Stolen Senior Year: Reflection of a senior year cut short by coronavirus

Call me sentimental, but I’ve been picturing myself decked out in the Lancer blue graduation gown ever since third-grade me saw my brother wearing his. 

They would call “Jaclyn Elizabeth Cameron,” and I would do my best not to trip in my statement wedges, shake hands with the principal and accept my diploma. Not to mention I would’ve asked one of my Harbinger photog friends to capture the perfect candid of me, cap in air for the kind of picture I’d have framed and look back on at 80 years old.

But now that’s not a possibility. The rest of my senior year isn’t a possibility. 

Queue the tears. 

Thanks to a bat soup-induced pandemic that endangers an entire generation, as well as my senior year, me and my 399 classmates won’t get to sing the school song in the gym again, compete in our senior sports seasons, say goodbye to teachers — the list goes on.

Although our senior year came to an abrupt end, it shouldn’t diminish the rest of our high school experiences. We still had three and a half years of pep assemblies, homecoming dances and time as Lancers. And quarantine provides ample opportunity to reminisce on all the memories. 

I could choose to go ahead and burn my graduation dress, pout and cry or even peel my East parking sticker off my car — but I’m not going to. I’m not going to because Shawnee Mission Wonderful is still my second home, even if I only see it driving down Mission Road. 

Instead of focusing on how much we’ll be missing out on — wearing college shirts on decision day, assassins, grad party season — it’s time to reflect on the past three and a half years (and what better place to do this than in between Zoom classes.)

We can replay those last seconds of the game against Rockhurst this year and how we stormed the basketball court in celebration. Or reminisce about our final Lancer Day, sporting our respective decades gear and throwing candy to the “sevvies” lined up on Mission Road. Not to mention screaming “South sucks” at the football game that we won while decked out in SEC Gameday outfits. 

Re-watching “Stranger Things” for the fifth time while stuck at home isn’t nearly as fun as scrolling through pictures from our jungle-themed Lancer Link Crew dance. Freshman-you spent the whole week trying to find the right cheetah print leggings to wear and you probably panicked when Link Leaders threw you in the dance circle. 

Forget re-organizing your closet — remember when you camped outside the main office all night to get the coveted first row parking spot? And from that moment on you didn’t have to worry about snagging a spot on the “good side” of the sophomore lot or trekking there when it was 30 degrees out. 

The moment you walked from the designated junior section of the bleachers to the senior section, you began your senior year and all that entails — skip day, prom, graduation. Or what it should’ve entailed. 

But as a senior whose undergone three years of memory-making experiences at East, you know that this hitch in the road does not define your high school experience. All we can do now is live by the school song:

“Lancers we will ever be.”