Page 87 - Herioter 2021

And somehow we are taught to do the
opposite. We take endless photos, we reminisce,
we have balls and leavers’ services and
prizegiving. We celebrate the good times, and
in this, we seem to highlight all the reasons we
should stay. This, to me, seems counterproductive.
I have been trying all week to celebrate the
good times. I bring cake and biscuits to lessons
where we try to combine fun activities with frantic
preparation for the upcoming ‘End of Course
Assessments’. I buy a disposable camera to
document the moments I don’t want to forget. I
feel I should be enjoying myself. But the truth is
I’ve had a terrible week, for all the usual reasons
that someone can be having a bad week- and
that is okay. Forcing yourself to have fun because
you feel you’re supposed to be having fun and
people keep reminding you to have fun, well,
that’s also fairly counterproductive.
So, how do we be productive about change? I
almost think I shouldn’t give you my answer. We
are adults now, and soon we won’t have teachers
We are am almost eighteen years old, so this is all I have to answer these difficult questions for us. We walk,
talk, think, feel like children. But the world keeps
ever known. And it has all come far too quickly.
reminding us. We are adults now. It’s another
These things tend to do so.
adults now between childhood and the teenage years that ledge to jump from, one we aren’t so ready for,
Twelve is a strange age to reflect on. The ledge
and we might never be ready for, but we have
to jump from nonetheless. I have experienced
you feel entirely ready to leap from. Usually. My
favourite book at age twelve was John Green’s enough change to last me a lifetime but there’s
Paper Towns, a classic for the pre-teens of nothing I can do to stop any more coming my
I’m sitting at my childhood desk, my Advanced Generation Z. Looking at my tattered copy beside way. I realised that some time ago.
Higher English notes sprawled before me, below me, the only line of the many highlighted and It doesn’t make it easier, but it’s all I can tell
the rain leakage in my bedroom roof that my circled in flowering teenage angst that speaks to you, as well as this:
mother has just told me we will have to paint over me in this moment is this: You are leaving a good thing, but more good
when our house is sold in the summer. My last ‘It is so hard to leave – until you leave. And things are coming. Different, but good. Enjoy
lesson today was maths, with Mr Buck, a teacher then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the the moments, and be prepared to let them pass
who has only known us for two months but who, world.’ to make room for new ones. Paint over the rain
I think, has quickly grown to like us. After all, why Obviously, I am not Margo Roth Spiegelman, leakage knowing another little girl will fill your
wouldn’t he? It’s not like teaching children. He’s teenage enigma preparing a mysterious escape shelf with her favourite books, knowing that the
allowed to genuinely like us, and not just tolerate from suburban Orlando, but right now I have to next house you go to will have been somebody
us, because we, like him, are adults now. hope she’s right. If she’s not, then I don’t know else’s too.
This week is my last week of ‘proper’ school, To any pupils reading this who aren’t in the S6
ever. Tomorrow is my last day. After 3.15pm on how I will do this. Leave, I mean. For my life has year group, you will know this feeling soon, in the
contained more change than I know what to do
Friday May 7, 2021, I will never again walk into with, enough change for a lifetime, and somehow blink of an eye. So, with gratitude and love from
a school classroom, take my books and pencil I am still scared, and somehow I still don’t know your vice-captain, please enjoy it, prosper and,
case out of my bag, put on my glasses to see the what to do with it. Change. When it comes. And it in the eternal words of Mike McCabe: ‘Happy
board, greet my teacher, try to squeeze in a quick always comes. Learning!’
story from my weekend to the friend next to me It is inevitable. Unavoidable. It grows us. It
before I am hushed and we begin learning. And I
helps us. We must embrace it. This is the only way. Sofia Macchi Watts (S6)

We are adults now (in an era of remote learning)

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