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Dear Incoming High School Freshman, Welcome to the big leagues! You're at bat in a strange, new environment and 'm supposed to tell you that it's not so bad… but it's pretty bad. Relax. You'll survive. Freshman year is one of the hardest (so look forward to that) and most formative years of your life. My advice is to just say yes… not to bad things (like drugs) but yes to new and positive experiences. Take on as much as you can. Try new things, both curricular and extracurricular. The more you try in your freshman year, the more you'll get to know yourself. Step outside your comfort zone. Or just don't have one yet. Take classes you might not normally take, volunteer for after school clubs, take up a new sport (or practice more of your favorite sport), form a band with your friends and play shows, get a part in a play, paint… you get the idea. Planning for your freshman year was supposed to start in 8th grade. They expected you to know where you want to be in five years. Realistically, most of you probably don't even know what you're doing this weekend. But you're expected to choose important life paths as you're unceremoniously dropped on the strange planet they called high school. After much (or no) planning and a summer of nerves (or video games), you face the task of getting your schedule of difficult classes, taking your ID photo (which will be in the yearbook — so look nice), and piling up hundreds of pounds of books you'll open exactly twice during the year. Then… the first day of high school arrives. A freshman is like a football, drop kicked from childhood to young adulthood. You go from being huddled with people you've known since you were five to being on a field swarming with boobs and beards. The seniors seem like old men and women (boobs and beards), the juniors, as stressed-out, arrogant, upper-classmen who can't seem to find their place. You look at the sophomores and think, "How are they only one year older than I am?" The campus is huge and your workload is even bigger. Your plan is to blend in and go unnoticed. You get caught in a stampede on the stairs, get yelled at for lingering and not staying to the right. But you're only trying to find the C building. When you arrive to your first class late (because you're clearly not Magellan) all eyes are on you as you pace the front of the room, looking for an empty seat. There isn't one. The teacher, who will now forever know you as the late kid, says you can just stand at the front for today. You awkwardly open your notebook and try to take notes while standing. The teacher has begun his first lecture and the assignment is due tomorrow. You get to your next class and you have a hot teacher. Lucky you. It'll brighten your day, but try to still pay attention to what's in front of you. The material, I mean. The classwork. Next, you have PE. Some of those beards are in this class. While you're changing, you notice one chest hair starting to grow. You give yourself an internal high-five. You're so wrapped up in your newfound virility that you don't realize you've put your shirt on inside out and backwards. The coach asks you if this is the first time you've dressed yourself and you say yes, trying to be funny, but the beards don't laugh. You're forced to run laps and have earned your new nickname, "Dumbass." Maybe it won't stick, you think. But it will. After suffering through PE, you have math… your least favorite subject. You've gotten there early because you don't want to get called

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