Trying to Remain Positive Through All the Disappointments

It’s fair to say that I’m jealous; jealous that I don’t get to make the memories that all the high school seniors before me have talked about. Our sports seasons have been cut short, our senior trips taken away, proms canceled, and graduations ended. As a senior at WWP High School North, I can relate with many of my classmates as we mourn the loss of our senior year.

We’re not stupid. We know why we are being quarantined, we know the benefits of social distancing, and we actively follow the guidelines that medical experts are asking of us. 

We know a lot more than what many adults are willing to give us credit for, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t sad and disappointed that our senior year has been cut short. 

I hate when people choose to dismiss our feelings, because I recognize that our senior year being canceled isn’t the end of the world, that there are people whose safety we have to keep in mind. But in that moment, I could only think of what we had given up to be where we are today. Granted, to others our sacrifices may seem menial, but to me they meant a lot. 

I go to a school where academic excellence is par for the course, where doing multiple extracurricular activities and sports are normal.

I struggled through AP courses, sports competitions, SAT tests, conferences, college applications and more. My friends and I were promised that sacrificing our sleep, mental health, and social lives would be worth it, because once we got into a good college, then we would be set. 

We were promised that this year would be the best semester yet, all we had to do was put our heads down and work hard for every year leading up to it to earn that special reward of being a senior. 

There were so many milestones that we never got to celebrate with each other and so many events which we never thought would be our last.

 I’ll never compete at another golf tournament, a Model Congress Conference, or a robotics competition. I’ll never attend my senior banquet, slow dance at prom, or walk the stage at graduation.

The more I spoke to the people around me, the more I realized that I wasn’t alone in the way I felt. We all were bound by this shared loss of our senior year, a general fear about the global pandemic we are facing, and the uncertainty of what is to come. 

Conversations were no longer, “what did you do today?,” because the answer was almost exactly what they did the day before that. Instead, we began to ask each other “how are you doing?”

I’ve gotten to know people in ways that I never expected, because we were united under the same emotions and understood what one another was going through. We were able to understand each other in ways that adults and other students are not able to, and I’ve seen a tremendous amount of support coming from each student for their peers as we try to navigate these uncertain times together. 

Amid all these things I won’t be able to do again, it’s easy to only mourn the losses of my senior year. After the initial shock, I accepted that I now have the opportunity to make the most of this situation we are in. I haven’t stopped making memories with my friends and supporting them through both good times and bad. Through technology, we all stay connected to celebrate, support, and encourage one another as we continue to pass many new milestones.

From car parades down my street to celebrate my 18th birthday, to photo collages on Instagram, hours long group calls, and a plethora of Zoom game nights, my friends have been there for me for some of the biggest moments in my life over the past few weeks. 

The physical isolation that we are under is no reason to socially isolate ourselves from one another. It actually brought me closer to many people in my life, showing me who cared enough to reach out and who all were willing to be there through tough conversations. 

Although I undoubtedly have missed some of the most iconic milestones of my senior year, my friends and I have tried to make our own special events and remind ourselves to stay positive and help one another as we begin to look towards the future.

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Anjali Dhayagude is a senior at West Windsor Plainsboro High School North in Plainsboro, New Jersey. She will be attending Purdue University this fall.