Senior schedule

A little half-sheet of paper in an innocuous, plain looking envelope arrived in the mail today. It's finally here... my senior schedule. My first reaction: "Oh cool, I get to know what classes and teachers I'll have this year. My second reaction: *checks calender* "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH."

It's kind of a slap in the face, finally receiving the memo that signals the end of summer. It's hard to believe, as it probably is for other people who are still in summer mode. Wait, we're seniors now? Only a few weeks ago we were still juniors, suffering under loads of homework and extracurriculars, worrying about Junior Prom, shaking our fists at collegeboard and the plagues of APs and SAT tests alike. This summer was the first breath of reprieve that we've gotten in awhile. And now we have to deal with college applications?

Oh man. It's kind of hard to describe how I feel right now. I always knew this day was coming, the day when I would have to start thinking about colleges seriously. It reminds me of the summer before my sophomore year, when I took my first two AP classes. It had come too suddenly, and though I had known about it, it hadn't really registered in my mind. It was overwhelming to wrap my mind around the fact that I would be taking college-level courses already, daunting to think all that could go wrong. And now it's kind of like that for college applications... I was always aware of the work that I had to do, but now the fact that I actually have to starting doing it is enough to induce headaches. So yeah, I've taken a look at the Common Application and started drafting some of my essays, but as summer draws nearer to a close I feel like a giant iron gate is slowly closing in front of me, shutting out my carefree world- the glorified sunny field of Hakuna Matata and all things stress-free that I've been frolicking in so contentedly this summer.

To be honest, I'm still pretty excited. First day of school, I get to see all of my friends again, the soccer season is starting, I get to meet new teachers.... but much as I like that feeling of freshness and back to school-ness, I know that'll get old pretty quickly. Once the homework starts piling up and the sleep debt grows higher I know I won't enjoy it at all. My classes are okay in terms of workload this year, I purposefully dropped an AP or two because come on, who wants to slave away during senior year? I already had junioritis LAST year 2nd semester, there's no way I'd be able to keep my focus this year after my college applications are all sent out.

It's annoying to have that cloud-o-doom constantly hanging over your head, though. School was bad enough, but having to do extra work preparing essays and filling forms is simply I don't handle very well. Procrastination becomes my best friend, and I've used that approach pretty much this whole summer. And by this point, any conversation you have with an adult lasting longer than 5 minutes will probably gravitate towards the subject of college applications. "Where are you thinking of applying?" "Are you excited for your last year of high school?" "What are you thinking of majoring in?" (Like we haven't all heard that one before).

Bottom line for me: I'm excited for senior year, but as for life before I finish college applications.... not so much.