So, it’s a few weeks later, and I’ve been busier than I expected. Marching band rehearsal for two and a half hours a day for three days a week, and something planned almost every Saturday. (Last weekend, we played at a St. Louis Cardinal baseball game—the mascot even borrowed my flute and pretended to play it!) I have a feeling that sooner or later yearbook will start taking up more than a class period, and student council elections will be held at the end of next week. Come to think of it, there’s an FCCLA (Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America) meeting tomorrow morning. Plus, two cousins of mine have transferred to Crittenden, and I’ve been trying to make them feel at home on top of everything else.

It’ll be some time before I become used to regular classes. The first two periods, calculus and advanced Spanish, are actually independent study, and it feels strange to go to a class and immediately start working for the rest of the period. Sixth and seventh periods are based on extracurricular activities, and it’s a new experience for me. A few things have also changed in my schedule since previous years, like lunch with nothing but juniors and other seniors (last year, the shifts were divided so I had the lunch with seventh graders) and fourth period as basically study time. Fourth period is somewhat nice because the entire class of ’08, a whopping one hundred or so students, was randomly divided into four. I haven’t seen some of the students since eighth grade when classes were chosen for us.

My advanced biology class in particular has been strange because of its size, almost thirty students. I’ve been in “large” classes before, but I believe thirty is unprecedented in a college credit class. Advanced English, when considered with first and second period, has caused me to consider switching to being a student aide or to a comparably easy class like multimedia. I could still earn Kentucky’s highest diploma, the Commonwealth Diploma, but I would lose a chance at three hours of college credit for only the cost of a test. This is the last week for schedule changes, so I’ll have to decide sooner rather than later.

It’s still early in the school year, but maybe I should be thinking about college more. Just the other day, a school survey asked if students had asked teachers for recommendations yet, a thought that hadn’t even crossed my mind. And a few friends have already asked me about helping them better their ACT scores. Maybe I should be doing more to prepare for actual deadlines, not just a indefinite thought of “this will help me in the future. . . .”

People often say high school is the best time of their lives, although admittedly they are usually the ones that didn’t do well after. I’ve spent the majority of my high school life preparing for college, and I suppose this year I’m trying to focus more on the present than the future. Time will tell if that’s the right decision.