Thoughts on High School

     High school is a crazy place. Everywhere you turn, there are bullies demanding lunch money, blonde cheerleaders with pompoms, and angry wrestlers duking it out in the hallways. Nerds run every which way, avoiding the scathing glares of the "in crowd" and druggies stand in corners, waiting for the teachers to leave so they can start smoking. Large football players argue loudly about last night's game while skater boys tromp around in their clunky shoes and baggy sweatshirts. 
     But really. How much of this is true? How much of this is just urban legend, made up by the classes before us and publicized by the media? Honestly, quite a bit:

Top 7 Biggest Lies of High School

• You'll use this when you get older: Every kid who has ever attended high/middle school in the United States has heard this one. And truthfully, they're lying. Unless you want to become a mathematician, you probably aren't ever going to factor trinomials again.
• Being in the band is extremely uncool: Biggest. Lie. Ever. I mean, yes, we band geeks are very geeky, but we're geeky in a fun, lovable way. If you seriously doubt this, I suggest spending some time with us-- maybe sitting in on a practice or attending a marching show? 
• Everyone goes to parties on the weekends and gets drunk: Well, yes, some kids do go and get drunk. But most of us? Yeah right. On Saturday nights, you can find me at home with a good book or having a mini-movie-party with a couple of friends. 
• Cheerleaders rule the school: Big, definite no on this one. They may be considered the coolest in their own social circles, but they don't usually take charge of the entire school and terrify the underclassmen.
• Lunch money= bully magnet: For the record, I have never witnessed anyone being shoved up against some lockers by a thug and having their lunch money stolen.
• Homework rules you life: In middle school, the teachers were constantly telling us that the homework level in high school would be insane, and we'd have to start forming gook working habits so that we would be ready to fulfill all of the learning requirements we were presented with in high school. In reality, going from middle school to high school is only slightly harder than going from 7th to 8th grade.
• You'll never fit in: For the most part, this isn't true. Yes, there are some kids who really don't fit in anywhere. However, almost everyone finds a group to hang out with-- the band geeks make friends with the choir kids and the theatre people, the math nerds and computer dorks chill together, and even the weird kids form their own cliques. 

Remember-- many of the things they say about high school aren't true, and for the most part, it's a pretty great place.

Thanks for listening,

Maggs