On Endings

Yesterday was my last official day of school. That's in italics because I've still got to go back after half term for exams, but from this moment on I've technically finished. Forever.

Excuse me whilst I go freak out and say WHAT THE HELL HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?

I've been in the education system since I was four years old (not including nursery) and twelve years later, I'm still not out the other side. I probably have about five years left. But that isn't the point. From now on, I won't be in school--it'll be college, then university, and then a period of what-the-fuck-am-I-doing-with-my-life.

Secondary school has been the longest stage of my life so far. Five years. Nothing has lasted that long, and it won't again at least until I'm out of university. And now that's ending. Ended. I just have half term, two weeks of exams, prom, and results day left. Then it's gone. Poof. Just like that. 

For a long while, I was looking forward to this day, looking forward to the eleven week summer that is now only three weeks and ten exams away. I suppose I still am, but that's not the point.

Over the past weeks, everyone has been bringing in notebooks in addition to the official yearbooks for people to write in. Most messages consist of acquaintances saying good luck at college, or I'm going to miss you, or I hope you get the results you need. But some of the things that my friends have written are darn lovely.

This is when I feel like a twat.

Over the past few months I've been feeling like they've been turning away from me, that I've been drifting from them. But only when I read their heartfelt messages I realised that I was the one who was doing the pushing away, and that I let such good friends slip through my fingers. Most of them are off to different colleges, and it's almost too late. Almost.

Yesterday, I was in this weird trance of feeling nostalgic, relieved and also really sad. I finally, finally, feel happy. I feel like I'm loved, and I look back at all the amazing memories of the past five years and I can't help but smile.

There was that time I went skiing (read: falling over) in Austria and half of the people spent the week throwing up. There was that time we went on a 'science' trip to Thorpe Park (we had a forty minute talk on momentum and spent the rest of the time on the rides) where my friend won a giant toy minion. I went with school to Germany and lived in a strangers house for a week. I've done more exams than I can count. I've cried. I've laughed. I've sounded like a sentimental idiot more than once. This is one of those times.

In our leavers assembly, a boy in my class played this on piano. Now, every time I hear this song I'm going to think of the school I've left behind. It's too soon to decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing yet.

I'm raising an imaginary glass of water (because champagne is just ew) in a toast to the years I haven't lived yet, and the stories that have only just started to unfold. I raise my glass to the friends that I love whether I'll see them again or not, and even to those crappy people who I'll forget in a few years. 

Here's to the future. I hope it's fab. 

Oh god, this sounds cheesy.