My junior year started out pretty much how I expected. As a junior, you wear a lot of hats, and I attempted to balance them all at once. I balanced my Varsity Tennis season, got adjusted to new classes, studied for the SAT, and practiced for the fall play. I even had the privilege of visiting some colleges that I have begun to consider during the beginning stages of my college application process.
A lot of pressure is put on post-pubescent minds, and we get so wrapped up in numbers and grades and recommendation letters and APs. We sometimes fail to see things in the eyes of others, or to look back at the big picture. Tragedy struck multiple times this school year. As a community, we were forced to step back out of our personal bubbles in order to care for each other. We stepped up and helped those who we care so deeply about. As a member of this community, I started to become more grateful for the things I have and who I am as a person, and less focused on the minuscule way a test would affect my GPA or how a college you get into defines you as a person.
The way I have seen my junior year is strikingly different from the way my sister saw it four years ago. Life still went on, and I began to rehearse for the spring musical and was preparing for my March SAT. While I heard whispers of school closures, I never expected that it would be so widespread (instead of preparing so hard for the SAT, I should’ve been preparing for a pandemic). I laughed at my mother for her stockpile of Clorox and was jealous of other schools having “days off.” I watched the Middle School Musical on livestream, which I thought was great, but didn’t think that hard about the implications of it. An empty crowd at a show seems more like a nightmare that I wake up with a cold sweat from, than an actual way of watching a live performance.
We were practicing for our own musical, Xanadu, in full costume for four hours a night, the SAT was just days away, when suddenly everything stopped. I couldn’t believe we weren’t magic -- unfortunately we can’t fight pandemics in our character shoes while dancing inches apart. So, here I am, recalling the text message I received in Physics class saying that school would be closed for 2 days. That was soon extended for three months.
Not to sound too pessimistic, but life doesn’t truly feel real anymore. We are stuck looking at screens for hours, so the concept of “screen time” has seemingly vanished. Gym class (at least for me) is Chloe Ting videos and Just Dance. Friends are icons on a group chat, and are not able to command a room with their presence. Teachers are somehow dealing with this entire mess of self-isolation, some with young children, as well as continuing to teach us. Online AP tests had the same likelihood of crashing as urbanoutfitters.com on Cyber Monday. Along with this, there has been a rise in social justice and the exposure of systemic police brutality.
2020 is going to be a pivotal year in our country’s history on almost all accounts. This is a historical time, we are living through something major, but it is not as adventurous as all those books tell you it is. I know I should be more focused on my mental health and journaling every current events story, but as an Ardsley junior I have been trained to seek out the best grade, get awards, become the President of a club, be on a Varsity team, take as many APs as physically possible (who cares about lunch), do better on the SAT than the person next to you, and brag about an all-nighter I pulled for a test. I want to stop caring, but like many people in my grade, I can’t. We are like dysfunctional Roombas bumping into a wall, wanting to keep cleaning, but having no where to go. Junior year is hard, but this year was especially so, not just for juniors but the entire district. Hopefully, there will be some light at the end of this seemingly never ending tunnel, and we will all be more appreciative of the exciting, melancholy, stressful and joyous times at Ardsley High School.
For now, I give a sincere congratulations to the class of 2020! You guys deserve the world.