Ah, high school. A place full of cliques, drama by the lockers in seemingly-infinite passing periods, and #relatable teachers who repeat things like “You know, I was a freshman once too.” Or so I was told. I grew up on movies that had me so excited for high school, and when I got there and found that not much of what I had been told by the media I voraciously consumed throughout my youth was true, I was a bit perplexed. After all, these were supposed to be the best years of my life, and the notion that I was supposed to experience them without a locker seemed preposterous. Yet along the way, I noticed just how similar they were, and witnessed or was a part of every single high school cliche imaginable.

“This isn’t like the movies” is a line more often used in movies than in life itself, but I found it especially applicable in the case of high school. Everyone knows that high school isn’t like the movies, but the extent to which I found it actually in fact, was like the movies, truly shocked me.

So, without further ado: here are my favorite memories from high school.

That Time I Got Detention on A Saturday Along With A Band of Misfits and We All Realized in The End That, Hey, We’re Not So Different After All.

That Time I Had To Choose Between What I Was Good At (Basketball), and What I Was Passionate About (Singing in the musical), Until I Realized That I Could Just Do Both, Because I’m Great.

That Time I Faked Being Sick To Have One Last Day On The Town With My Best Friends, And Ended Up in The City’s Biggest Parade, Much To The Chagrin of The School Administrators.

That Time I Accidentally Was Sent Back in Time Because of The Mischievous Antics of My Strange Old Friend Doc Brown And Realized, Gee, 1955 Sure Was Different.

Prom.

With all the graduation festivities, it’s inevitable that one would reflect on their high school years, and because of this I realized that mine was anything but cliche. Because of all those memories I’ll never forget, it’s safe to say I’ve had a high school experience that could only be described in one way: cinematic.