The Bluestocking 2022-23

Hayden Blakely | Grade 12 Growing up is complicated

Growing up is complicated. I’m months away from everything in my life ending and the next chapter of my life beginning. No home-cooked meals every night, no dog sleeping at the end of my bed, no teacher who has known me since I was twelve, no more of the familiar. Soon it will be crappy dining hall food, nights alone in my dorm, and 200-student lectures. New faces, new school, a new stage of my life. For seventeen years the only thing I had to worry about was being a kid, but now my future is ahead of me. I find myself closing my eyes and holding onto that comfort, trying my best not to let it be real, but it will happen whether I want it to or not. In the blink of an eye, scraped knees and playground swings turned into heartbreak and car rides. The weekends stopped being 48-hour sleepovers and Disney marathons and turned into 6-hour homework sessions and going out to parties. How did it all happen so fast? Where did all the comfort and innocence go? Maybe I’m being melodramatic, but sometimes I can’t help but think that little girl with her blonde pigtails and pink sundress is now a woman who is going into the world all alone and she doesn’t feel ready.