Here you are

So, here you are in the last few weeks of high school.

I’ll bet sometimes you thought you’d never make it. There were a lot of reasons. Academic success has never really been a big priority in your family. No one was getting you up in the morning except you. You were the one making your breakfast, if you had it, and sometimes you were also making sure that other people in your family had breakfast too.

The same goes for lunch – so, imagine that, at a time when it is clear that good food and a proper diet makes it easier to learn, you didn’t always have regular meals, let alone healthy ones. Maybe your school doesn’t even have a cafeteria, so the possibility of joining a kitchen team and having lunch every day wasn’t an option.

You had a feeling that you could succeed though – and it turned out that you could learn, some things came easier and some were much more challenging (or even seemed alien in a way – it was probably strange to watch some other fellow students pick those subjects up more easily than you). You may at times have found yourself asking for help, often from other students, and maybe you helped them out too, in the subjects that you found easier to absorb.

People always complain about the legendarily bad teachers, but there have been a few really incredible teachers too. You might feel a little like they changed you – you know you’re different because extracting them from your life just leaves a totally different landscape – and I assure you that appreciation won’t go away – in fact it will most likely deepen. You will remember them again in other times where the things they taught you come to the surface and you think about what it was like learning from them (how they believed in you, or how they were a little more strict (but did that because they were determined to help you to truly LEARN), or how they gave you bonus credits for extra work... or any other number of reasons).

You are an unlikely statistic and success story, but as lonely as that has felt at times, you aren’t alone. There are other people out there like you, possibly reading this column right now; who went down that road too. Maybe they didn’t have parents around. Maybe they had other responsibilities, duties, pressures, and even things that no one at school ever knew they went through when the bell at the end of the day rang and everyone ran for their busses or pushed open the big silver doors to walk home, feeling a little freer, your day possibly became more challenging or complicated.

Maybe the people around you at home didn’t necessarily mean to come across as unsupportive. Maybe they just didn’t know how to be there for you (or maybe they flat-out thought school was stupid). Perhaps there were also things going on around you that were sketchy, or worrisome, and maybe over the course of your seventeen-or-so years on the planet you’ve seen quite a lot - the kind of thing you know some of your friends and acquaintances from school might not be able to handle. Here you are though. And now, maybe the world both seems pretty exciting, because you know something you’ve worked towards is looming there in the distance. A different life. A different living space. Different opportunities, different experiences and a different atmosphere. You are right about all of that.

It might feel like the world is a little bigger too.

You are right about that too, but you can make that work for you.

The thing about exceptions to rules, and unlikely statistics, is that there is a built-in kind of resilience. It is now up to you to use that resilience for something.

You may find yourself right now where many people in your family have not – preparing to write (and succeed at) your final exams for high school, preparing to put on a cap and gown and walk across a stage to receive a high school diploma...and maybe there are moments where you sort of don’t feel like going to that ceremony – you might not have many folks who are interested in attending, you might feel strange with the mixture of home and school in the same place at the same time .... but if you can find it within yourself – DO IT. Be celebrated. Receive that piece of paper. Feel proud of yourself. Know that what you have accomplished is outstanding, exceptional, and is a big piece in the future good things in this world. Because those who withstand and rise above circumstances that do not indicate positive results, but yield them, are among the true wonders.

What is to come is perhaps going to be a little challenging at times, because again, unlike many of your peers who have grown up privileged, with supportive families, what you might experience isn’t the fear of failure that hangs about them on a regular basis, but rather, fear of success and what that means in your family and the community you grew up in. It is possible that they don’t know what to do with success, and won’t applaud or praise your accomplishments. It is possible that they’ll even make fun of you for being studious, committed, for doing things that are different from their lifestyle. If you need it though, seek out the applause, seek out the support, ask for help and never give up on yourself. When you struggle, knock on doors (yes multiple doors), make phone calls, do online research to find out where there are people who are not just ready to cheer you on, but motivated and happy to do so. You deserve to keep succeeding.

For now though, even if at times you felt alone, scared, hungry, uncertain, tired, sick of it all, even if you had moments where you really, really felt like giving up, even if what was to come didn’t make sense and you didn’t know why you bothered or where it would lead, YOU HAVE SUCCEEDED, AND THAT IS A BEAUTIFUL THING.

In this moment, with this little column, I hope to lead an ovation of people who are prepared to come forward and recognize people like you. Who are ready to help you to lead us in building the future. You are promising, you are hope, and you are allowed to do all of the awkward and strange things that happen next. You are allowed to make mistakes – just always learn from them and while you can decide to let some things end in your life, never, ever give up on yourself. Getting this far already shows that you were meant for wonderful things, and that you’ve already begun to shape the path that will lead you to more.

It is okay to want this. You have our permission as a greater community, not

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