You know, there’s a lot of kooky book going on right now. Trump and Steve Bannon are going crazy with the racism stuff, the divide between Greek Life and administration at the College of Wooster is as wide as the Grand Canyon, there’s a new Secretary-General of the UN, and every day we get closer and closer to the cosmic heat-death of the universe. Things are as nuts as like 3 bags of trail mix. Or at least things seem that way. I’ve lived for as long as I can remember, same as you probably, and I’ve noticed that when I look back, I always say to myself “Jesus, man, calm down. Your world isn’t ending, nothing that you are currently caring about will matter in, like, a month.” But that’s the thing. It’s really hard to put current issues in your life into perspective, because you ultimately have no true idea how much your life will be affected by a choice you make, so you have to assume absolutely everything matters. This long, clunky beginning of an article takes me back to about senior year of high school, and the summer following it. Looking at what mattered to me then, I realize that nothing I did from April to August ultimately affected any part of my life right now, save for some AP test scores, and I just want to relive that time right now.

I sucked at school back then. I don’t know exactly why, but I just sucked super hard at academics during that time. I think I would stay up until 3 AM every night back then just trying to go over worksheet after worksheet, packet after packet. At that moment, school was the most stressful obstacle I ever attempted to overcome. But looking at it right now, whatever I got on my final report card, which I can’t even remember now, really didn’t matter. I was already accepted to Wooster, and I gave them that deposit. That is a binding $50, so if they tried to get rid of me, I would have sued. I would have lost disastrously, but you get about 30% of the idea.

I think my prom was literally the most fun I’ve ever had wearing silver clothing. My friends were there, I had just gotten suspended for sending a controversial tweet, and school was over. But the best part about that night was the date I took. I didn’t think I would have even found a date, considering I went to an all-boys school, I couldn’t drive, I played Magic: The Gathering, I had the small talk skills of a grape, my best friends were 6 ultra-nerds… you get the idea, I was screwed. But lucky me, my ultra-nerd friends pulled through, and I found an awesome girl to go with. Now, in the short term, this was great, because I didn’t have to go with my cousin or something. But long term, this was disastrous. See, I have never ever been in a relationship before, and I didn’t, and still don’t, really know how to enter one. But man, did my 18-year-old self like this girl. Long story short, I went to her graduation party, gathered up all the courage I had in my body, and pathetically stammered out to this girl if we could be more than friends. She said no. And at first I understood, but that summer, I was as crushed as an origami crane sat on by a yokozuna. I was destroyed, a wreck for that whole summer. But man, when I think back to that time, I cringe. I cringe so hard, I crange. I have to make up a word for the amount of cringing I do. I worried so much, because that was literally the first girl I had had meaningful conversation with in about 4 years of an all-boys high school. Now sure, I still am a bad conversationalist, but I don’t talk to a girl here on Wooster and think to myself “Man, that’s the one. She’s the one.” But the me of yesteryear would. Now, I don’t even talk to that girl. And she was cool and all, but there are people here that are into the UN and stuff I super like. So I’ve had some amazing interactions with people here who talk about the stuff I’m passionate about, and it’s the greatest thing ever.

Now, I don’t want to poop all over my senior year self, but I think about that time of my life all the time to remember that even though I might be going through a rough patch, it’s not the absolute end of the world. Now, to bring it back to the top of the article, that’s not to say you should just assume nothing is going to matter. You should always work your hardest to make life good for yourself and others. But if you think like I thought back then, your mind goes to some bad places, and that doesn’t help you at all. So work like what you do will matter, but don’t go insane over it.