing but babies, we’re immediately labelled “unique” and “one-of-a-kind” and told that we’re going to change the world… Teachers say she has the potential to get full marks in everything all the time. Your parents say that you could be the next president of the United States! (No, sweetie, it doesn’t matter if you’re Indian. You’re a special little cookie and you can do anything!). It’s the “you can do anything” message that fucks us up. No parent wants to let their child know that they’re most likely to end up with 2.5 kids and a 9-5 job. And no kid needs to hear that. But I know that my parents and teachers told me for ten years how incredibly “above average” my intelligence was. My mum told me too often how beautiful I looked. How I had that ‘presence’ that other people just didn’t. And even though, as I got older and my grades started reaching that comfortable point, or my Instagram posts got a decent number of likes, but nothing remarkable, and nothing I did, or said was noteworthy enough to single me out in a group of people and notice me- even then, I held on to this deeply ingrained belief that I was above average, maybe a little misunderstood, but definitely an incredible product of nature.

Sure, reality kicked in, of course it did. Teachers soon realised that I had to set realistic goals for university, and stopped telling me to aim for the highest grade, (notably, my physics teacher mentioned very earnestly that I could easily score a 60% if I just tried hard enough). But the thing is, if I had been aware of what the word average implied when I was seven, I might not have felt like a total disappointment almost ten years later. Although, I’d probably still be this dramatic, I am a teenage writer after all.

But basically, this is me coming to terms with the fact that I’m not the girl in the movie who can just see through the broody mysterious guy’s mask. I’m not the girl who walks into a room and has all eyes on her. I am not remarkable. Which isn’t to say I’m suddenly boring and bland- I, despite myself, still think I’m a fairly engaging person- it’s just that I fall into the masses, as most of us do. And I’m still not ok, and I’m still going to reblog edgy art on Tumblr to make myself feel important, but at least I’m not disillusioned.

I sound so self indulgent and annoying, but please bear with me, I don’t have problems real enough to write about, this will have to do…