LEHS Senior Perspective 2022
I have visited many schools during my fourteen-year journey, and it is my friends and teachers that I must thank for helping me understand the meaning of success. Those who cared to watch me grow were able to give words of encouragement from the heart and not just from muscle memory. With their kind support, I pushed my way to the top of what I thought was the entire world, hoping to make them proud. Though my life has barely begun, I believe I have already succeeded!
From my earliest memories of my childhood, I remember adoring being able to learn new things. It was empowering knowing that I was expanding my academic abilities just by listening and observing. As it turns out, I was learning at a much faster pace than the rest of my kindergarten class. I remember the first book I was able to read by myself — Bonnie’s Blue House by Kelly Asbury. It is a small children’s book, so it wasn’t much. But my teacher was so astounded by my quickly gained reading skills that she marched me up to the principal’s office where I reread the entire book twice and got a frosty certificate for Wendy’s! After that, she discovered I was also pretty good at math. So, during our class activity time, I would voluntarily sit at her desk doing third-grade math problems. I was more than happy to skip out on coloring and cutting up paper to study more. My reward was simple: a sticker for a job well done and a feeling of great satisfaction.
However, it wasn’t until second grade that I moved to the Liberty-Eylau community. Since I was still young, it was easy to make new friends, and that was a major focus for me as well. I guess you could say by then I was in a bit of an academically rebellious phase. Instead, I wanted to focus on adventure and travel.
In the fourth grade, I made a friend who ended up being my best friend for eight years, and Malia and I are still the best of friends today! Our biggest common interest back then was our odd obsession with planning our entire lives after high school. Our teacher, Mrs. Lavender, had once told us a story about her time attending Baylor University and how she thoroughly enjoyed the college experience. That was enough to send me and Malia into a deep hole of researching colleges, cities we wanted to live in and jobs to look forward to. Over the years, we contacted at least a dozen colleges, including the University of California at Los Angeles and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Of course, we only received informational pamphlets back, but we were ecstatic!
The beginning of high school got off to a bit of a rough start. Although my elementary years went by smoothly and I never struggled to learn, middle school knocked me down and chewed me up… a lot. So, I was not very confident in continuing my path in school. Inevitably, I was what many gifted students call “burned out.” I had no motivation to continue learning material I was not convinced would be important for my future. But, again, my best friend was there to remind me of the previous years we spent planning and researching everything together. She helped me remember why we wanted to learn in the first place. It isn’t about the rewards or the acknowledgments. It is about the feeling of satisfaction we get from succeeding—not just reaching the cookie-cutter version of success, but our own genuine success—happiness.
Finally, I stopped being lazy and got to work once again. Everything paid off, and I was completely surprised by the fact that I was ranked first in my class by the end of freshman year. I was first my sophomore year, and then first during my junior year. Senior year came around quickly, and I continued to be ranked first in my class. I was not alone either. My best friend was also working hard enough to make it into the top five, and I could not have been more proud of her.
Despite our best efforts to plan out our lives, I was still undecided about some major decisions. What did I want to do next? Attending college was a no-brainer, but what would I study? If I am being completely honest, the answer I came up with wasn’t exactly formed for any particular reason. I like the idea of helping others, but being a doctor involves more than my stomach can handle, but why not go with the second defense line of medicine? So, I am ecstatic that I will attend Baylor University in the fall on a pre-pharmacy track that will set me up for pharmacy school, and ultimately, I plan on becoming a pediatric pharmacist!
