I’m Supposed to Be Excited for In-Person Senior Year. I’m Not.
I’m sitting cross-legged on my bed right now, folding the overpriced senior spirit hoodie my mom made me order last month. It’s got the school’s eagle logo stretched across the chest, and the cuffs are already a little too tight around my wrists. Mochi, my cat, is curled up on the pile of jeans I pulled out to pack for my locker, purring so loud I can hear her over the podcast I put on in the background. School starts in seven days. Everyone I’ve talked to lately—my parents, my aunt, the lady at the grocery store who asked what I’m doing this fall—acts like I should be bouncing off the walls. Finally, back to normal, finally the best year of high school, right? I just smile and nod. I haven’t told anyone I still lie awake at night trying to think of excuses to opt back into full-time online.
It’s not like I never went to in-person school before. I did all of freshman and sophomore year in the building. I know what it’s like. I just got used to the other thing, I guess. The thing where I wake up eight minutes before first period, roll out of bed, brush my teeth, and log onto Zoom in my pajama pants. If the lecture is dragging, I can slip into the kitchen to pour another bowl of cereal, or water my succulents, or give Mochi extra treats. No one side-eyes you for getting up mid-class. No one judges you for eating lunch alone at your own kitchen table. When I have a free period, I can lay on the couch and watch dumb TikTok compilations instead of loitering by the water fountain pretending I’m waiting for someone so no one knows I don’t have anyone to hang out with. That’s the part no one talks about, right? How much less awkward being alone is when no one can see you’re alone.
We had that mandatory senior orientation last month, just to get schedules and walk around the building. I went, just to get it over with, and I already forgot how crowded the hallways are between periods. Everyone’s shoving past each other, yelling to friends across the hall, backpacks slamming into your ribs. I was holding an iced coffee I got on the way, and some guy from the soccer team turned around too fast and slammed right into my arm. The whole thing spilled all down the front of my new white jeans. I just stood there, sticky coffee dripping into my shoes, and no one stopped. Not even the teacher walking by. Finally, I saw Lila, who I used to sit with at lunch sophomore year, and she saw me and waved, but she was with her new friends and didn’t come over. I just ran to the bathroom and spent the rest of orientation hiding in a stall until my mom came to pick me up.
After I cleaned up the coffee, I still had to go get my senior ID photo taken. I forgot how that goes—you stand against the scratchy blue backdrop, the lady behind the camera yells at you to smile bigger, the flash is so bright it spots your vision for a minute after. When she showed me the preview, my eyes were all red from the cold wind outside, and I had a weird double chin from smiling too forced. I asked if I could retake it, and she sighed and said we don’t have time, it’s just an ID, no one looks at it anyway. Which made me feel worse, because everyone keeps their senior ID as a little memento, right? Now mine’s gonna be bad forever. Stupid, I know, but it stuck with me. That night I cried a little in the car on the way home, not because of the jeans or the bad photo, just because it felt like… I forgot how to do this. I forgot how to be around that many people all at once, all the time.
Most of the people I used to be close with aren’t even doing full in-person. One of my best friends switched to online for senior year so she can finish her early college classes. The other two fell off over the past year, like people do when you don’t see each other every day. We don’t text anymore. We don’t make plans. It wasn’t even a fight, just… nothing. One day we stopped talking, that’s it. So if I go in, I have to figure out where to sit at lunch. I’ve been replaying that scenario in my head for weeks: I walk into the cafeteria with my tray, I scan all the tables, and all the spots are taken, and I have to stand there holding my tray while everyone looks at me, and I have to go sit at the empty table by the vending machine alone. Is that stupid? Probably. But it’s what I think about when I can’t sleep.
My dad said to me last week at dinner, “You only get one senior year. You’re gonna regret it if you hide out here at home the whole time.” I know he means well. But what if I regret it more if I go and I’m miserable and lonely for nine months? What if all the stuff everyone talks about—prom, homecoming, spirit week, senior pranks—isn’t even fun for me? I went to a football game last spring when they let people come back, and I stood in the cold for two hours, my feet hurt, I didn’t know anyone to sit with, and I left at halftime and got ice cream alone in the car and that was way more fun than the game would’ve been. Why is that such a bad thing?
Wait, Mochi just knocked over my water bottle. Give me a second. Okay, it’s just spilled on my notebook, no big deal. Anyway.
The thing is, I can’t just opt out. All the classes I need for my college apps—AP Bio, government—they’re only offered in person this year. The district cut most of the full online program back, so if I want to graduate on time, I have to go. I already signed the forms. My mom already put a deposit down for the senior trip to Disneyland. I can’t back out now, not without messing up a whole bunch of stuff. So I’m going. I just don’t have to be excited about it.
I still have seven days. I’m gonna keep folding my clothes, I’m gonna keep checking my schedule a million times a day, I’m gonna pet Mochi a lot and eat too much ice cream after dinner. I might still try to talk to my counselor on the first day to see if I can switch at least one period to online. I don’t know what’s gonna happen. Maybe I’ll walk in on the first day and someone will save me a seat at lunch, and we’ll do stupid senior stuff and it’ll be fine. Maybe I’ll hate every minute of it, and I’ll count down the days until graduation. Either way, right now, I’m allowed to be hesitant. I don’t have to fake excitement for the “best year of my life” just because everyone says I should. I’m just… taking it one folded hoodie at a time.
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