People say time flies when you’re having fun. In certain cases, I think time just flies.

When I went to my high school the other day to run at the track, I could see the tent before I even drove through the entrance. I always thought it was so pretty and classy, the graduation tent. Big, circus-like but not in a bad way. It was a production. It was important and it was on location - a bonus.

It was something I saw every year and couldn’t wait for my turn to sit under it.

How was that a year ago already?

I remember moving up from eighth grade like it was yesterday. My teachers chose me to be the female “MC” for the ceremony out of all the girls in my grade. Some could say that’s where my interest in broadcast journalism started, in the sweaty, smelly gross middle-school gym strutting my strapless neon chevron dress down the runway - I mean the stained and taped gym floor.

I also remember my first preseason as a freshman. My first day of high school. Getting my license. Going to prom. Last preseason as a senior and captain. Last first-day of high school. Going to prom again. Graduation rehearsal. Graduation. What I wore, what I ate for lunch that day and what other business I had to tend to afterward are all things I recall as well.

Another thing I can remember is how much I wanted to leave high school and go to college. By the end of it I was so sick of everyone and everything. I was speaking to people who were going to my college more than I was speaking to people at home at one point. I was more than ready to start a new chapter and to wipe my slate clean.

How was my soon-to-be graduating self supposed to know that I would be wiping my slate clean yet again exactly a year later?

Change is a tricky concept to fully understand. It’s hard to realize it in the moment that it’s happening. It’s also hard to distinguish change from simply not knowing things you thought you did.

Unfortunately, I have a perfectionist mindset. Yes, I said unfortunately. I have a hard time going with the flow and like to know what’s coming. I have a plan for everything and I don’t like surprises.

Well, a lot changes in a year. A lot happens in a year. And a lot of surprises take place.

When I was 9 I decided that I was going to have a son named Tobey and a daughter named Rebecca and that I was going to marry a man with an Australian accent who lives in America in order to avoid the sharks and scorpions.

My ideas for my future have changed slightly since then, but to different baby names and different criteria for my husband. Where I was going to college however was something that I was set on.

Things change.

It’s like ordering jeans online. You have a great image in your head of you in these rocking pair of jeans, but you just won’t know what they look like until you try them on. Well. I had this grand idea of what my college experience was going to look like and let me tell you. What I experienced my freshman year was NOT it.

Going to college is hard. Being away from home is hard. Living on your own is hard. And it’s hard to not get wrapped up in the mess of it all. I could feel myself changing into someone I wasn’t comfortable with and it was a weird feeling.

I was making decisions I wouldn’t have previously made, doing things I wasn’t comfortable with, and a lot of times trying to fit into this mold that I knew I was never meant to fit into it.

With that being said, I lost myself a little bit. A really easy task for a then 18-year-old young woman to accomplish. That and spending a lot of money on Chipotle and clothes. Really easy to do.

At the beginning of the school year, I refrained from talking a lot to my home friends in order to let myself start anew. Something I feel like a lot of people do. But by the end of the year, I realized that I had isolated myself even more from people at home than I already had months before.

My original intent was to live my best life at my new school with my new friends and catch up with people at home every once in a while. Then it turned into me not wanting to talk to people from home because I had no exciting news to share. It also turned into me not wanting to see people or adults over school breaks because I wanted to avoid the “how is school?” question.

Eventually, I got over that. The last month of school was the hardest because I was so close to the end. I just wanted to be back home. I found comfort in seeing random people on the weekends when I would come home and talking to people about what I was going through. I started to talk in my home-friend’s group chat again and started engaging more.

Not because I had things to talk about or because I wanted to share what was going on, but because I felt better hearing from them. It felt normal. I started feeling nostalgic about high school.

A lot of people say they hated high school. The lunch food, the drama, the cliques. I hated all three of those things. I couldn’t wait to get away from it all. But now that I’m a year out of high school, I realize that none of that mattered and none of it matters.

What matters is doing what will make you happy. I know that sounds cheesy but it’s true. Don’t stay in a place that isn’t making you progress. Don’t go to a party just because you feel like you have to. Don’t get dinner with someone because you feel like if you don’t it will cause drama.

It’s refreshing to know that I still have my group of friends to rely on. At the same time, it’s interesting to notice who I haven’t stayed in touch with. Some were ones I thought I would talk to all the time. We talked maybe once all year. You notice who texted you on your birthday and who didn’t.

A lot changes in a year. I went into my freshman year thinking I wanted one thing and ended my freshman year realizing I wanted the complete opposite. I’m really glad that I was able to recognize myself changing and the situation I was in, and I’m excited for the year ahead!

I went to the track again today and the tent was looking extra special. All of the chairs were underneath, the custodians were having their own jam session while setting up the band instruments (great running music) and there was a good vibe in the air.

Congrats grads! Happy Father’s Day dads!

As Sharpay Evans once said, “It’s out with the old and in with the new, goodbye clouds of gray hello skies of blue.”

Hello skies of blue is right.