A Walk Down Memory Lane...

I visited my high school today. Yes, it is true that a mere six months ago I was walking the same halls, vowing to never return. But there were some teachers that I wanted to see, and my swim coach. Truthfully, though, I wanted to go to see how much my life has changed, to get a feel for how different it really is now.

Somehow the entire high school felt the same size as my shoebox dormroom. It smelled worse than I remember it, and it was even uglier than I recall. It was still just so familiar. I kept on expecting to see my classmates, or friends waiting for me at their lockers, but I of course never did. All of the faces were new and unrecognizable, and left me wondering, "was I ever really that little?"

I got to talk to my very favorite high school teacher. I walked into her classroom after the last bell rang, and she looked up and smiled. "How's school?" she asked. I hesitated for a minute, struggling to put how I felt about college into diplomatic terms. "It sucks, doesn't it?" I laughed, and sat down on top of my old desk in the front. And just like I had done every month or so during my senior year, we sat and talked. And, as usual, she gave me enough encouragement to go on for a long, long time.

After a good half hour, she had to go home to feed her horses, and I walked out of her room. Across the hall was one of my best friend's lockers, and I half-expected her to be standing there, exasperated at me for holding her up. I half-expected for us to turn down the hall together to go home, and half-expected us to scrap going home and stop off at Jitters for just a little bit. But she of course wasn't there, being seven time zones away, and I walked down the hall by myself.

I called my voicemail to check my messages, and just a few seconds later a hall moniter yelled at me for having a cell phone in the school. I hung up with an ugly stare and waited for her to turn the corner before redailing and listening to the message all the way through. And I didn't feel sentimental anymore. In fact, I felt pretty happy that I was in college, after all.