After COVID, future seniors should never complain of ‘senioritis’ again

Take it from a senior in the Class of 2020, “senioritis” should never be felt again.

Maybe I’m weird, but I never felt the need to rush through senior year. Before all of this went down, I was dreading the day it would all be over. Turns out, that day came about two months too soon.

We never thought senior year would be over when we left school for spring break. If anything we were all fleeing the scene because we were waiting for this break. A vacation or a stay-cation, I think it’s fair to say all of us seniors just needed this week to recharge, honestly everyone did.

As I look back on it, I think if we would’ve known it was going to be our last day, we would’ve done things a little bit differently. We might have stayed late to talk to teachers one last time or give our friends a hug before it was deemed “unsafe” to do so. 

But we didn’t know. How could we have known?

If there’s anything this experience has taught me personally is that we don’t appreciate things enough. We expect a lot and don’t think there’s ever the possibility our expectations won’t be met. 

Since I was in elementary school, I glamorized the idea of football games, prom, commencement and what that feeling of walking the halls one last time would be like. I fully expected the opportunity to get to walk the halls of Cedar Heights again after completing 13 years of schooling, probably tearing up as I passed the faces of my former teachers and feeling a lot taller than the lockers that once housed my Hannah Montana backpack.

I remember when graduating elementary school felt like the scariest thing in the world. My friends and I cried as we walked out those doors and clung to each other like we wouldn’t see them in a couple months for BOOST. It was ridiculous. We felt like we had done it, like that was it. We didn’t know we had six more unforgettable years ahead of us.

Now, as I’ve reflected a lot these last couple months, we as a class have done so much that our elementary school selves could’ve never believed. 

I read through a book we wrote as a class in the sixth grade about where we’d each be and what we would’ve accomplished by the time we were 50 years old. Wow, was I nowhere close. I think I know where I’m going now as an almost 18 year old, but I think even if I sat down with the same intent to write about where I’d be in 32 years, I’d still be very, very wrong.

Why do we rush it though? Why do we sit and ponder about what we’ll be doing when we’re 50 when we can’t even know what we’ll be doing in the next month?

If I would’ve been asked in February what the rest of my senior year would look like, I can tell you I would’ve never said I’d be writing this heartfelt piece about senioritis from my bedroom on a Thursday afternoon, cozy under a blanket, at two in the afternoon, right after I just walked the stage of the auditorium in front of my family as a makeshift commencement the night before. 

Although I’m sad we didn’t have the traditional graduation ceremony, it’s so sweet all the thought and hard work that was put in to make this experience and accomplishment still feel special.

I started thinking about how I wanted to hang my tassel on the mirror in my car like so many people do, and as I looked at that golden 2020 charm I thought about from now on, everytime I look at it, I’m going to have a very different memory about what that final month of high school was like than any other student in any other class.

COVID-19 has taken so much from us seniors, but it’s made us the strongest and most unique class. We always joke about how 2020 must have meant going into this year, everything was going to be as clear and as perfect as 20/20 vision, but that’s not what it turned out to mean at all. 

What I think this whole 2020 symbol means now is that our class sees the world with more open eyes and more understanding. Like perfect vision we take in every light and see not only things as they are, but as they could be.

Class of 2020, we are battle tested and strong. This experience, I think, has made us all a little bit more grateful for what we have and we will never take such amazing opportunities for granted again. We’ll stop rushing through life and we’ll live in the moment more than any other class ever has or ever will.

Take it from the class of 2020, “senioritis” should never be felt again because you never know when a global pandemic is going to throw a wrench in your 13 year old plans.