Sarah Asgari “Grade 12: Just Keep Going”

GRADE 12: JUST KEEP GOING ____________________________________________________________ by Sarah Asgari, Grade 12

Grade 12 has not been a fun year for me. Any last vestiges of joy that potentially lingered have long since been leeched away by university applications and their impending due dates looming over my head. If it’s not the applications I’m worrying about, it’s the question: “What am I going to do with my future?” (This question should obviously be answered before applying to any program whatsoever, but when would I ever find the time to answer it?) This steaming pile of dung also comes with the expectation that, to be successful, I have to obtain a career in: engineering, law, business or medicine—and make a handsome income in those respective fields.

“You have about six options for university, Sarah: Western Ivey, McGill, U of T, McMaster, Waterloo and Queens for the aforementioned career paths,” my parents, grandparents (who don’t even speak English by the way, it’s just that somehow matters revolving around career choices tend to transcend language barriers), aunts, uncles, cousins and distant family friend I met once, all say.

Those are just the people who have opinions. Opinions they feel entitled to voice, because they’re family and they know what’s best because they’re old experienced. The thing is, I know my relatives come from a place of kindness. I just don’t think they understand that they also come from a place of superiority (not to mention the notion that they have a claim on my future and how it progresses). The pressures they both knowingly and unknowingly inflict on me by voicing their vision of “the right path” confuse me to no end. I don’t even know myself well enough to understand what subjects I enjoy, and I’m starting to think it’s because I was only ever surrounded by—and exposed to—careers in medicine and business in my familial circle.

Will it ever end?

The view from the bottom of my deep, dark pit of despair and self-pity makes the answer to that question seem like a very firm, resounding “no.” It’s not just the pressures from family and university that make this year dismal, it’s the feeling of alienation. Both to myself and my classmates. A couple of days ago, one of my peers received early acceptance into a business program, and all I could think to myself was: Are you JOKING? It didn’t get better from there. My second thought was: I haven’t even filled out my applications. My third thought was: Why am I thinking about applications when I have no earthly idea what I want to do with my future? My fourth thought was: How am I supposed to apply to places when my sense of life direction is so skewed that I can’t even tell which subjects I like! My fifth and final thought was: I’m seventeen. How am I expected to pick a potential career path? Last week, my mom yelled at me for harbouring a bunch of towels in my room. That’s literally what my life experience is limited to. Towel harbouring. Evidently, my thoughts came full circle.

Okay. So, I spiraled hard after I received Tam’s fantastic news. But I got over my feelings of intense jealousy pretty rapidly. They were a thing of the distant past. I smiled through my clenched jaw and congratulated my peer. My dentist (thanks Mom) fit me for a mouth guard a week later; I chipped one of my teeth from grinding too hard.

GRADE 12: JUST KEEP GOING ____________________________________________________________ by Sarah Asgari, Grade 12

Congrats Tam! Nothing but love and support coming from here!

Maybe it will get better.

Wrong. It will never get better. I am a changed person because of university pressure, and let me tell you, it is not for the better. In fact, I can confidently say that this negative transformation has not only transpired in myself, but also in my classmates. What is this change I speak of, you may ask? Well, only that we have turned into absolute savages. We are completely unhinged. We beg our teachers for grades. We pick apart their brains with incessant questions about marks and useless inquiries about the smallest, most irrelevant details. Grade 12s have come to resemble parasites, and teachers, their defenseless hosts. We slowly torture them by sucking the life out of their bodies and wreaking psychological warfare until they die. Then we abandon their bodies and continue on to the next teacher victim.

Last semester was especially brutal. I had a Politics class with Mr. Schneider. There were about twenty of us in that course. I remember, after every test, we would swarm Mr. Schneider like a bunch of unwanted germs. I could’ve sworn I saw his hand attempt to peek out from the masses—as if to grapple for some sort of rope to lift him from the throng of grade-hungry students. And I wish, I wish I could say I was an exception. But I was so not.

I went over one particular test with him, and he said, “I think I could give you an extra mark”—boy, do I bet he came to regret that—and I looked at him, with unshed tears in my eyes, and in my head thanked God for his merciful aid. I then proceeded to hound him through various online platforms (because there was way no way I could maintain eye contact and do this) for a week until he changed my mark. My only solace was that this occurred at the end of the semester, so I didn’t have to face my indignity and shame for another four weeks.

And you know what? That’s not all I did. Two days ago, I had an oral expression test in Spanish, and I looked my teacher right in the eyes—no, right in the soul—before we started, and I said, “You carry my future in your hands right now, Ms. Suters. I just wanted you to know.” I read somewhere that saying someone’s name personalizes you and makes individuals more responsive to pleas of desperation. I added the desperation part. If you’re reading this, Ms. Suters, I’m really sorry.

These pressures have actually been extremely challenging for me to manage. For the first time in my life, my actions have concrete consequences on my future. I have to study and get an adequate amount of sleep and focus intently in class in order to get results. Moreover, I find that my productivity plummets drastically when I’m stressed. I can’t pay attention to tasks at hand and I procrastinate until the last possible minute. This only emphasizes my unpreparedness for adulthood. It’s painfully apparent that I don’t take well to responsibility.

Even though Grade 12 has been full of challenges, it has taught me so much about myself. Firstly, I learned that I don’t need to know where I’m going or what I want to do. I’m sure I could even learn to deal with homelessness. Adapt, change, overcome. Secondly, I realized: there is no point too low for me to sink to get the results I want. Thirdly,

GRADE 12: JUST KEEP GOING ____________________________________________________________ by Sarah Asgari, Grade 12

disappointment is in eye of beholder. Unfortunately, if the beholder is important to you, then disappointment is actually contagious. We don’t hear that advice often, but they’re important words to consider. Finally, I realized that I am woefully unprepared to face the imminent reality that comes with independence: responsibility, decision-making and adulthood.

artwork by Yina Song, Grade 9