I've never really posted a discussion forum topic before, but this time I think I'm excited enough to make an exception...I finished high school today!
So here's how it played out:
(1) Awake at 6:30 AM. Coffee, and lots of it. Force myself over to my desk and scribble down a journal for the last major assignment of my school career. Apathy sets in almost immediately, in crippling amounts. Realise that my marks are almost certainly good enough to get me where I need to go next, so I write down the equivalent of blowing a raspberry at the teacher, and my primary education is over. Toss it in bag, grab Sugar Hill Gang and Men Without Hats CDs. I'll need those.
(2) Arrive at school. The "muck-up" part of the day is well underway, with an epic battle on the school oval. Think the opening scene of Gangs of New York, but with shaving cream and water bombs instead of meat cleavers and wooden clubs. Discard tie and begin wading through the warzone, eventually finding my own friends, who brilliantly have brought Super Soakers so large they appear to be modified miniguns. Turn around, shaving cream cans in hand, and decimate opposition.
(3) Tear myself away from sculpting a shaving-cream beard on my arch-nemesis, and rush to the assembly hall, where I work feverishly with a small tech crew on preparing the spoof assembly that we've worked hard on for the past few weeks. Teachers have forbidden me to screen my pisstake documentary about a laughably ridiculous Homie-G student who left the school under mysterious circumstances: it is, unbeknownst to them, headlining the program. Briefly, I wonder what it would feel like to be expelled on graduation day, but the envelope needs a-pushin'!
(4) Assembly goes down very well. My graduating 'peers' have a collective IQ that doesn't quite exceed double digits, so they prefer the fart jokes and dirty dancing (doubly worrisome being as it's an all-boys school) to my This is Spinal Tap-esque biopic, but to hell with them: everyone capable of bipedal movement and rudimentary language in excess of the latest 50 Cent album later compliments me on the proceedings.
(5) Morning tea with the teachers. Nostalgia is beginning to settle in heavily: not quite blubbering yet, but it'll happen. Sign everyone else's shirts, as they sign mine - one last chance to trade barbs and witty double-entendres, as you do in these cases.
(6) Finally, as people are filing away, I signal to my best friend and we head down through to the junior school, to the 1st Grade oval which has a beautiful view over the city's river. Just over 10 years ago, he and I sat down there, little more than bright-eyed little tykes, and with pencil and paper in hand drew an impression of our city skyline. We have lunch down there, looking over to a view that has changed: small saplings that we recall have sprouted into large trees; bushes not even planted back then now obscure some of the view; and of course, the city itself has changed, growing into something a little more. We reminisce over the school, shared experiences and the like - and even though he and I have grown apart somewhat over the years at the school, settling into different groups of people, I think that he appreciates the closure as much as I do.
And that's it, really. In an hour and a half, I go back one last time - there's a church service, and then the formal graduation dinner. I just really felt like it was a story worth sharing, and I will definitely post a picture of the dinner when I return (I plan to take huge amounts of film).
I was just wondering, how did everyone's final day of school pan out for them? Or if you're still at school, how do you plan to end it all?
So here's how it played out:
(1) Awake at 6:30 AM. Coffee, and lots of it. Force myself over to my desk and scribble down a journal for the last major assignment of my school career. Apathy sets in almost immediately, in crippling amounts. Realise that my marks are almost certainly good enough to get me where I need to go next, so I write down the equivalent of blowing a raspberry at the teacher, and my primary education is over. Toss it in bag, grab Sugar Hill Gang and Men Without Hats CDs. I'll need those.
(2) Arrive at school. The "muck-up" part of the day is well underway, with an epic battle on the school oval. Think the opening scene of Gangs of New York, but with shaving cream and water bombs instead of meat cleavers and wooden clubs. Discard tie and begin wading through the warzone, eventually finding my own friends, who brilliantly have brought Super Soakers so large they appear to be modified miniguns. Turn around, shaving cream cans in hand, and decimate opposition.
(3) Tear myself away from sculpting a shaving-cream beard on my arch-nemesis, and rush to the assembly hall, where I work feverishly with a small tech crew on preparing the spoof assembly that we've worked hard on for the past few weeks. Teachers have forbidden me to screen my pisstake documentary about a laughably ridiculous Homie-G student who left the school under mysterious circumstances: it is, unbeknownst to them, headlining the program. Briefly, I wonder what it would feel like to be expelled on graduation day, but the envelope needs a-pushin'!
(4) Assembly goes down very well. My graduating 'peers' have a collective IQ that doesn't quite exceed double digits, so they prefer the fart jokes and dirty dancing (doubly worrisome being as it's an all-boys school) to my This is Spinal Tap-esque biopic, but to hell with them: everyone capable of bipedal movement and rudimentary language in excess of the latest 50 Cent album later compliments me on the proceedings.
(5) Morning tea with the teachers. Nostalgia is beginning to settle in heavily: not quite blubbering yet, but it'll happen. Sign everyone else's shirts, as they sign mine - one last chance to trade barbs and witty double-entendres, as you do in these cases.
(6) Finally, as people are filing away, I signal to my best friend and we head down through to the junior school, to the 1st Grade oval which has a beautiful view over the city's river. Just over 10 years ago, he and I sat down there, little more than bright-eyed little tykes, and with pencil and paper in hand drew an impression of our city skyline. We have lunch down there, looking over to a view that has changed: small saplings that we recall have sprouted into large trees; bushes not even planted back then now obscure some of the view; and of course, the city itself has changed, growing into something a little more. We reminisce over the school, shared experiences and the like - and even though he and I have grown apart somewhat over the years at the school, settling into different groups of people, I think that he appreciates the closure as much as I do.
And that's it, really. In an hour and a half, I go back one last time - there's a church service, and then the formal graduation dinner. I just really felt like it was a story worth sharing, and I will definitely post a picture of the dinner when I return (I plan to take huge amounts of film).
I was just wondering, how did everyone's final day of school pan out for them? Or if you're still at school, how do you plan to end it all?
The Last True Evil - consistent nobody in the Discussion Forum since 1998