Seniors of Carbon County School District No. 2, you are about to officially take your first step into the “the real world.”
I would make a reference to a popular reality television show which used to be on MTV, but I’m not sure if you’d get that reference. Nor am I sure I want to age myself, though I’m going to be doing that now. I, along with 35 other members of Saratoga’s class of 2005, sat through my own graduation ceremony 19 years ago.
At 36 students, we were one of the largest classes to graduate around that time. We were also one of the last classes to graduate from Saratoga High School before it became Saratoga Middle High School. Our class could be a bit of a logistics nightmare since it’s very difficult to fit 36 students into one classroom though the student counselor at the time certainly gave it her best effort.
As a teenager, I was not terribly motivated, I had no idea what the world would hold for me nor did I know what I wanted out of life. I had applied to only one college, Central Wyoming College (CWC) in Riverton, and had primarily applied there as it was the same college my father had attended. The only scholarship I applied for was through CWC itself, but that was revoked following my first semester due to failing grades.
I didn’t take the SAT or the PSAT, either. I did, however, take the ACT and the ASVAB. My score of 24 in the ACTs didn’t open too many doors for me. My results from the ASVAB test, however, led to countless calls from the United States Marine Corps. I had no intention of enlisting, which I politely told each recruiter over the phone, as my goal was to become either a well-known published author or an English teacher. I wasn’t terribly motivated towards either of those goals, either.
Yet, despite my utter lack of motivation, I remember having high aspirations for myself. I was convinced I would not only become a bestselling author by 2015, but that I would leave Wyoming behind only to return for my 10 year class reunion as a mild celebrity. That didn’t happen. I never finished college, a fact which seems to surprise some people, and still only have just one year under my belt. I could try and place blame elsewhere for why I never completed college, but the truth is that I had neither the drive nor the focus to finish college.
For many years, I let life happen to me. After my single year of college, I moved to Missoula, Montana and worked at a bookstore and arcade. While there, I found myself standing in a foodline at a homeless shelter and going to the local food bank. Despite working two part-time jobs, I could barely afford to get groceries at WalMart. One might think this would have worked as a motivator for me to figure out what I wanted to do with my life.
That, however, wasn’t the case. From Montana, I moved to California for a few months and then moved back to Wyoming. Three years after I graduated and swore I’d leave Saratoga in my rearview mirror, it filled my windshield. I would occasionally think about returning to college, but never went beyond thinking about it since I didn’t have any concrete plans on what I wanted to study.
These thoughts often came to me while I was working at Valley Foods when former classmates would come into the store to shop while home on holiday. They would often ask how I was doing or what I was doing and that green apron would feel like a weight around my neck. I was working at the same grocery store I had been working at in high school and had no plans for my future.
This is a dangerous way to live. A life, like a city or a house, must be planned. Maybe not down to every minute detail, but an outline of where you want to go and what you want to do certainly doesn’t hurt. If you don’t have a plan, you don’t really have an anchor and you will often find yourself adrift without a safe harbor in sight. When that happens, things can seem scarier than usual. You thought yourself to be a tree with mighty roots, but now find yourself to just be flotsam carried away by the storm.
Take a breath.
Take another one.
Life is not static and the plan you have for your life may not always go in the direction you were hoping. Even if you get turned around, however, you still have the map, and a compass, to get you going where you need to be. Your map maybe didn’t account for the hills and gullies or the peaks and valleys, but they are a minor detour at best. At their worst, you are taken down a new and interesting path.
Wherever you end up, however you end up there, make sure that you have learned something along the way. Also, make sure that you arrived at your destination because you chose to, not because it was chosen for you. Remember to not just exist, but to live.
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