Expired chocolate. Un-serious final assembly that involved a teacher faking a pretty realistic fall on stage. A badge that says “Cheryl’s free to fly!!” with a pixellated eagle. A paper bag with my name on it. Derros that spray-paint the generic “eff you” on school walls in the dead of the night. Yawn. That’s NMHS for you.
Honest, random thoughts start here. Welcome to the Wacky World of the Cheryl Brain.
I truly hate this time of the year; the end, the final, the curtain call. Especially this year. Everyone’s high on emotions, mice scrambling to savour the very last morsels of a year they took for granted, a year they all swallowed without chewing until they realise that it’s nearly gone. The year we dreaded, the year we hated, the year we feared, the year we abhorred with all our overtired hearts, it ran past like Michael Johnson on speed and then we realise how much we’ll miss the way it always had us in a chokehold(maybe not). Prancing around the supermarket in my ill-fitting, messy school uniform and beat-up man shoes I’ve worn throughout my NMHS life, I came to a halt when I spotted a whole row of sparkly, tinsel-y, red and green and gold and silver stuff that screamed MERRY CHRISTMAS WE SWEAR SANTA ISN’T A PEDOPHILE! Since when?? Where did last Christmas and the torturous plane ride back to my island in the sun go? Where did Cheryl of last Christmas go? I swear, I am so unfit I can’t even keep up with Time without losing my breath every 10 minutes and feeling the consequences of physical dormancy bite into my muscles.
I hate how people say they wish they’d gotten to know this person and this person better and if they could live through Year 12 again they’d be great friends to everyone. Is there any point in saying that? We’re always going to take something for granted, we’ll always think that we have all the time in the world until we find out that our depth perceptions are warped and that 10 months really felt like 5 hours. Yeah um, I’m one of those people. Sentimental to the point where I stare at myself in the mirror and projectile vomit.
I hate that I’m joining the crowd and mourning about my non-loss. Shut up Cheryl.
“Never underestimate the seeds you have sown in this school.”
Thank you, Seth.
I guess most things, edible or not, have an expiry date and we just…enjoy them while we can. And not try to down them once they’re dead and gone. That expired Toblerone bar made me feel funny, never good to live in the past is it.
