As my time at Wootton comes to an end, I find myself staring at my computer, wondering how newspaper seniors before me were able to write their final articles.

Every week, in both my AP Lit and Newspaper classes, everyone writes a journal, where you can follow the prompt or write about whatever you want. My journal entries are often just my stream of consciousness. I rattle off what I am feeling, what I am stressed about, exciting things coming up and just about anything else I can come up with. It has been a great outlet for me, and I often find myself writing these journals in a humorous way, to make English and journalism teacher Evva Starr laugh as she reads them. So I decided my senior reflection would be in the form of a journal entry, not just to Ms. Starr, but to anyone who feels like reading it.

I cannot believe I am leaving Wootton and graduating in a week. It blows my mind how fast high school went by. I still feel like I am a freshman, sitting in the back of the newsroom, terrified to give the editors-in-chief my article to edit, because that meant I had to talk to them. I know the pandemic took away part of my high school experience but it still went by quickly. I find this so interesting because as I was living it, it felt like it was going by painfully slowly. In the blink of an eye, it is all over.

It scares me that my life is about to completely change. I hate change. Sure, I have gone through the transition of going from elementary school to middle school to high school, but life has always been the same. I wake up at home, go to school, come home to do my homework and all my other activities, eat dinner with my family, go to bed, and then I would do it all over again. Soon, that changes forever. I am going to a new place, where my daily life and experiences will be completely different. That is truly terrifying.

It is also exciting. Soon, I will get to experience new things, in a new place and make tons of new friends.

Overall, the past couple of weeks have felt weird. We are in limbo, ready to be done with high school, but sad to leave at the same time.

I am incredibly sad to be leaving Common Sense, as it has been so important to my high school experience. I have learned about myself and grown so much since I first stepped into the newsroom in 2019, and I will forever be grateful for that.
Thank you Ms. Starr for believing in me and always supporting me, thank you to all the friends I have made in the newspaper, I love you all, and thank you to the 2019 field hockey seniors, who definitely won’t see this, for telling me I should join Common Sense. Without them, I wouldn’t have all the amazing memories I hold so close to my heart.