Just another piece of the string

So I guess as I leaving school for ever, I feel it is of course cliché and necessary to write a blog about leaving school.

For me, and I suppose just like everyone, school has had its ups and downs. But of course it has because school has been my life for the past twelve years. The majority of my time and energy has been spent on school and learning for over a decade. When I think of my life, all I seem to see is school. Some of the earliest memories that I have are of school and I can say with certainty every memory I have is somehow linked to school; whether it be on the school holidays I did this, or with my school friends I did that. Even if some of the things I have done have not been directly linked to school, school has always been a constant backdrop of my life; always there in the background, sometimes coming forwards and other times being forgotten. But even when it was forgotten, school has always been there.

And now that feeling of school is disappearing. That brick wall that has always been there no matter what is going to be knocked down. As of tomorrow morning at about 10:30am. I have… mixed feelings about this. I have never been one to take comfort or feel security in the fact that I have constant things in my life, such as school. I have always craved changed and hated it when I fall into a pattern of doing something, no matter what it is. And school has been much the same pattern of my life for the past 12 years. So quite frankly, I’m sick of it. I needed change long ago so this suddenly different lifestyle that I will get from leaving school will be met gladly on my behalf.

One thing that everyone feels they must do is look back on their “journey” so to speak. I look back on mine with many different feelings. Yes, I have done some amazing things and I have done some not so great things. But you know what? I do not regret a single thing that I have done. I have mulled over this thought for several days now, trying to come up with something that I regret doing. But nothing presents itself. Sure, if I were to do some things again I wouldn’t do them the same way. And yet I still don’t regret doing them the way I did them. My life has been far from perfect but I have managed to work with what I had. I worked with the situations, with my own limitations, with both mine and other people’s choices and consequences. Perhaps I did not make the very best of what I had, but still, I have just as many good memories and bad memories. And I guess, as I said in my last ever English oral, in the end it really does all comes down to how you wish to view your journey. And me being the person who I am, I will always look more on the things that I enjoyed, rather that the bad things. So even though it has not been easy, I think I shall always look back on school with fond memories.

I want to share with you a feeling that I had the other day at the reflection day. I looked up at the powerpoint and there on the screen were the words: “FAREWELL GRADUATING CLASS OF 2010” and I had a strange feeling. Something inside me let go, stopped holding onto whatever I had been holding onto before. I think that was the moment that I accepted the idea that I was leaving and never coming back, that I would never experience school life again. So for me I have already left behind school and have already moved onto the next part of my life.

I say ‘the next part of my life’ with certain sarcasm I guess. I know that everyone talks about life as being in stages, but in all reality, life is one continuous strand, with a beginning and an end and everything in between. It seems to be human nature to separate life into sections and so based on that feeling, I have often found myself feeling like when I leave those school gates tomorrow, the world will stop for a split second to mark the end of one part and the beginning of another. But I’ve realised that it will not be like that. I will continue on walking out those gates and home and then on to schoolies and then later to university. Life will keep on going until all I have is faded memories of school and what I did there. That is how our life is, and everyone who you see on the street would have once before gone through leaving school. I am not the first person to do it, nor will I be the last. I am just one of the millions who have already done so and still lived on much the same. So in all reality, leaving school is not such a definite ending of something and beginning of another. I find it slightly ironic that everyone who talked tonight spoke about conclusions and openings . Because it is not like that, life is not like that. It keeps going forward, whether you are at school or not. There is always more future to look forward to, more past to look back on, and more present to enjoy.

So enjoy it I did, as I stood waiting at the side of the hall tonight looking over all of the tables. I knew that this night would never come again so I made the most of it. But then, one moment is never like any other. We talk about things being constant and in a regular pattern, but they aren’t really. “Just like the poem, life is also inconsistent and rarely follows a true pattern.”

To finish, I wish to leave you with an excerpt from the poem that I chose to do for my English oral, entitled The Road Goes Ever On and written by JRR Tolkien. I won’t deconstruct it for you so you can take from it what you will. But for me, this poem symbolises a lot of our journey and portrays it in a slightly different way, which really makes all the difference.

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with weary feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.