As my time at East comes to an end, I’ve had a chance to reflect and reminisce on my four years a Pioneer. I am fortunate enough to say that these past four have been the best years of my life, and while yes, the football games and things like that have been fun no doubt, the people are truly to thank for this. I don’t think I fully appreciated the wide scope of incredible people I’ve come to know here is overwhelming, I don’t think I fully appreciated the wide scope of incredible people at this place at this place until the beginning of my junior year, which is something I look back on as a mistake. When I started to branch out, join new clubs, and talk to people that I hadn’t much in the past, my enjoyment of waking up and going to school grew exponentially.

Don’t get me wrong, to this day among my favorite things to do is pound Dr. Pepper and play 2k in a basement with the same guys I’ve been close to since middle school, but balance is critical; when you are tied at the hip with your “friend group” to everything you do, your high school experience stops becoming your own.

The eight guys that I can thankfully say are my best friends are people that I will love to death, but the experiences made by branching out to other areas of the high school experience are also of incredible value to me.

So my advice to any underclassmen would be try something, anything, go out for a new sport, do a new club just for the heck of it, hold nothing back because experiences like laughing on the bench of Mehney field with the lads, suffering through run thru after run thru with Twonity, getting together weekly for Euchre with guys I never thought I’d be close friends with, and countless other experiences that my freshman self would have written off have truly made my time here something I will forever cherish. Make your experience unique, it’s worth feeling uncomfortable at first trust me.