“Walking into the old Bellaire building as a tiny, 14-year-old kid felt like yesterday, and now, I’m graduating. It’s all gone by extremely fast. 

I hate that my full ‘high school experience’ was cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but it was still worth it in the end. As an introverted freshman doing school online, the experience was really awkward and I felt no drive or motivation for anything. However, as the years went on and the pandemic slowly passed, I reconnected with a bunch of my middle school friends and made plenty of new ones. 

To this day, I still feel like my 14-year-old introverted self, just with a bigger attitude, body and personality. I opened up more, and I even got involved with school activities, such as joining [the] eMotion Dance Company.

Joining [eMotion] was the best decision that I made during high school. While I sacrificed my GPA quite a bit, I wouldn’t trade my experience with the beautiful people [in eMotion] for the world. To be able to connect with people through the art of movement is something that I didn’t know would hold so much value to me today. I sit with these people, laugh with them and talk to them every day. They get annoying and quite loud sometimes, but they’ve become a close second family to me. I really cherish all of the members and the director Ms. Kent. 

[My] advice [is] to find something you care about, and once you’ve found it, don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone to be a part of something greater.”