If we were French, in addition to being even less motivated than we already are, we seniors would be called les élèves terminaux. Literal translation: the terminal students. A title such as that is a constant reminder that senioritis is always terminal. No one gets better, the effects build up, becoming more and more potent until the bitter-sweet release of the end. This is the end.

Senior year is the culmination of all of high school. All the time and effort of high school gets channeled into a single year that tends to be all or nothing all the time. One day is everything at once: senior project, finals, studying, then the next- nothing. Nothing at all. Just another day of gazing out the window thinking about how funny time can be. How you either want more time or want it to pass more quickly. How high school drags on for four seemingly endless years as the second hand lumbers around the clock face with a thump for every passing eternity of a second, and yet by the end of senior year, it has of course gone by so fast.

The hit or miss nature of senior year is what makes makes it stressful, and that’s what makes senioritis such an influence. Senioritis is what causes us to try to find an escape from the building tension; the pressures and responsibilities of senior year and accepting the inevitability of graduation. For months now, it seems everyone has been constantly asking me about how the year is going, what I’m doing next year, if I’m ready for graduation to which I reply, “Fine, school…again, and I doubt anyone is going to put graduation on hold if I’m not, so sure.”

If the entire year is all or nothing, the last week is an amplified version of that. The tension builds as finals and senior project presentations creep closer and closer until suddenly you’re filling in bubbles and find yourself before an audience. Then it’s all over. After that, the wave of relief hits and in the undertow we are swept back and forth not really worried about where we are going but just in a slightly delirious, elated state of relief. Happy to be going somewhere.

The prospect of being done with high school is definitely exciting. So is the thought of moving on. However, with my days here numbered, it’s almost too surreal to actually believe. 1 year left, 9 weeks left, 5 weeks, 2 weeks, last week, mere days left, soon I will be counting down the hours on a single hand. After so much time spent at this place, I’m sure that when I make that fateful walk through the doors I’ll look a lot less like George Clooney in Ocean’s 11 walking out of prison and more like Eggsy from Kingsman. But walk out I will.

School is always going to have boring moments, stressful moments, fun moments and once every other blue moon, a truly fantastic moment. The important thing is to find something fun to do when it’s boring, suck it up and get the stressful stuff done, enjoy the fun moments, and make those fantastic ones happen. It’s true, senioritis has no cure. But fun is a pretty good medicine. As a senior, there are a lot of responsibilities but also opportunities.Throughout the year we do what we have to, we try to make the most of the time we have left, and then suddenly, it ends.