Graduation sneaks up on Souhegan High seniors

Published: Thursday, June 11, 2009

The Souhegan High School class of 2009 graduated Friday. After four years of homework, projects and essays, the end has finally come.

The anticipation in senior hallways and senior classes had been building over the last few months, and finally reached a bursting point in the last week of their high school careers.

All of the checkpoints had been completed: senior project, AP testing and finals. All of a sudden, amid whirlwinds of last-minute studying and assignments, it seemed that graduation has snuck up on the senior class.

“Graduation came so fast,” senior Dan Green said last week in the midst of yearbook signing and last-minute book returns.

It seemed to have caught most people by surprise. It could be that the rest of the school will continue on for a few more days, that senior trip and graduation took place days after the last day of finals or that we didn’t want to believe it, but high school is over.

“The years flew by,” senior Alex April said on the eve of the senior trip.

The expedition to Maine for whitewater rafting was “a last chance to connect with classmates that you see daily but take for granted,” as senior Paul Caso put so eloquently.

With a packed schedule leading through graduation, the Souhegan community attempted to keep one last hold on its departing members. Between the trip, coming in to school the next morning for a pre-ceremony run-through and then graduation, the last few days of our Souhegan lives were packed.

Following graduation was the school’s all-night affair dubbed “Project Graduation,” at which students such as Caso really had one last chance to connect with their peers.

Through all of this planning, Souhegan had left its seniors little time to realize that the end had arrived, but it has.

And with the end of the school year comes the end of my column. Thanks to all of my readers, as well as my peers, for their interest in my columns. The opportunity that The Telegraph has afforded me has been beneficial beyond anything I had expected.

The only thing I can ask of readers is to be as supportive of future student columnists as you have been to me. Thanks again.