School days can be the best days of your life

Having recently finished secondary school, Chloe looks back at her school years and what she’ll miss most.

Written by Chloe Boland

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With the Leaving Cert over and my school days officially finished I've had some (in fact, quite a lot) of time to think. As I sit and write this each of my friends are doing their own thing: some are working, some are on holidays and others are simply chilling at home. However we are not together, and nor will we ever be like we were two months ago. We will never again sit together at lunchtime laughing at English exam questions, nor will we ever sit in the same classroom with the same teacher we've had for six years. There will never be another lunchtime spent sitting in the sun complaining about a biology exam or fretting over state exams. Those days are over and they have come to a bittersweet end.

For years I've been told that school days are the best days of our lives. For years I've laughed at such a statement, thinking that it was all lies. Yet, here I am right now accepting that perhaps it is the truth. My time in school may not have been the prettiest, with the stress and pressure of looming exams, but such things aside school was actually pretty great. My memories from school are full of laughter, smiles and incredible friendships. They are memories unique to a school setting that cannot be relived or recreated outside of the walls of that building. As I embark on my journey into the adult world *shudder* I am finally beginning to realise why school days are marked as the best days of our lives.

Where else do you get to see your friends almost every day and have set times where you can definitely all sit together, eating, laughing and having a good time? What other place can you form positive relationships with teachers who you trust and get along with? What other time in your life do you get to live without the worry of finances, bills and taxes hanging over you? School days may be tough and present incredible amount of pressure for young teenagers, but at the end of it all as I look back I am greeted with many more happy memories than sad ones.

I spent my last months in school willing them to end, longing for the day it would be over. However as soon I was finished I realised my wishing has been in vain. Now that I am finished I find myself regretting how I took all those years for granted. There is little I can do about it now, only encourage those still in school to relish the moments spent with friends, family and teachers because they are moments you will never get back. 

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