By Brian Hughes ’15

The thought that some people have about your four years of high school being some of the best in your life is a questionable one to me. For my sake, at least, I hope it’s not so.

Come graduation, I don’t want to be standing there in a cap and gown with my diploma thinking about how “the best years of my life” are already behind me, and more importantly about how doomed I am for the rest of my life if that was the best part of it. But even with that said, I don’t think I would change a whole lot given the chance to go back and do it all over again.

Dealing with the pressures and obstacles of Sherwood over the past four years has shaped my character to my satisfaction and has taught me a few life lessons. Take for instance all of the bright, colorfully confident students here who just overflow with intelligence and self-proclaimed potential, so much so that they can’t help but share with you all the things they know (especially about themselves). These types of kids can teach you a great deal, like how to restrain impulses you have to give your input and instead sit back and laugh to yourself contently.

And then there are the lucky students out there who have already aligned their futures and realize school doesn’t need to be a part of it, so they do everything they can to divert their priorities from class. I can’t thank these people enough for giving me daily examples of mannerisms to avoid copying myself.

Ultimately, the most important thing I have learned in high school, if anything, is how to roll with the things that I can’t change and know that what lies within the school’s walls is not everything life has to offer. The one thing I will miss, however, is the anticipation felt when I think about what my later years will bring.