Assignment 24 - Ella Franklin

All of my life junior year has been hyped up to be the worst year of high school. People promised mental breakdowns and weight gains and constant stress. I experienced none of that. Junior year also happened to be the year I stopped listening to how people told me things were going to be and instead began experiencing things as they are.

I found junior year to be enlightening. I wasn't stressed. Everyone always tells me I'm stressed or I have anxiety, but I really don't at all. I have concerns. I have obligations. But I don't have stress. When I look back on junior year, I picture it like a meadow. Just a calm, open space. Sophomore year, on the other hand, is mountainous. Snow capped mountains. Gray and jagged. But junior year was very calm.

In that calmness I find that maybe I didn't learn as much as I did among the mountains of sophomore year. I feel like I left the year not unchanged but unscathed. I don't think I am the same person as I was at the beginning of the year. But is anyone ever?

Junior year was shedding a layer. And in every layer you shed you come closer to who you really are. But I've also had more identity crises than any year prior. But I've also grown to understand myself and get to the root of all these crises and I've found solace in that.

I always think I'm so far behind. I look at all my peers and I think they have it all figured out. They know what they like, they know what they wanna do, they have a solid friend group, they are happy. But when you look closer, you realize nobody knows what they're doing. Everyone else is all just trying to figure it out but no one has and no one is, but nobody talks about how none of us have any idea what we're doing.

I turned 17 my junior year. I've always wanted to be 17 and now I am, so that is a success.

I'm sure I failed. I might be interpreting this question on a much deeper level than it warrants. On a very basic level, I failed a few times. I failed several physics test. I failed every time I waited till 10 PM to start unit assignments. I applied for something that I really wanted but didn't get. No wonder I listened to "You Can't Always Get What You Want" so much this year.

I feel very at peace leaving junior year. Maybe it's just a placebo caused by the yoga headband I'm wearing that I got for $0.50 at a yard sale or maybe I have finally found peace within myself. I have become someone who I not necessarily should be, but someone I can be. I can live with that for a while.