It’s one of those things that doesn’t hit you right away, but feels like a cold, hard brick when it does.

Unaware of the speed in which three years could actually pass, I sauntered into senior year in a daze, completely unprepared for the weeks to come. The morning of the first day of school was a blur of wide grins, pats on the back, and expressions like “senior year, eh?” With a fake smile plastered on my face, I shook hands with faculty, wandered about like an inmate just released from AMHI, and when asked if I was excited about my senior year replied ‘of course!’ – all the while convinced that I was still dreaming in bed.

My parents cautioned me that these four years, above all, would pass the quickest. But my parents were also the ones that warned me I would shrivel up and die if I didn’t eat every last green bean on my plate, that I’d end up living in a refrigerator box under a highway bridge if I didn’t finish my algebra homework, and that if my room wasn’t spotless the boogey man would devour me in my sleep. Was it any considerable surprise that I had trouble believing them? Even when they informed me of the relative swiftness of the high school years?

I moved through a fog that first week of school, feelings of bewilderment and desolation forming a cloud above my head. In those three days, confusion was common and solace was scarce. That week, I stopped counting the number of times I stood up when the junior class was called for a meeting, or the number of papers I’d filled out with ‘Name: Christina Nugent, Grade: 11’ on them. I found myself sitting in the seats I’d been assigned last year, this time, purely by choice.

Every year, on the first day of school, our principal, invites the senior class to the gymnasium, offering wisdom and encouraging words. So this event was anything but a surprise. Though for some reason – possibly the fact that I still fancied myself as part of the junior class – this meeting, to me, came as somewhat of a shock. For what seemed like hours – only because the wooden bleachers cause you to lose feeling in your backside after only a few short minutes – our principal spoke. The words he said, though I desperately tried to grasp them, floated over my head like tiny iridescent soap bubbles that could not be caught, no matter how far I reached.

The next few weeks weren’t any less baffling or simple, as parents and teachers had alluded. Senior year is nothing of the carefree, effortless year everyone had made it out to be. “You’ll have fun this year,” they said, “senior year, it’s the best year.” So far I have seen nothing of this marvelous close to high school that adults have always raved about. Senior year is no easier than junior year. There are just as many classes, just as many responsibilities, and just as many deadlines. Though, after the idea of senior year settled in, I came to the conclusion that I didn’t want this year to be easy. If it were easy, it would be boring; and boredom, I’m afraid, is something I’ve never accepted well.

I’ve only been a senior for about a month and a half now. But I’m already drowning in homework, squeezing extra-curriculars into an already overflowing schedule, and sprinting through the halls using every spare minute to get something done. I’ll repeat what I said earlier: senior year is not easy. Though I believe packing your schedule with study halls and lunches is a mistake. A friend once said, ‘The only way to live, is with no regrets.’ Each day I believe that more and more. Taking the easy road your senior year would be one of the most fateful mistakes you could ever make. Don’t let your senior year slip by. Finish out your high school years with a bang.

Please know, that I am not here to scare you; and I’m sorry if you’re shaking in your Uggs right now. My intent was not to get you to start crying and dreading senior year. Because though it snuck up on me quite unexpectedly, that I wasn’t fully prepared, and that college scares me half to death, these past four years truthfully were some of the best. We all worked hard, we grew up together, and though it will be sad going our separate ways this June, I honestly can say that I don’t regret any decision I’ve made. Although I wasn’t ready for the headaches, the strict deadlines, and the surprising amount of homework, I feel the teachers at Monmouth Academy have prepared us well. I feel confident that by the time May rolls around, and we’re forced to separate, that all of us – all forty-nine of Monmouth Academy’s senior class of 2008 – will be successful, wherever, whatever we decide to do with the rest of our lives. After all, we were taught by the best.

Now, I’ve always been a little clueless – a little slow on the uptake – but senior year didn’t truly phase me until about three days ago. It didn’t hit me as I walked through those familiar double doors, it didn’t hit me as I sat down in homeroom, it didn’t even hit me when we were called down to the gym for our first senior class meeting. I didn’t realize that that would be the last time I’d walk through those doors on the first day of school, that that would be my last homeroom ever, that when our principal talked about the senior class… he was talking about us.