The beginning

Or at least, a beginning

Saying I peaked in high school is kind of like saying rainbows are green — technically true, but in a very limited kind of way. Peaking in high school has the general vibe of the high school valedictorian who turns up as your cashier at the hometown Michael’s when you’re shopping with your mom on Christmas Eve. And then you don’t know whether it’s more offensive to acknowledge or ignore them, so you offer an overly friendly smile and an exaggerated “Oh hi!” and pray that they’ve either fully forgotten you or that they’re feeling just as awkward about this encounter.

That’s not the kind of peaking I’m talking about here. In fact, by most metrics, life since high school has had an upward trajectory. I am now more educated, more employed, more mature, less single, and less hotheaded (kind of) than I was some fifteen years ago.

But there is a green slice to my high school rainbow — my social existence. Notice I didn’t say social life, as that would imply that I participated in truly social, non-academic activities with other humans. I did not. But I did eat lunches in the quad and worked on group projects at friends’ houses and went to club meetings after school and traveled across the country with my Science Olympiad team.

Despite the pitiable scope of my activities, the quality of my social existence was at an all-time high, yet unparalleled by any other phase of my life. I met some of the most talented (and now, most successful) people I’ve ever known. I felt like I actually had a community, and belonged, and people who somehow understood me on a deep level — all of which I know is counter to the “typical” high school social experience.

So that part of me definitely peaked in high school. I don’t know how all this was the way it was, or if my memory of it is some sort of learned trauma response. But I distinctly remember feeling that my full self was accepted, even though that self was insufferable and snarky and at times unhinged. I’ve expended an inordinate amount of effort since then trying to find new friends who could replicate that feeling, subsequently giving up, and simply remaining close to my original high school friends.

In high school I thought these friends were pretty normal. Were we kind of masochistic to subject ourselves to an internationally standardized curriculum that required comprehensive testing at the end of our senior year? Sure. Was it absurd that half my friends spent their spare time in research labs? A little bit. But generally, I assumed we were just a nerdy bunch having an otherwise unremarkable experience.

I’ve since learned that that is not entirely accurate. There were things about my high school that were definitely weird. And then there were other things that were interesting and funny. And yet other things that were random and I probably shouldn’t remember as well as I do, but they make for good memories.

I’ve been wanting to write about these memories since high school — literally as the memory-making was happening. Back then, I told my friends and they were excited by this idea, and we talked about me writing a book one day (one suggested title was “A Perfect Li(f)e”; unsure of how that relates) — of course, having absolutely no idea what it actually takes to write and publish a marketable book. I assumed that the feeling would fade with time, but it has not. In fact two career changes, a chronic illness, and several cities later, it’s probably the thing that’s stayed the most constant. For years this idea-broth has simmered, aroma occasionally wafting over. But now, it’s the memories that are fading, and also there’s a pandemic, and what I had thought was broth is actually milk that’s about to boil over.

So I think that’s what I’ll be writing about here. Beginning to write this is the textual equivalent of stretching out on a hotel bed after a fifteen hour flight, except each hour was a year and the bed is my laptop. What I’m saying is, I think this will feel good but maybe after getting comfortable I will realize the bed is way too soft, and decide the plane seat was better because at least my lower back was supported and there were no weird stains. Either way, something will happen, and hopefully it will involve some rainbows.

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