REMEMBERING WHEN: The weirdest September of your life
By KEITH SCHELL
As a student growing up, there is an inevitable rite of passage that occurs in every person’s life without them realizing it. And it always happens in September.
It is a weird and awkward September and it happens in every person’s life, regardless of gender, status, or financial situation.
No one ever talks about it. It just happens.
And nobody ever sees it coming until it’s too late.
Some of us are happy to see it come, but the vast majority of us are saddened to experience it once we realize it is happening.
Nobody ever prepares you in any way for the weirdest September of your life.
And that weirdest September of your life is: THE FIRST SEPTEMBER THAT YOU NO LONGER HAVE TO GO BACK TO SCHOOL!
All your life until this particular September, you always went back to school in the fall. No ifs, ands, or buts about it, you just did. Like the mob of lemmings in that classic Sunday night ‘Wonderful World of Disney’ nature episode back in the day, following each other over the cliff and into the ocean because that’s just what they did, you simply went back to school every September in your youth because that’s just what you did. It was simply a part of your natural instinct as a student to return to school every fall.
But with the beginning of that first fateful September that you don’t go back to school, you are no longer a student. With the beginning of that first fateful September, you are now officially an adult. Things just drastically changed for you in that moment and your life from then on will never be the same.
Now you have to look for a job, find a mate, buy a house, establish a life, and begin to do all the other un-fun sucky things that go along with the inevitable ushering into adulthood.
The kids who thought they knew everything back then couldn’t wait to ditch school and did so at their earliest opportunity. But most kids just wanted to stay in school and hide from the outside world for as long as possible. I know I did.
The first year after I graduated College, I was working in my first ever job in my chosen profession in an office in the city. When September rolled around at the end of that summer, I was ready to chuck the job and go back to College. Back to pub nights, dorm life, seeing my College friends again, and care-free College fun.
I could feel the call within me that September to go back to school like always. Like the Salmon migrating back to that one specific stream to spawn, I wanted to go back to school that fall like I always did to learn stuff, hang with my College friends, and have fun.
But with the arrival of that first September after leaving school, the realization that I could never go back to school again as a full-time student washed over me like some kind of profound and humbling epiphany. For the first time in my life, I realized in that heartbreaking moment that I was now a full-time working stiff.
And in that moment, for the entire month of September, I was completely and utterly lost.
I suppose, in a way, it was almost like a loss of innocence. A realization that I had, without understanding it until that very moment, passed from one stage into another in my journey of life. And in my heart, I was not ready to make that step. But I had no choice. It was suddenly upon you and you had no choice but to deal with it.
But as the years began to pass, the instinct within me to go back to school every September finally started to quieten within my heart. And after a few more Septembers of struggling with this thought, the urge within me to return to school every fall was finally gone.
As a clueless student, no one ever realizes how good they have it until it’s too late. Like the line in that old song, “You don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone”. While profound in its simplicity, that line holds very true to this day. How were we to know that back when we were full-time students, being in school was as good as it was ever going to get for most of us?
But that’s all over and done with in this weirdest of September moments. No more going back to school in the fall. No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher’s dirty looks.
Ever.
No more doing the silly little student things that you just took for granted in your youth: No more cutting classes, no more smoking behind the gym, no more hanging out at the Mall, and no more partying with your friends every weekend until the wee hours of the morning. No more ‘Glory Days’, like in the Springsteen song. Those days are now gone forever.
Welcome to responsibility. Welcome to earning a living. Welcome to becoming a concerned and caring parent. Welcome to paying off a mortgage and a car loan. And welcome to all the other things that come with being a grownup.
Welcome to adulthood. It happens to all of us.
Just do the best you can!