Don’t expect anything from me

“What are your plans for the future?” “What do you want to do after high school?” “What college do you want to attend?” “Do you know what you want to major in?” “What are your career interests?”

Every student is asked these questions at some point in their high school career and the faster senior year approaches, the more often these questions are heard. For anyone who is still in high school and can answer all of these questions confidently: #1 I hate you, #2 I envy you, and #3 can I be you?

Like most students, I have no plans for the future. My plan is to graduate high school. That’s it. That’s as far as I’ve got.

Unlike most students, I have two older sisters who have both been very successful in college. Therefore, I am also expected to be very successful in college (which only makes it that much worse).

With older, successful siblings come many things: all of their old high school teachers immediately liking you because they expect you to be like them, everyone asking (and expecting) you to do everything they’ve done and be just successful as they were, and high expectations.

This is one thing that only children will never have to worry about, expectations. Being the youngest sibling can be tough. Either your older siblings are screw ups and everyone has very low expectations for you or your older siblings were very successful and now everyone has very high expectations for you. Neither situation is better than the other.

When you’re set with high expectations, questions about your future only come all the more often. Because your siblings have their successful lives planned out, you should also have yours planned out. While I do plan to be successful in something, I have yet to determine what exactly that “something” is. So when I get bombarded with questions about my future I begin to have a mini heart attack because all I can reply with is “I don’t know.” After saying those three words and watching my mother cringe, the sorry soul who asked the question (while simultaneously giving me the urge to crawl in the nearest hole) looks at me with pity and replies with “you’ll figure it out, you have time.” The saddest part? I don’t have time.

Senior year is making a fast approach for me and by this time next year I need to have a plan for my life. I can’t even decide which classes I want to take next year, how am I supposed to decide which college I want to spend the next four years? What I want to major in? What career I want to have for the rest of my life? I’m barely seventeen-years-old and I’m deciding right now what my 57 year old self will be doing every day.

And what happens if the expectations aren’t met? Disappointment.

Everyone has felt disappointed before, but the feeling of disappointment is so much better than the feeling of disappointing the people you care about. Parents can tell their kids how mad they are all they want to, but nothing hits the heart harder than when a parent says they’re disappointed in them. Anxiety hits every time someone brings up the college conversation because I know people have high expectations for me but I don’t know how to fulfill them.

And with high expectations set, the impact of the failing fall hits harder.