Who you were at school doesn't matter

Growing up, school had always been a great part of our lives. A daily routine. It takes up 12 whole years of it, too, at least.

For some reason, though, it feels as if the social status we used to posses in our school years, will always, somehow, define us for the rest of our lives. Thinking about it, school had always been a terrible cliché case, right? Like in these romantic comedies about a dorky kid falling in love with the class president or prom queen. Almost as if we’re separated in groups since day one.

The popular girls clique, the athletes, the geeks and the nerds, the bitches, the stoners, the sluts, the virgins, the artists,or that weird crowd of kids sitting on the narrowest spot of the hallway, whose names you don’t even know. Everyone eventually finds their place in one of these groups, hoping to finally fit in. But what we tend to forget is that people are so much more than items, you can’t just stack them in a category thinking that it’s the right one for them, or that the place you’ve sorted them into is who they actually are.
What we completely fore pass, though, is that it is nearly impossible to only be one of these things. I can promise you, I have found myself in all of these “groups”, but I never managed to fully identify with any of them.

And the reason I was never even remotely able to find myself in these groups,was because there were pieces of me in each and everyone of them. I have been the popular girl, the geek, I have been the virgin and the slut. I have been the class president, as well as the kid standing in the hallway waiting to be noticed, overwhelmed by sadness and overflowing emotion. Well, I was also the fat kid, once, but that was a really long ago, and I don’t think that it’s a particular group. Just thought it’d worth a mention.

And I guarantee that every time I tried to fit in, in any of them, all I would receive would be nothing but complete disappointment. Well, I do have to admit that there is only one clique that had always thrilled me, and of course, it was the artists. I mean, obviously. Maybe it was the one in which I found my crowd, after all, or the one I could find more and more pieces of myself. I guess mainly because, in this loneliness us people find ourselves into so frequently, all we truly need is the handhold of someone who understands. Someone who shares our pain.

And I won’t argue anyone on this, it’s certainly good to be around people who share something with you. After all, you can’t find common ground when you and someone else are polar opposites. Just imagine Mia Wallace, let’s say, hanging out with Barney. Unlikely, right?

But that’s a completely different story.

I think that most of us can’t even see what’s wrong with that system we have created for ourselves. Being okay with being put into groups, labelled as cool or someone better to be avoided, and living by that label for the rest of your life. Do you have any idea how sickening that can get?

Lets start off by supposedly saying that you are the cool kid, the one everyone wants to hang around, the popular one, the pretty one, even the smart one. You think you got it all figured out don’t you? You think that life will always be good to you, that no matter where you go, who you meet, this status will always stick around, right? Well I can assure you it won’t. Once you get to the real world, you know, the one school is supposed to prepare you for but usually fails, you eventually find out it is not a wish-granting factory, for your use only, and that nothing is given to you freely anymore. There’s undoubtedly, always, going to be someone prettier, more talented, smarter, and generally better than you. You will have to tear yourself up to reach the top again, and this time with your true worth. And it’s going to be extremely hard to accept that you have nothing special anymore, except than this beautiful reminisce of what you thought you used to be. And then, it will strike you. You have been empty inside all along. So please, be someone, not for everybody else, but for yourself. While you still got time.

Now, if you belong in the more stigmatised, or less lucky groups,my darling, please, I hope you remember that this won’t last forever, either. You had been created for so much greater things than the mean and negligent names they had created for you. You are someone and you are loved. I really can assure you, you will even forget about it at a certain day and age.

In the end, all I can say is that, in my opinion, it really doesn’t matter. And it doesn’t even matter even if you’re experiencing this mess right here and now. Fuck what they want you to be. Be who you are, and if you still don’t know, that’s okay too.

Be the dork, be the weirdo,the fashion icon, the prom queen, the slut that dresses like the Virgin Mary to go play basketball after 5th period, and be the spelling contest champion, all at once. At the end of the day, it all comes down to what makes you happy. And trust me, once you stop labelling, and start living, life in general gets so much more fun.

After all, school is indeed a microscopic version of the world that awaits you. So do everyone and yourself a favour and at least try to get something good out of it. Whether you believe it or not, you will find yourself feeling as if you’ve gone back to school once in a while.

But this time there will be no recess.