By Giuseppe Palmer, Staff Writer
In all my four years of high school, little has stayed consistent except for the close circle of friends who I’ve shared all of school with.
Back in middle school, I became really close with this group of guys. We all met through mutual friends throughout the course of our time at Everett, and eventually became a group in 8th grade. We claimed our spot on the yard for lunch and were there every single day; eating, playing basketball, and messing around.
But when high school admissions came out in 8th grade, we found that we were mostly going to different schools. We all assumed that it would be the end of our friendship, and I was okay with that because I figured I’d just make friends and move on.
But I was wrong. Even though I was at Lincoln and most of them were at Galileo, we continued to hang out on the weekends all throughout freshman year. We became closer than ever. And when COVID hit, even though it stopped us from hanging out in person, we talked every day on PlayStation and over the phone. And when restrictions loosened, we began to ride our bikes all around the city almost every day.
Eventually I began to feel like I had no place at Lincoln and I wasn’t happy there, so I made the decision to transfer to Galileo to join them. After initially failing to be accepted to Galileo, I applied again and came to my new school on the third day of junior year.
I’ve been able to see this group every day now since transferring, and it’s been amazing to spend time with them. Being able to see each other every day at lunch, in class, and around the school has helped us to continue to grow closer. I had missed that during the time we weren’t at school together, so coming to Galileo felt good to be back together.
And this year has been so much fun now that we’re seniors, because we’ve been able to go easy on schoolwork and focus more on just enjoying the time we have left. Classwork doesn’t matter as much anymore, as we’ve all been accepted to colleges, so we’ve been able to spend more free time hanging out and doing fun things more than we have been able to in the past.
We’ve been able to do stuff after school when in the past we would have had to do homework, and our weekends have been more freed up since we have less to worry about in school. And even though that tends to consist of just sitting around talking and doing nothing, it’s still fun.
It’ll be hard to separate again when we graduate, but a few of us are going to colleges that are close together and hopefully we’ll be able to stay in touch once we’re all gone.
We’ve been together for such a long time and through so much, I know that this group is the thing I’ll remember the most when I look back on my high school days.
