My grandmother’s and mother’s generation preach to their grandchildren and children that high school will be the best time of their life. Hardly any responsibilities, proms, friends, Friday night football games, etc. They paint this pretty picture that actually makes high school seem pleasant.

Pleasant is not an adjective I would use to describe my high school experience.

High school was, and never will be, the best years of my life. I hated it there. I hated the school system, I hated the town it was in and, for the most part, I didn’t like anyone I went to school with either. I had two solid friends in school, that’s it.

I tolerated everyone else.

It’s not that I was bad because I wasn’t. Straight A’s, high honor roll every quarter, AP courses, National Honors Society, French Honors Society, athlete; I was the epitome of a perfect student. I never skipped school or class, never had a detention and when I got called to the office it was because I left my gym clothes at home and someone dropped them off for me.

But high school was still a literal hell for me.

I was by no means popular. With the exception of the cross-country team, who were more family than friends, I had almost no friends. I said hi to lots of people in the hallway and spoke to people in class, but none of them knew me well. They were acquaintances only because we had class together and once those classes stopped, I never spoke to any of them ever again.

There’s a bunch of people I was “close” to in school that I haven’t said one word to after we graduated.

I got made fun of. I admit I was really dumb my freshman year. But the rumors I heard about myself and the things people were saying about me that weren’t true, were unreal. There were quite a few girls that didn’t like me for absolutely no reason.

There is nothing nastier than a girl that has it out for you.

The small-town atmosphere drove me insane. It’s like a black hole. If you don’t leave after high school, you’re probably never going to leave. There was so much drama in the town itself, it wasn’t just limited to the school.

People really need to stop romanticizing small-town life, it’s not cute, it’s horrible.

The people themselves bothered me. Having no friends was half not my choice and half my conscious decision. Welcome to Lock Haven where you can be a hick one day and a drug dealer the next. I have been graduated for three years now and I still see people I went to school with trying to fight each other.

WE ARE ADULTS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING.

The school itself was just horrible. Scheduling, the administration, how they ran the athletic programs, everything was a mess. Since graduating I've seen them let go of the teachers they should have kept. Cut budgets where they should be expanded. Give money to the programs that don't need them.

My senior year they decided our indoor track team was no longer an athletic team or a club. We didn't exist.

Granted, a lot of the hate I feel for high school came from a stressed home life. Those two things are obviously not related, but since it happened while I was in school I associate the two.

After I graduated and left for college, that was it. I never went back. I go sometimes to see my mom and my best friends’ family, but other than that I avoid that area like it’s the plague. I want nothing to do with running into someone I went to school with at Walmart or Sheetz.

I would never want to go back to high school. They were NOT the greatest years of my life by any means. Going to college far away from home where I am literally just a number has treated me well. I am almost a fully functioning adult, but that school can’t take credit for any of that except giving me my diploma.

I will more than likely never speak to anyone I graduated with ever again. I will never go back to that high school. And I am 100 percent OK with that.