Editor's Letter

Ah, yes. It’s the fresh new start of a year and I, uhm … want it to end already haha. Woah, sounds depressing. I’m just joking… maybe. Where do I start? No, I’m not hating 2019… I’m just… looking forward to 2020.

Disclaimer: this might sound dramatic, but I feel very stuck-inroutine and in a very lame, gray space in life because of school.

See, I, like many others, have been in schooling for 12 years now and I just feel ready for a change and ready to leave, you know? I get it, we all have to go through it and I should just push through it. You’re a few months away from the end of your school career. You’ll miss it so much once you leave. I know, I know, but allow me my emotions!

Don’t get me wrong, I do not hate school, I have subjects I thoroughly enjoy (like Maths…unpopular opinion) and school has given me the opportunity to meet some real gems of humans. I have been able to accomplish so much with it and I have learned so, so much, but it’s been very much the same. Crazy hard work throughout the term, the end of it draws near and then it’s crazy hard studying for the big tests. Now rinse and repeat.

I guess some of it is my fault (I’m admitting it, Mommy and Dadda) because I am a low-key perfectionist. Carefree when creative, but when it comes to handing in tasks or doing things for marks… it has to be basically flawless or I won’t hand in at all. Throughout my schooling career, I have tried to take part in a LOT of things and keep my academics at a high standard too. I did so much for exposure to different things to enrich myself as a human being, but I also wanted that resumé to look…magnificent.

Now what this resulted in, Dear Readers, was an insanely busy-allthe-time, stressed human doing too much after school, balancing homework, social life, good grades, sleep, career decisions - the

whole lot while still trying to remain sane. As you can guess, this very nearly ended in me reaching a burnout in grade 11, near the end of the year (a.k.a. worst time period of my school life to say the least) where I was feeling so unprepared, stressed and ill-equipped for the future when in reality I was simply thinking too far ahead. Thankfully, I didn’t reach a complete burnout, like many unfortunately have to go through, to have an epiphany.

After quitting some activities, caring less about the unnecessary and saying no to things that don’t really benefit me or bring me joy, I find myself much happier. Through realising that in the future I will not see the people I see daily or experience what I currently so often do, I have come to appreciate schooling a little bit more. I am privileged to be able to go to school and be taught by amazing teachers. I am not frolicking into each lesson, beaming with joy, taking out my pen enthusiastically and writing my notes with a huge, goofy grin on my face. I don’t think anyone can accomplish that daily, but I am not wishing the year away anymore.

I don’t have much more time on my hands. It’s a new grade, so it goes without saying that there is more to do, but I am surviving. Am I still looking forward to 2020? YES in Caps Lock because I am planning to do a 5-6 month course I have been wanting to do for so long and a trip to France… France! I’ve been dreaming about this for years, so yes, this makes very excited for 2020, but I’m enjoying the time I have between now and then. I am saving and working for the future…2020 and beyond and I’m so excited for it.

So, though it may feel like you are learning things you’ll never use, (which is very likely to be true) and you might also want your school career to end, let me be cliché and tell you to push through and try to enjoy it. Time is never given back to you and like the other chapters in your life that you miss, school will be one.

I am missing parts of last year even though it was tough. I am still too inexperienced to be giving much advice, but if there’s one thing I can preach it is: don’t conform. You’ll lose time trying to fit in and you can burn yourself out for that magnificent resumé everybody wants to have. Hard work does pay off, but academics don’t define you. I’m preaching to myself too.

I hope term two treats you well and, for the both of us, I hope those June question papers are lovely.